On the list of things that I find interesting, alongside vegetarian recipe blogs, the hindi festival holi and baby animals, is the idea of party based politics.
This comes to mind when thinking about last week’s election and some of the conversations that I had about the election with some of my less politically minded friends.
When questioned about how they were voting, many simply replied with sentiments such as “oh, I’m a democrat, I’m just voting for whoever the democrat is.”
There is something about that mentality that rubs me the wrong way.
While I understand the idea of identifying heavily with a party, I cannot imagine having so much faith in an institution that I let it decide my vote, which I have always been taught is my most direct and effective tool to affect national politics.
I feel like in theory, parties are intuitive.
They give us the ability to associate and identify with likeminded people who share common values and opinions with ourselves.
But, at some point, human nature kicks in and our desire to define ourselves by the group that we are associated with takes over.
What once might have given a forum to conversation and learning among likeminded people now serves as an excuse for people to throw their political weight around without exerting any intellectual effort.
This is, of course, a generalization, but I have had enough of the aforementioned conversations to convince me that if this phenomenon is not common among voters now, it will increase as current young voters take the political reigns.
This is the original blog post that inspired me to think about this topic and eventually write this post.
This article makes an analogy that political parties are like ice cream carts.
It argues that the party system currently functions by pressuring its consumers to subscribe solely to one party (or brand of ice cream, think Ben and Jerry’s and Haagen Dazs). When, in reality,
It’s a model which is meant to predict which ice cream cart you choose out of two, not one that’s meant to persuade you to buy an ice cream if you don’t want one.
Yo. This makes so much sense.
Both types of ice cream are there if I want them.
Generally I prefer Ben and Jerry’s but if there is a day where Haagen Dazs is what I need, then you can bet that I am going to get Haagen Dazs.
I am sick of people telling me that I have to choose what type of ice cream I want and then stick to it for the rest of my life or else I risk earning such career ruining nicknames as flip flopper.
The moral of the story is that party loyalty isn’t always all that it’s cracked up to be and that-in my eyes-it’s better to make your own decisions based on the issues as opposed to party lines.