When I lived in southern Oregon, I was distantly acquainted with one of the county commissioners. One day I ran into him at the Post Office. We began talking about politics, and I said that I tended to view the world in shades of gray rather than in stark black and white. He immediately disagreed, saying that when it came to politics, he saw things strictly in black and white. I didn’t push the point because it would have been futile; after all, he knew the TRUTH
I think that he is an example of an attitude of absolutism afflicting the political discourse in the country these days, the idea that one’s political views are absolutely correct. That outlook is a symptom of tribalism, a blind adherence to one’s tribe (whether political, religious, ethnic, or regional) and its values and a disparagement of those who are members of other tribes. This is particularly true of political parties. What is ironic is that although political tribalism is manifested by absolutism in viewpoints, that absolutism is hypocritical. The news is filled with stories of how the stances of politicians change based on the direction of the party. The support of evangelical Christians for Trump is an example of Republican hypocrisy. The Democrats have their own version of hypocrisy, too, including the blind support of Bill Clinton in the Lewinsky affair.
Politics is an act of compromise. After all, this nation was founded by compromise—the Constitution was shaped by compromise, particularly regarding slavery, and compromise has been a recurrent theme since. When compromise gave way to pure tribalism, the result was the Civil War. The tribalism that is in full flow now is again a threat to the republic.
I am subject to the same pangs of political tribalism, although my views often fall outside of the traditional Republican-Democratic dichotomy. I don’t like either party; however, I feel strong distaste for the current version of the Republican Party, particularly its stands on LGBT issues, privatization, environmental regulation, and climate change. That said I think that the Democratic Party is nearly as establishmentarian, more interested in maintaining power than manifesting principle. I loathed the hard-edged machine and Balkanized politics of that party when I lived in San Francisco.
Sometimes, it seems that we have a one-party system with two wings, and little substantive difference between the wings. I wish the party structure here was (I use the indicative mood “was” as an indication of hope, instead of the subjunctive “were”) more European, comprising an array of parties that reflect real differences of views on issues. For example, we have no strong green political movement in the country, or, despite Bernie Sanders success in the 2016 race, any party with even a whiff of socialistic views. While there is a party with the name libertarian, it seems to be basically a version of the Republican Party although more tolerant on drugs and less tolerant of militaristic adventurism. I would like to see a system comprising several parties, each manifesting specific principles, not homogenized platitudes, which would form the philosophical basis of the policies of that party. Such a multi-party system might be more chaotic than the dichotomous system we have now, but it would also be more responsive to the changing opinions of the populace and would be a vehicle to give voice to those opinions. Moreover, it would promote compromise more than the current Republican-Democrat standoff.
Given that the two-party system seems to be part of the DNA of the country, a multi-party alternative might seem impractically idealistic. Whether our political system has two parties or many, however, I increasingly doubt even whether we can govern ourselves at all. In this age of cynical, sophisticated propaganda delivered through television and the internet, our politics increasingly resemble “professional” wrestling, with us voters similar to those wresting fans, reacting to sham theater as though it were real. After all, in a nation of 350 million or in states and even cities with populations of hundreds of thousands or millions, how can we have more that superficial knowledge of candidates? As a result, we tend to vote according to tribe by default.
In a future post, I will offer a modest proposal for an alternative. Stand by!