I'm getting more and more disturbed by the political divisiveness of this country. What follows is disjointed rambling.
Driving down the freeway the other day, I see this guy in a big truck. Two American flag stickers, and one Bush/Cheney in '04 sticker. (I mean, come on. I can see if it was an old sticker from 2000. But now? You're still on that train? Wake up dude!)
I got frustrated about that, and I got frustrated for a lot of reasons. I hated that I felt like I immediately knew everything this guy stood for. Iraq was necessary; gay marriage is a joke; war protestors are disgusting and unpatriotic. And you know, I'm probably not wrong. He could have looked at the stickers on my car and guessed that I stand for many of the opposite views; he wouldn't really be wrong either.
Is that what it's come down to?
I don't know. It's never that simple, and of course there are many whose beliefs are somewhere in the middle. Maybe even the majority, although it doesn't feel like it anymore. The folly of the Bush administration has caused people to run to either side. Most Democrats don't even like Kerry, but boy they are out there touting him anyway (something I refuse to do. Not that I'm a Democrat. But anyway).
I digress. Ultimately, these people who have gone and gotten themselves Bush- and O'Reilly-ized, Fox-ized, Coulter-ized.... I really wish they would stop for a minute and think about their humanity.
I feel strongly about this because I went through a conservative phase in my late teens.
I had always had a liberal outlook on life, but found myself to be very different in a lot of ways from my family and the small town where I went to high school. Finally, at around 17, I succumbed to conservatism for a while, hoping to close some of the gap between myself and the validation I needed. I went to church with my brother a little bit. I read the Bible a little bit. I started debating the conservative point of view in my classes, whether I knew what I was talking about or not, and talking to my parents about politics.
The phase lasted about a year, and I came out of it feeling quite bitter. The only reason I did it was because, for once, I wanted to feel accepted. I wanted to feel right, and I wanted to be approved of. And I was. I was stroked almost daily for this behavior. Oh, was I stroked. They loved it. And in church, in particular, I felt right. It felt good to have all these people coming together for what seemed to me the purpose of feeling right together. I watched with amazement how strongly behavior was reinforced. Of course, reinforcement happens in liberal circles too, and it's a human thing, not specific to any type of group. But the solidarity there was so very strong. Stronger than anything I've felt anywhere else.
And that's just so scary.
It seems to me that the live-and-let-live, liberal attitude is more natural. Echoing our good friend Elvis Costello, what IS so damn funny about that?
Individualism and community are both beautiful concepts that can co-exist. As an individual I have the right to do whatever the hell I damn well please as long as I don't hurt anybody. But I also give my time and resources to my community, to my country. The right-wingers spin that around, don't they? They say: You don't have the right to be "immoral" in your personal life, and we can legislate that. But when it comes to economics you can have your individualism and do whatever the hell you want.
Including hurting people, as has become so obvious.
