Enough is enough! To hell with the present state of politics. We need a revolution.
We, the people, must no longer allow ourselves to be manipulated by people whose concern for our interests extends no further than their own. We do not need manipulative politics. We do not need authoritarian politics. We do not need bullying politics. We do not need over-simplified politics. We do not need the politics of immediate gratification, especially the gratification of our governors. We need far-thinking, far-reaching, humane, imaginative politics: real democracy.
We need, first of all, a politics of Community. To hell with the politics of division and alienation, no matter how much we may differ in our points of view. We have, over the centuries, to our glory, created a complex, inter-related, multi-variate, unbelievably interesting human world. We need politics that respect our astonishing diversity, seek to strengthen it, celebrate it, not politics striving for the triumph of one part over others, even our own. We share this world, this continent, this country, this province, these counties, this municipality, this neighbourhood. We are not obliged to like or agree with everyone in it, but we must learn to hear and respect them. What we share is far more important than any of our petty differences of interpretation.
We need a politics of Negotiation. To hell with the politics of zero-sum: what you win, I lose, so let's fight. When we make the effort to understand each other, when we make the effort to reconcile our differing points of view, when we make the effort to come to agreement, then we all win. So what if we thus enter into a perpetual state of negotiation, in which nothing is ever finally resolved? That is the kind of human world we have created, to our great credit and benefit. We might as well get used to it, and create for ourselves politics that match.
We need a politics of Compassion. To hell with the politics of exclusion and resentment. If we cannot learn always to look at each other with a compassionate eye, which does not mean a sentimental eye, then God help you if you are one of the unlucky among us, God help you if you are one of the ill-endowed, God help you if you make a mistake, God help you if you get sick, God help you if you get old, because we in our corporate political selves will have turned our backs on you. Your life will depend on what your family and a few kind individuals around you can do, and chances are it won't be nearly enough.
We need a politics of Justice: Economic Justice, Social Justice, Criminal Justice. All are related. To hell with the politics of “I’m all right, Jack.” To hell with the politics of trickle-down economics, which aren’t economic and don’t trickle. To hell with the politics of the gated community and the enclave. To hell with the politics of unequal opportunity. We are wealthy beyond any historical or sustainable dream of avarice. We can afford to be generous, we can afford to be just, we can afford to believe we are all in the same boat. As, of course, we are.
In the criminal field, to hell with the politics of revenge and retribution. Of course people, especially the young, screw up, make mistakes and sometimes do terrible things, and of course, in this human world we have created, we must sometimes enforce consequences, so that people can learn from their mistakes, and so that we can isolate and disarm the truly dangerous. But let us keep those consequences within the bounds of compassion and true justice. As for the victims, justice and compassion will guide us to do the right thing by them too, far more effectively than vengeance.
We need a politics of Maturity, that faces facts and deals with them. To hell with the spinning politics of fear and the deliberate, self-interested inflation of perceptions of risk. To hell especially with the politics of ideological make-believe, that seek to bury our heads in the sand so that those to whom we give power can frolic out of our sight for the benefit of themselves and their friends.
We need a politics of Creative Imagination. To hell with the politics of entrenched institutions. In the necessary, unending search for improvement we need freedom to experiment, to change even fundamentally, to change again if necessary, to throw out the bathwater without being accused of sacrificing the baby by those who are profiting from the present arrangements.
To hell entirely with the politics of greed, and self-interest, and fear, and inhumane neglect, and narrow-mindedness, and deliberately cultivated ignorance. And if we dismiss these evils to where they belong, replacing them with politics truly fit for our human world in this twenty-first century, or fifty-eighth century, or fifteenth, or five-hundredth, or whatever count you embrace, then we will find that our present, ultimately destructive war against the natural world, with all its ruthless exploitation, has ended peacefully too.
The political and economic evils around us, although perpetrated with unseemly glee by our leaders and custodians of power, depend on persistent validation by us, the voters and consumers. They reflect the way we think. We can bring on the revolution simply by changing the rewards that are in our gift
To the barricades, my friends: for our own sakes, for our children, our grandchildren, and beyond. Our ancestors, in their embrace of Progress, looked out for us. We must do no less in our turn.
Issues:
1. Polite Campaigning ... a plea for courteous, rational, mature discussion during political campaigns, against negative campaigning of all kinds ... GO TO
