this post was submitted on 07 Nov 2024
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United States | News & Politics
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It was not, but I'm not going to sit here and argue with a kid about things I lived through. And no, I wasn't middle-class, I was deeply poor.
Perhaps you're conflating "the electoral dog and pony show" for "politics" then, because if you were "deeply poor," it's hard to imagine not dealing with politics. Easy example, the cops are a pretty political institution, acting as the agents of establishment powers. Hell, the enclosure of the commons and the resultant practically monopolistic effect that landlording has is also pretty political, liberals just don't talk about it (other than Adam Smith).
It wasn't shoved in our faces 24 hours per day. Of course we were affected by the laws which govern us, but outside of much shorter election cycles, the government wasn't something that normal people discussed every day, all day. The politicians did their things in the background and we lived our lives. You cannot understand how exhausting this new reality is unless you've experienced what it was like before what you referred to as "the dog and pony show".
What you're describing is a low consciousness of politics, whether due to desperation, poor education, or whatever else, since those moment-to-moment experiences generally could productively be described as political.
My argument, and you might actually sympathize with it, is that the only fundamental difference here is the media screaming at people about this nonstop. Seriously, lineral people who like to fancy themselves as "staying up to date" with political goings-on are basically in an abusive relationship with the media that complete contorts their ideas of the past and future to promote the "this is the most important election of our livetimes" bullshit that they've done three elections in a row now. It's not what the politicians are doing, it's this screaming from the media that is frankly wrecking the mental health of the people who listen to it regularly.
I actually do remember what it was like before then and a few months into it starting, whatever you might say of my decision making, I just disconnected for two years because I already hate Trump and don't need a thousand headlines a day that ORANGMANBADORANGMANBADORANGMANBAD. It ended up being a good opportunity to learn about politics from a historical perspective and get some distance from this shit (and ultimately, that was a major factor in my becoming a communist, but we aren't here for that).
Right on, yes we can call it that. So the average person existed in more of a low consciousness state back then. And why wouldn't they? The government systems operated as they do, and there wasn't much an average person could do to change those things in-between election cycles.
You're right that most of this is the media's doing, and then the rest is having attention whores as leaders. Notice that Biden wasn't clamoring for headlines every day of his four years in office.
Now with social media people equate complaining online with activism and believe they're somehow helping by yelling into the void non-stop. Or they're just overwhelmed with the constant bombardment from the 24 hour news cycle, and constant interaction with people across the globe, and need to yell into the void for sanity, or companionship, or whatever. I'd put myself into that latter category these days, or at least these last few days.
I tuned out a few years ago myself. I was sick and tired of seeing Trump's face and hearing his name all the time. I got off all of social media, bought some magazine subscriptions, and spent more time outdoors. It was wonderful. But I don't know many other people doing that these days. It's not like the old days where you can just be offline and have a vibrant social circle, and do your thing. A significant portion of the average person's life -or at least the average person around me- is spent online. So eventually I came back online. I do actively avoid politics outside of elections though, and I have a pretty healthy block list going.
Thanks for engaging. I think we understand each other and aren't quite as different as I thought from your original response.