All the recent drama on Twitter reminds me how much I hate politics. Being a conservative political “activist” is an exercise in frustration and futility. Several people have compared trying to organize conservative activists into a unified political movement to herding cats, which is an apt analogy. Conservatives, like cats, are independent. It doesn’t matter how successful you are at getting them together, they will always find something to disagree with each other over, and whatever unity you might have had initially rapidly evaporates. Leftists, on the other hand, are like sheep. They will, in general, submit to any leftist who has any authority (by the way, here is a good post that might explain this phenomenon). It is unrealistic to think a unified conservative movement will be more effective than a leftist one.
Why I started blogging about politics in the first place wasn’t because I had an interest in politics (I say that I do for the sake of simplicity, but that isn’t really the case). Politics is mostly about winning elections, which relies on both image and forming a unified coalition. Few people pay attention to me, so what I say doesn’t have any effect on the overall image of conservatives. But, I don’t think it matters anyway (I’ll explain this later), and I certainly don’t like thinking about how things look to average people. As for forming a unified coalition, it is difficult to do because conservatives, in general, don’t like to compromise, because they are principled. And this creates infighting, which creates drama, which I hate. Put simply, politics is about people. It is a social thing. That isn’t what I’m interested in. What I’m interested in is ideology, philosophy, and policy.
So, I am going to try to focus on those things from now on, and not talk about politics at all, if I can help it. I’ve thought for a while, anyway, that conservatives tend to focus too much on politics and not enough on ideology and philosophy (which is exactly what the left wants, because its ideology is fundamentally immoral, and if enough people were to realize that, the left would be screwed). Furthermore, this has the benefit of rendering image irrelevant. If enough people understand the ideology (as well as the opposing ideology (i.e. leftism)), a politician (for example) can say anything that is compatible with that ideology, even if it is something that people have been trained to think is something one isn’t supposed to say, and it won’t matter. For example, Mitt Romney’s 47% comment shouldn’t have been controversial, because it is simply a statement of fact. And anyone who understands conservatism would have recognized that. In addition, the “war on women” rhetoric wouldn’t have been effective, because people would have known that the right treats people based on their merits, and that it is characteristic of the left to accuse people on the right of hating a certain group of people.
“Several people have compared trying to organize conservative activists into a unified political movement to herding cats,”
That’s rather funny and true. I’m reminded of Ayn Rand and her disdain for such movements (such as Libertarianism), because they weren’t based on any concrete foundation, no basic premises that they could all agree on, just an ideology prone to whatever majority view is held at the time.
I too despise politics as it is and the idiots that manage to make a name for themselves out of it. I prefer the philosophical, ideological side of it.