My Political Stance, Part Two: Uh, Forget Part One?

The whole point to my writing these entries on here is mostly theraputic. I have no grandiose delusions of actually being a notable blogger or embuing anyone with actual legitmate wisdom; rather, I want and need to practice writing and organizing my internal thoughts.

So that said, my last entry two months ago was really, really bad.

But that’s ok — it served its purpose to me at the time. My mistake was to try to approach my own disjointed lack of a political stance and try to outline what my political stance was, which proved to be an exercise in futility, first and foremost because I simply just didn’t know what I was talking about. I tried to approach a complex political science topic as a layman very much not versed in the political sciences.

So with no further adieu, I present to you:

My Political Stance (Revised!): Part Only: I’m Stuck (Spoiler!)

Here’s the deal guys — This is what I know I’m not at the moment:

I’m not a conservative. Change is the very spice of life. Being stuck in “the way things have always been” never ends well. Older is not superior to younger. I’m not going to literal hell for challenging old ideas. I do think traditions can be good and I do think tossing traditions and old established tidbits of wisdom out the window willy-nilly is certainly throwing the baby out with the bath water, but I don’t think that alone qualifies me as any kind of actual conservative. Above all, I am bothered by conservatism’s tendency to lean toward some flavor of authoritarianism.

I’m not a progressive. At least I don’t think I am? I don’t actually know what a progressive actually is. Seriously, not kidding here. It’s a topic that I find the more I research it, the less I think I actually get it. I do believe in equality for all, regardless of race, gender, religion, ethnicity, or whatever other sub-category of people you can think up. I admire plenty of progressive folks. I believe we’re better off embracing change and the future instead of planting our feet squarely in the past (and our heads in the sand), but I don’t think that necessarily makes me a progressive. Above all, I worry that progressivism might suffer an error of how more so than an error of what; I fear it may be short-sighted, unaware of possible authoritarian consequences of some of its mechanisms.

I still stand by my conclusion in Part 1 that I’m probably some flavor of classical liberal. I do fiercely believe in the freedom and autonomy of the individual. I am passionately anti-authoritarian; however, I also recognize some authority (ideally a bare minimum) guards us from a hazardous Wild West anarchy. For example, if you want to marry the same sex, two people, five people, the state of Virginia, or a cardboard cutout of President James A. Garfield, you should be free to have at it — just as long as you don’t pester me about it and allow me the same freedom to do my own thing. On the other hand, I worry about the long-term consequences of classical liberalism run a muck (or perhaps libertarianism) resulting in our society’s inability to ever achieve anything majorly significant while we’re wildly on entirely different pages. It took more than a handful of people to win the space race, after all.

So there you have it. I have no flipping clue what the heck I am because I have issues with literally everybody, apparently.

This is, in summation, why I more often than not refer to myself as a moderate or at most, a moderate somewhere on the liberal spectrum. I mostly want the government to stay out of our business, but protect our rights. Assist those in need, but not lord over us. Let us rule ourselves, but not to the point where we each individually wander off into an ironically collective oblivion. Rid society of the evils of prejudice, but not by forced homogeneity.

I do want to point out one very important detail here, though: note my stances outlined here have nothing to do with who I hate. I have been referring to ideas, not people.

I don’t feel I really have a place to fit in, here in today’s political climate.

3 comments

  1. “I don’t feel I really have a place to fit in, here in today’s political climate.”

    1. That may not be a bad thing.
    2. Sure you do — you fit in with others who don’t have a place to fit in here in today’s political climate. 😎

    You may be inspiring me to get back to blogging, even for “mostly therapeutic” reasons, as you put it.
    We should hang out again soon and discuss how we fit in to this lack-of-fitting-in-ness.

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