I look at it as a matter of both privilege and apathy. I get upset (not visibly, of course) when people say they don’t “like” politics, or blow it off entirely. Politics is not some separate entity, we are living in a society! An inherently political game!
Furthermore, there is no “politics” as just a concept. What part of politics? Literally everything is politics. Climate change and environmental care? Food and agriculture? Economics? Culture, beauty, art? How can someone blow off literally everything? To me its an attempt to shut down conversation and demonstrates they don’t care or have no idea about the atrocities that have occurred/are going to due to the West’s collapse and climate change. Am I out of touch? Being non-undedstanding?
Let me know, thanks
“yes I’m apolitical” supports far-right governments like the US
Reminds me of the right wing western gamer crowd who will go on about games having political undertones as if meaningful art is a bad thing but half their post history is just China/Russia bashing and social credit jokes
The moment there is a minority character, they cry politics, but when there is a game where you are a soldier waging war, they don’t call it politics.
Politics: a term to describe any opinions, beliefs, or values that conflicts with the shady agenda of of the people in authority; any form of accountability, human right, or freedom of speech in USA that irritates the people in power.
Apolitical: an adjective to describe people who blindly follow and support the personal politics of a people in authority without questioning; a trait where a person abandon their independent thought and mindlessly follows the hivemind of willful ignorance and bootlicking devotion to one or more politicians.
Deprogram just did an episode on this, check it out!
The latest one? I am assuming its “The ideology of not having an ideology”
Edit* listened to it last night! Outstanding
Yeah, being ‘apolitical’ is still a political ideology. And it’s a bad one because of its inherent apathy. It’s responding to the corruption and injustice at the highest levels of government by ignoring it. And when they’re an eligible voter in a democracy, being ‘apolitical’ is consent and support for the actions of the incumbents.
But you also have to distinguish that from people who don’t have the spoons to talk about politics at any given time. Making people too emotionally and/or physically tired to address the systemic issues is a core part of the system. That isn’t on the individual.
You’re definitely right. But I myself live in the west and see so many who ARE able to care not and those are the ones that make me mad. I’m certainly not referring to those overworked individuals unable to express any sort of emotion let alone passion.
Thanks! :)
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This. If someone claimed not to have an opinion on China because they don’t care, I would respect that far more than someone who blindly claims that China is an authoritarian genocidal totalitarian dictatorship regime
I guess so, I just feel like people who don’t take it seriously aren’t the ones starving, being blown up, shot, or imprisoned. It just demonstrates such a lack of understanding - which is fine - until they are directly confronted with these realities and blow it off. Perhaps I’m wrong about the whole thing.
I definitely agree with you there.
I had a phase around 15-17 where I didn’t do politics either. But, as it turns out, politics does me. Not being involved in politics is not an option if you ever want to improve your life.
You’re not out of touch. Politics has a great influence on everyone alive. But it’s also complex and can be tiring. So if you don’t want to do the necessary research that’s required when forming an informed opinion about politics, you can just say that you don’t do politics and call it a day.
I can relate to this. I avoided taking an interest in politics until I realized how much it was affecting the things I cared about, and the society I was a part of. Like the original post hints at, there is a false concept that politics is a distinct entity, like a hobby or interest, and not just an aspect of nearly everything.
Nobody is apolitical.
I get very frustrated with people who claim they are, or people who get out of difficult discussions or reflecting internally on current issues by saying things like “I don’t pay attention to politics/the news” or “we can never know what the truth/right answer is so why bother.”
These are inherently political positions, and ones which almost exclusively benefit the status quo.
I think what people mean by being apolitical, especially people in the imperial core, is that they don’t follow party politics, and they don’t cheer for one team or another. That’s perfectly fine of course, especially knowing as we do that all bourgeois parties are essentially the same. “Politics” in this sense is a distraction from taking care of the real issues we face as working people in a predominantly capitalist world.
