Remember how I posted here my comments from Athena’s blog? Her father, John Scalzi, has a blog too. He posted on Whatever last week.
His point: Although John came up through journalism with a taste for politics, and although most of his friends are “political junkies,” he doesn’t expect other folks to talk politics. As he put it, it’s just like how his friends are into science fiction, many of them writers of sf, but he doesn’t expect others to be space fans.
Of 103 comments, the feeling is we can’t all do politics, and we each may do whatever amount of politics we can. For some troubled souls, their optimal amount is zero. And that’s OK. As I commented:
QUOTE Down the years I’ve both lost the idea that people should have ideals, and lost the idea that their ideals should be the same as mine. As the learned Socrates might say, “It is what it is.”
As a boy reading Robert A. Heinlein, such as the town hall meeting in Red Planet, and then as a pre-student hanging out with the keeners in the student union building, I maybe thought, maybe, that people in the grown up world would be political. But no. Neither are the normal apathetic students.
Today I won’t say people should get involved, nor that they should vote. The way I rationalize my charitable outlook towards my neighbours, besides saying the majority of customers are always right, is to philosophically say that a relay race only needs one person on the baton at a time, that a herd of deer can safely graze head down while only one is a sentry.
I expect the majority to grin if I try to enthusiastically tell the latest plot of (outer space show/soap opera/sitcom) Or tell the latest politics. As long as I am not arrogant, they don’t expect me to expect them to be involved. If they ask my opinion on something, I will only use a soundbite, trying to be entertaining, unless they ask for substance. I am dimly surprised to be an influencer in real life.
And if I vote, as part of the minority who vote, it’s not as an elitist fascist taking responsibility for the body politic. Not like in that Heinlein movie. Hey, I can’t possibly be of an elite minority, for I live in redneck down-to-earth cattle country. You know, with that western song “always be humble and kind.” UNQUOTE
I was surprised by heated comments, some after Aaron Dow took eight good paragraphs to give eight points of how one may politically participate, including protests and petitions. A few thought he was scolding them (wrong) and elitist. (wrong again) Others, viewing Dow as “white middle class,” had a chip on their shoulders for how poor people are too tired to do any of the eight points. I thought to pour some oil on troubled waters:
QUOTE Somebody’s impoverished father used to get up and read the neighbour’s newspaper, and then put it back: He did not let poverty stop him from minimal civic involvement.
Someone groaning under two jobs used to—never mind. My point is not to give up. Barak Obama’s mentor, the community organizer Saul Alinsky, noted the choice of saying, “The world is too big for me, I quit.” Instead, Alinsky advised thinking of a huge mural, where one is painting just one leaf, focused and clear, confidently having a blurred vision of a bigger mural where others are also painting their leaves in the world.
I try not to fall for “divide and rule” tricks. And if I say, “I should” or “you should” I do so only to motivate myself while simultaneously having a charitable outlook towards others who aren’t carbon copies of me. Call it doublethink. (Please don’t divide yourself from me or others by assuming the worst about me) Or as George Orwell said, “Every healthy society must demand a little more from its citizens than it can reasonably expect.”
In that spirit, I thank Aaron Dow (and other contributors!) for his nice list—it’s beyond my reach, but still a nice list. UNQUOTE
People spoke of “duality.” So I responded:
QUOTE Here’s a duality: We can use the mob to take to the streets for something without any nuance or complexity, bearing in mind Alinsky’s thought that “anything that drags on becomes a drag.” Yes, some protestors are more interested in feeling glee or outrage than in thinking or educating others. Like the mob. But we can use that.
The other part of the duality is those blessed folks—totally missing from Occupy Wall Street—who are willing without glory to do the tedious work of thinking and research, such as finding out which companies own which companies. It is this other part that was missing when the Iranians had their glorious overthrow of the Shah. Too late the mob, including eager students, learned the need for tedious checks and balances, with eternal vigilance being the price of freedom, too late.
I would hope that someone besides Corey Doctorow (loved his book Little Brother) is patiently comparing and contrasting the decline of the Federal Bureau of Investigation to the fateful operations of Homeland Security—which I see as descending on greased rails. The F.B.I. used to attract the best of our wholesome clean cut Americans, remember? UNQUOTE
Having said a great deal today about my philosophy of politics, I won’t need to return to this subject for a long time.
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Sean Crawford my blog likes comments too
October 2020, quotes edited for clarity and length.
Some of my best friends are white middle class liberals, but I still enjoy Tim McGraw
