An Open Letter From a Spineless Political Moderate
What is the purpose of political parties? What positive influence do they serve? What do they do to improve us as a society? These questions recently led me on a google quest. The only noteworthy thing I could find was something called, “The Five Major Functions of a Political Party”. In case you haven’t heard, they are: the recruitment of candidates, fundraising, campaign support, advocacy of political issues, and government organization. First of all, only one of those things improves us as a society. (advocacy of political issues) Secondly, do we really need parties to do any of these things? What if I told you I can name two more things political parties do? What if I told you the negative impacts of those two things infinitely outweigh the positives of the other five? I like to call them, “The Two Major Malfunctions of Political Parties” Are you ready? Okay. Here we go. They harbor the hostility and division in an ugly political climate, and they value their own particular set of bundled ideals over free and critical thought.
Here’s the thing. Anyone who expects you to affiliate with a party or adopt an "if you're not with us then you're against us" attitude is expecting you to close your eyes and follow blindly. That doesn't improve you as a person or us as a society. It simply promotes one voice. That is all any given party represents, one single opinion on each issue. The partisan way is convince as many people as possible to adhere to one single solitary point of view. This is completely contradictory to the kind of critical thinking that should be occurring when analyzing the issues. To top it all off, only two of these groups matter and they both hate each other. Not only do political parties harbor the division among us they are the division among us. Party lines do the same thing any lines do. They divide. We say we’re united as the red, white, and blue. Yet, most of us stand divided as the red and the blue.
In today's society, we are expected to have opinions on every single issue. Fact is, that is simply not realistic. Most of us have these little things called responsibilities. Responsibilities consume time and energy. After we take care of our responsibilities for the day we rarely have the time, the energy, and sometimes even the desire necessary to do the research, apply thorough critical thought to said research, form our own opinion, and then repeat that process for EVERY single issue. That literally is an actual full-time job for some people. We call them, political pundits.
This is where political parties swoop in to save the day. I believe many average everyday people affiliate with political parties so that they can have an opinion on every issue. When they lack the time, energy, or desire to research any given issue, they look to their party. As a result, many of their opinions are not formed with personal research or critical thinking. At times their opinions are merely their own by proxy of their political affiliation.
I believe it's okay to not have an opinion on everything. When you think about it, everything really is a lot of things. As a matter of fact, it’s all of the things. I think being neutral on some issues should be expected of any freely thinking person with responsibilities and a social life. Even so, moderates like myself are called weak and spineless when we fail to pick a side. Well, I am calling bullshit. It’s actually the other way around. See, when we moderates don't have the time, energy, or desire to form our own opinion on an issue we simply tell society to fuck off with this unrealistic expectation and we choose stay neutral on that particular issue until we can research it and put some actual thought into it. When those within any given political party don't have the time, energy or desire to form their own opinion on an issue, they have the luxury of simply looking to others within their party to tell them how to think.
Allowing anyone to tell you how to think is bad enough, but actually seeking it out is the weakest most spineless thing I can think of. It’s disgusting on the most visceral of levels. To be frank, It makes me ashamed not of my country but, the human race in general. Call me a party pooper. Call me a cynic. Call me a weak and spineless cuck, Call me what you will. I don’t care anymore.
To be absolutely clear, I’m not saying there is no free thought whatsoever occurring among individuals affiliated with political parties. What I am saying is political parties by their very nature do not encourage free thought. If you openly differ from your party on any given issue you are instantly ostracized by others within your party. As a result, it is increasingly difficult to think freely while being affiliated with a political party. Why willingly put yourself in that kind of an environment? It’s stupid.