It’s hard to get people with this “apolitical” mindset out of it though. Teaching people that “politics” is two or three “diametrically opposed” teams, fighting against each other for life and limb, has been a wildly successful grift on the part of the capitalist class. It’s hard to get people to come to the realization that labour issues, living conditions, social/cultural conditions, environmental issues, and so on are all political, and that we can challenge and change them without needing to declare allegiance to a bourgeois party.
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There’s a relevant adage: “Never discuss religion or politics”
Of course you shouldn’t listen to it, but it’s there because like you said, controversy and relationships. Those ideas tend to be deeply seated as a part of someone’s identity that will get them offended if you insult, and they tend to be beliefs that people want the rest of the world to share.
The real answer is to be careful when talking about them, understand your audience and pick your battles.
I understand why you would get upset, and yes a detachment from politics can be a result of privilege, benefiting from the status quo, knowing you will be alright regardless, or it can be a consequence of demoralization, despair, having been disillusioned or taught to expect that change is not possible, or of simply not having the time or energy to think about politics while busy just trying to survive day to day.
Most people are not particularly ideological or political, their primary concern is their everyday life, their material wellbeing. The way to get them to see the importance of political struggle is to show them the connection between politics and their material interests, and to show them that a better world is possible if we fight for it together.
Definitely. I understand that, but how exactly do I demonstrate that? How do I make someone who has a distaste for politics or blows off serious things care?
How do I even bring it up?
Listen to them. Don’t preach at people and tell them what they should and shouldn’t care about. Find out what they actually care about. You will find that most ordinary people are largely worried about similar things. Then find ways to address their concerns. This is the hard part. It may not be something you can do alone but only as part of an org, through collective action. On the most basic level, the way that the communists and socialists win the trust of the working class is by actually working to make a tangible difference in their lives, through organizing and solidarity. Actions speak a thousand times louder than words.
I try to not begrudge people if they are 1) genuinely, in a colloquial sense, apolitical, as in they stay clear away from the news and issues etc., even though most people still have an issue or two they fixate on, and 2) they aren’t some pompous asshole who, like you said, is just privileged and gets to not care because they live in a cuddly bubble. However, most people say some shit like that they’re “apolitical”, don’t care etc. but actually are and are just trying to act like they’re enlightened.
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Just be a communist ML internationalist in America. There’s no winning.
Rule of thumb. If they’re American; they have a fucked up opinion about anywhere.
You might be able to talk about local things. But never talk about international stuff. Im finding that Americans are xenophobic as fuck. Every single one. 😒
It’s upsetting for sure, it seems like they refuse to have wool taken from over their eyes. A few coworkers are like that, I like to get in quick quips on politics just to get them understanding that the Union is protecting us and the assholes in corporate are quite literally burglarizing us. Depending on the person, they may be “not political” as in they don’t enjoy it but have opinions, and others are fully apolitical and genuinely won’t care if you say Uyghurs are not genocided, Stalin was based and NATO is a terrorist organization in league with the largest terrorist group in human history, the CIA. They’ll just sorta be like ok, cool, I’m not sure what most of that means. But obv that’s different for everyone. I think that if you try engaging with them a bit they may come around but don’t force it
No you are not right because politics is a topic that many people are not comfortable talking about
If you asked me about politics, even if we were friends, I would probably also say I’m not really interested in politics but if you asked me opinions on social issues in the country that we live in I would be open to answering that to even strangers
I try to educate my friends on geopolitics and history here and there to hopefully brainwash them but straight up saying I’m a communist or typing ZZZZZ probably wouldn’t work since they oftentimes change the subject whenever I side with Afghanistan, DPRK, etc. over the USA anyways
Why, though? Depoliticization is extremely dangerous.
I try to as well, and some of them listen, but most people I talk to are simply apathetic because they both don’t know enough and don’t care enough because the system benefits them. I cannot, in good conscience, say that avoiding and ignoring politics as a Westerner is okay. I again may be entirely wrong but it’s just how I see it.
Because Westerners, and especially Amerikkkans are fascists and you risk getting fired or attacked if you freely reveal you’re a communist
It’s especially bad for me because I am ethnically from an enemy state and I work in a “high class” industry filled with high earning elitist lumpenproles
