Themeattics

When a lot of remedies are suggested for a disease, that means it cannot be cured.

Anton Chekhov

Mandated vaccinations. Tax brackets. Censorship of ideas. Definitions of words. Spending policy.

These are the things we argue about nowadays. Now, despite the title, I’m not going to argue these things are pointless. That’s obviously untrue, they directly affect our lives in observable ways, which is why they’re so easy to use to get under people’s skin. And, if I’m being honest, even these things are too high-level. To get into the real red meat we’d need to go even more granular. COVID vaccine mandates, “Fair Share” taxation, whether tech companies can determine what is said on their platform, etc. The more specific, the easier it is to take a stand and plant your flag. By the same coin, the easier it is for outside groups to get us motivated and at one another’s throats.

It’s easier still due to the fact that we have such an enormously powerful central government. When the opinion of a person in rural Wyoming (but I repeat myself) has a direct effect on the life of a person in Manhattan, and vice versa, it’s easy to understand why we get so up-in-arms. These two people likely have significantly different lives. Different goals, different ideas of what determines a “proper” life. Trying to govern all of them under the exact same rule is a fool’s errand, which was the whole idea at the start of the United States. This place is too big to govern under one rule, let the states be their own governments with something limited up top to keep them safe and able to do as they please.

Now, obviously, we ran into some issues – that tends to happen when people don’t view others as people – but I’m not getting into that here. All I’m saying is, when the people who represent you live with you, they tend to understand what they represent. As the power of the central government grew and it began to creep into all aspects of our lives, “local” issues began to fade away. Who knows who sits on their local school board? Who understands what their mayor is doing? What does your city spend money on? Nobody cares about that when Washington can use an agency or decree to shutter your business.

A side effect of this growth is obvious – government has become a job. A well-paying job, at that. People make millions by calling the “other side” the enemy, then sitting around doing next to nothing but plotting how they keep their job. Oftentimes that’s by doing nothing, but I don’t really need to get into that. That’s not the point of this post.

What is, is this: all these things we argue about, the things they use to keep us hating one another, are nothing but symptoms. They’re the “easy” things, the parts we can use as weapons on one another to argue about endlessly, moving from one to another at such a rapid pace we don’t notice we’re missing the point entirely. Trump stole the election because he’s a Russian asset. Now he’s a facist. Now he’s not doing enough from the federal government to stop a virus spread. Now he hates everyone that doesn’t look like him. Now Biden stole the election. Now his son is taking bribes. Now he’s using a vaccine to control the population. Look, over there! Squirrel!

What the hell are we actually arguing about? It’s not vaccines. It’s not censorship. Take a step back and look at what modern political discourse has in common. Then take another step back and look again. And again. Keep going. There’s a lot of distance to cover to get at the root of all this. Yep. Keep going, I’ll wait.

I’ll admit, it’s taken me a while to get here. I think I’ve brought this up before, but I really think I’ve come to find the base of this all, and I’d love to hear from you guys if you disagree. I think, in the end, this all boils down to our take on the human condition.

On one end there are people who believe society defines humanity’s nature and that, with enough time and direction, the perfect people can be forged. People devoid of hate, of prejudice, of anger and distrust. As such, it is the responsibility of those elite who have moved farther along this path to oversee the system and help get the rest of us get to that same position on the path so that we can make the next step.

On the other end are people like myself, who believe that mankind exists in a fallen state and can never be perfected. We view all people, individually, as fundamentally flawed and therefore understand that they cannot guide us along a path toward perfection, no matter how hard they try. That isn’t to say we shouldn’t – and don’t – try to better ourselves, to reach for that idea of perfection, but we understand it cannot be obtained.

Take those two ideas and look at the all fringe squabbles we’re having now. Trace back every one and you’ll see where the other side is coming from. I felt pretty good about this one for about five seconds until I found the next question. The one I still don’t have an answer for.

How can those two groups be governed by the same system?