(Political) Animal Instincts

9/7/2011

6 Comments

 
[Disclaimer... while this is meant to be pleasantly provocative and inherently inflammatory, my comments are not  oriented toward one political party over another; it is not my intention to inspire any partisan bickering!  So none of that!]

What if we lived in a civilization where people cared enough about their society to be thoroughly aware of what was going on in it? (Or do we? ) Politics might consist of actual deliberation instead of mindless rhetoric dumps.  We wouldn't be satisfied with nice sound-bytes that align with our pre-established ideological views. We might have to think... collaborate...be democratic. (Or are we?) The whole "by the people for the people" thing might actually work; perhaps there wouldn't be such a harsh line between "citizens" and "politicians." We might have a more functional representative democracy - people trusting their leaders and their leaders actually making decisions based on the well-informed citizenry's will. Political debate wouldn't focus on single "issues," but on the interconnectedness of the many issues of political debate. We'd be intellectually  more unified and perhaps be able to make more positive changes for the common good.

We've read Plato, Aristotle, Hobbes, Machiavelli, More,  Rousseau, Locke, Mill and the rest of the gang. So have many other of our country's leaders (though perhaps not enough). We have all these models of ideal governance, but none of them ultimately work.

So what's the problem?

Human nature? OUR nature as a society?  Is there ever a perfect politics?

Probably not. "All politicians are corrupt." "The system is broken." Blahblahblah, cynicism-cynicism-cynicism.

Okay... so now what? We still have a society to hold together! What do we do? 


KS
6 Comments
Conor
9/8/2011 09:08:29 am

Katie, I'm loving the political pensees. I'm so tired of the so-called "debates" on TV. Whether they are Republican or Democratic, they just consist of candidates tooting their own horn and bashing the opposite party. Right now, the way to get votes on the Republican party is to bash President Obama at the debates. The Democrats did the same thing when President Bush was in office. It seems that if you are the President you get all of the blame and none of the credit.

So what is one to do? I like to follow the advice of Don Draper, "If you don't like what people are talking about, change the conversation." I think it is time we change the current political conversation. The news stations always overanalayze everything. They are quick to fact-check any statement a politician makes, but they omit any rhetorical fallacy. Call out an ad hominem when you see it. Tell people that candidates are begging the question, using red herrings when they should be using modus tollens and modus ponens.

That's my 2 cents.

Reply
Tess Civantos
9/9/2011 04:40:31 am

... We put our hope in Heaven. Sorry, I don't mean to say that Christians should remove themselves entirely from things of this world (we are called, after all, to be in the world although not of the world). But the longer I work in political journalism (all 3 months of it), the more I want to go live in a nice cabin somewhere with puppies and a garden patch and minimal contact with the outside world. This is, of course, in stark contrast to Christian principles of winning the world for Christ - I think of St. Teresa of Avila's saying that "Christ has no body now, but yours. No hands, no feet on earth, but yours. Yours are the eyes through which Christ looks compassion into the world. Yours are the feet with which Christ walks to do good. Yours are the hands with which Christ blesses the world." So there is a dichotomy here between my desire to just abandon the world to its wicked ways, and my desire to serve Christ by working in the world to better it. The latter seems so ultimately useless, however, since no changes ever last for long and no system ever works very well. I could probably go into a whole pensee of my own about this. Basically, what is the point of trying to make things better, if the world will continue to be stupid no matter what you do? But on the other hand, we win our salvation by trying. Cyrano de Bergerac said that "The noblest battles are always fought in vain" and I am beginning to think that the Christian ideal, as well as the democratic experiment, are two of the greatest and noblest battles that mankind has ever fought, and also that both will ultimately be in vain in this world (obviously not in the next). And that is why I say that all we can do is put our hope in Heaven, because this fallen world sure isn't going to shape itself up any time soon.

Reply
Conor
9/9/2011 02:15:32 pm

Tess, whenever you compare, you despair. (Yeah that rhymes) I think it's too much to expect the world to live up to a Christian ideal, although that is what we should strive for. Like Father Zosima, we must work to make paradise on earth. I guess it depends on your definition of a Christian ideal. If the world was full of people that loved each other, that would be enough for me. I wouldn't care if not everyone went to Mass or confession, but maybe you think differently. Part of what makes the world interesting is the diversity of cultures/ways of life. There are as many ways to live as there are people. So if you say the world should reflect a Christian ideal of say the Catechism, that's a very tall order, but if you want the whole world to make God's love a reality, I'm right there with you.
Yeah at times it seems that there's a lot of bad in the world. People love to say that the world was way better off "back in the day." We don't really know how bad (or good) the world has gotten. The only thing that has changed is that we now live in a world without walls. If some guy murders his wife in Kansas, it's over the internet in seconds. So we don't really know that there's more bad, just that we hear more about the bad.
Sorry for rambling, but my long-winded answer to the question "What is to be done?" is simply this. Be Christ for others, especially those close to you. Let them see Christ whenever they see you. It doesn't matter whether or not you save the whole world. If you cultivate God's love in your immediate surroundings, then that's good enough for me.

