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I think we see this sort of backwards. People who make their politics, religion, or sexuality the center of their personality generally are not emotionally healthy. TBH, I think we have an ongoing mental health crisis that’s manifesting itself through politics.
There used to be a normal way to do politics when I was a kid in the 1980s and 1990s. Sure people had an interest in politics, but it was nothing like today. For one thing, the thought of breaking a friendship over politics was something that didn’t occur to people. You disagreed, even argued, but you were still friends and still did things together. And furthermore, politics was just one thing among several that a person might be interested in. There would be other things, TV shows, sports, cars, art, music, and hobbies that took up most of people’s time and attention. It was a much healthier way to do politics, and frankly made for better politics. When people tune out, it’s possible for the leadership to stop posturing and campaigning and start governing.
I think the problem is less centering one's life around politics as it is centering one's life around politics but not going beyond vague, slacktivist methods like calling people out on social media or even attending protests. Actual politicians and people who work for political or community organizations for a living don't seem to have this problem. If she were concerned about the "little people" who Trump was supposedly leaving behind, it might have done her better to do legal work for people who couldn't afford her services, or get involved with a charitable organization, or even picked up litter along the side of the road. It's not like there aren't a lot of people out there looking for volunteers. But I don't think that was ever on the table because I think her political centerdness was downstream of mental health problems, not the other way around.
I tend to find most of those people have policies they care about, maybe worker protection or something are not as ill as the vibes based group. I’m not going to say you can’t be interested in policy or active in policy positions and be semi sane. But a lot of people are using politics as a substitute for identity and morality to the point that it takes on almost a cult mentality and you have little else going on in your life, or if you do, you’ll worry about the political implications of your other life choices. I find such people sad.
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If I may reframe this, healthy people do not make politics, religion, or sexuality the center of their personality.
People centering their personality around religion is an old, old phenomenon, and while often seen as annoying, it is very much something that society knows how to deal with.
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I mean I think it’s true of most things. Obsession is a sign of a problem. Most people tend to find a balance between interests, hobbies and life. I think this is part of the impulse behind the JBP advice to “clean your room” before you take on the great issues of the world. If you’re unhealthy, you’ll get obsessed and it takes over everything else, and probably make things worse.
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I'm not positive, but my impression is that this was a conscious turn by really important elite factions in the 80s, though. I don't believe it was "how politics was prior to the 2010s" - it was more like, what politics looked like once the Reagan detente offered up grill-pilling as an option for exhausted voters who were ready to move on from disruption and political struggle. No more fighting over politics - instead, America is great, nationalism is great, Wall Street is great, money and capitalism are great, religion and families are great, no more inflation is great, Hollywood images of peaceful race relations are great, local religious observances instead of national politics is great, Cosby Show instead of All in the Family is great. And especially, Boomers finally leaving their disruptive twenties and settling down to be stable and raise their families is great.
If you go back and read, say, "Fear and Loathing on the Campaign Trail, 72" by Hunter S. Thompson, or "Days of Rage" by Bryan Burrough, or really anything about the rise of the New Left in the 70s, there is a whole lot of familiar archetypes, topics, and styles of rhetoric.
I guess at this point I'm coming to believe that breaking the brains of a certain amount of people is an overtly desirable feature, not bug, of certain kinds of political agitation. Making people unreasonable can actually be a really effective strategy for forcing certain kinds of change through, because then powerful leaders can't (by definition) reason with those people, and thus have to give in to demands instead or find some other way of dealing with them. I feel like that's what I've been seeing, at any rate - people who would naturally be somewhat unstable having that massively amplified by forces that appear to be attempting to accentuate exactly those tendencies for a variety of reasons.
I absolutely agree with your prescription about what would be better, I'm just not sure if there's a way to get there from here. I think there were a bunch of factors that made Reagan exactly the right affable messenger for that turn in the 80s for a turn away from politics of a certain sort.
On a personal level, or a community level I think creating and maintaining “politics free zones” is a good idea. It can be anything from a gaming group or hobby group or just a group of friends who meet regularly without allowing political talk. Fostering the same kind of thing in family, friend groups, or business settings.
On a personal level, I think it’s unhealthy to spend more than an hour or two a day thinking about politics. As such after you’ve read that much news, it’s probably a good idea to just go do something else. Read a novel, draw, watch a drama or sports, dance, play a sport, hang out, whatever, but don’t marinate in political news. And I think personally reading news, especially from a good reputable source, is better than watching videos or getting it from social media. Reading is much less likely to be sensationalized or emotional.
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