I have been feeling alienated from my former passion for all things political for some time now. I have a stack of unread newspapers by my door and an even larger stack of unread emails from the various political bodies that solicit me for my support. Two recent conversations have led me to wonder why those newspapers gather dust and those emails to waste space in my hard drive.
First, my friend Dylan (a.k.a. Cyberhobo, a.k.a. The Dutchman), challenged me on my first political post to my forums section. I had written a comment about the latest Democratic web campaign in which they portrayed George Bush’s Supreme Court nominees as mindless monsters intent on destroying the lives of Americans. Unfortunately, in the spirit of comradeship, he has removed the post but the gist was this: Responding to the various entities of modern politics is beneath me. It is a waste of time to worry about the ramblings of the various parties and that I should find something far better to consume my mind.
Then today, my parents and I had a very long conversation about the relationship between an individual and the state. This oddly enough sprung from the question on how a majority of the learned individuals on the Supreme Court could honestly say that on one hand the notion that a man should be judged based upon the color of there skin is not only unconstitutional but reprehensible (GRATZ v. BOLLINGER) and then on the same day say that the State has a “compelling interest” in backing such a corrupt action (GRUTTER v. BOLLINGER)? However, the gist of the two-hour conversation was that man’s liberty is not defined by the state, or political figures, or the society in which he lives but is instead defined by the individual man who seeks his own autonomy.
While these two conversations may seem very to concern disparate subject matter, they have led me to the following conclusion:
Not only is politics beneath me but it has also been a sin for me to have spent any time commenting on it. Sin may seem a strange word to use but I have been committing the sin of forsaking my own mind for the mind of others. All of my political debates, discussions and diatribes attempt to convince someone else to share my viewpoint. In a strange way this is not that much different from the dictator who compels me to act by pointing a gun at my head. Both of us are worried about the behavior and thoughts of someone else. No, I do not have to accept the ultimate guilt of being a man who used someone else as an ends to a means. However, I do have to accept the guilt of a man who has used himself as a means to change someone else’s ends.
Therefore, I resolve to quit worrying about what all of the power hungry politicians are saying. I am blessed to live in a country where the worst that we do is far better than the best of most countries throughout history. I do not have to feel compelled at this point to pick up my gun and fight the forces of evil that are destroying the spirit and lives of men. Instead, I can happily and contently go out and vote my conscious (yes, I’m still going to vote Libertarian) and spend the rest of my time thinking about something far more interesting, my own life, ideas and happiness.