Reply
Lillian
9/10/2011 03:54:17 am

Katie, thought-provoking as always... I feel the same way about the redundancy of politics, on both sides of the table. It's quite frustrating, and it's enough to make a young person (many of them already are) totally disillusioned with the whole thing.

I think that human nature definitely is the problem; I'm not sure if we're able to govern ourselves even close to ideally. But to echo Conor and Tess, the fight is worthwhile and it's heartening to know how many good people are out there.

Reply
Nick
9/12/2011 09:01:00 am

Katie, I know that you like Camus, and I'm currently re-reading The Plague, so I think my thoughts are impelled in that direction. One of the things I like about Camus is his ability to present a response to an absurd reality, one which is entirely removed from ideals. Or at least deities. Grand, who toils at writing a single sentence when not working at a generally meaningless, clerical job, is one of the more positively shaded characters in the work. Why? Not sure exactly, but I'm also reminded of Aristotle's assertion that a democracy comprised of farmers, who don't have lots of free time to become career politicians, is the best form. (Of democracy.) So, I think there's an option here which similarly avoids cynicism and naive optimism - and that is to distract oneself from the ideal considerations. Each individual, a part of the political whole, does not necessarily need to constantly consider/comment on/whine about the politics of the day. A balance of involvement and distance might be mentally beneficial. Machiavelli's writings on republicanism also indicate the benefit of balance, although in his formulation, this balance is actually more of a tension. The interests of the plebs/commoners/people are at odds with the interests of the senate/elite - but that's good! The interests are sometimes derived from apolitical pursuits, but they come into the political realm in order to form the political whole which secures and nurtures. Hopefully. It's the Socratic elenchus in political form. (At least that's what I think.) If politics is all one knows or does, what other interests can be at play? So, to attempt a conclusion to what has become (or maybe always was) an aggressively rambling comment, I think that what we could do is "distract" ourselves. The negative connotation associated with such a suggestion may be deserved if one is distracting oneself from reality - but I don't think politics currently has much realness to it. In the meantime, I like Conor's suggestion to call political figures out for ad hominems. That would be very satisfying. (Also, like Machiavelli, I chose to ignore Ecclesiastical considerations in order to present another aspect of the discussion. Balance, balance, balance.)

Reply
Joey
9/15/2011 12:07:16 pm

Katie, I think people DO care enough about their society to be thoroughly aware of what is going on in it—if that were possible. The problem is that it's not. I have been struck again and again by the absolute complexity of everything, especially when dealing with human relationships and political matters. I have come to believe that if something seems simple, then it's probably because you just don't understand it well enough. Political candidates and pundits like to make things sound so simple and clear...because clarity is what people want, so they can pick a side easily and without much effort. I am also quickly learning from my job in journalism that you can't put much trust in media, either. It's not that they lie (although they can do that sometimes), but that most news stories vastly oversimplify matters in order to make them fit into a neat little packet of information. Unfortunately, the real world is never quite so simple. If you want to really learn about an issue, you have to do some deep and long investigation. The devil is always in the details. Due to sheer time it takes to get a good grasp on these complex political issues, one person might be able to come to a thorough understanding of one or maybe two issues in a lifetime—and that's after a long period of hard work and study. The problem is, people just don't have enough time to gain a really thorough understanding of everything in the political sphere. We're not given an infinite amount of time to make perfectly careful and deliberate decisions. We have lives to lead, so we're all forced to make some preemptive decisions without having all the information. I think the vast majority of political decisions are really gut calls rather than the result of careful deliberation, and maybe that's just how it has to be in a finite, imperfect world.

On a totally different note: Katie's post and Nick's response make me think of this suggestion that a friend made to me over the summer. Career politicians always seem so inauthentic and slimy, and don't seem to be able to really accomplish any positive change. What if there were no career politicians, no political class? What if, instead of an elected Congress, we simply had a body of regular citizens who were picked randomly every year or two years or three years to serve "legislative duty," just as we do with jury duty? As my friend pointed out, "I think that a body of people selected randomly off the street could do just as well, if not better, than the people in Congress right now." At least they'd probably be more likely to work with each other and not fall into rigid partisan deadlock. Of course, they would have access to aides and the Library of Congress so that they could read up on things that they don't know much about. I don't know that this would ever work...but it's an interesting thought experiment.

Reply



Leave a Reply.