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That's pretty insightful, especially the need to launder politics through culture in order to manufacture consent. Hadn't thought of it in those terms.
Related to the "You may not be interested in politics, but politics is interested in you" point.
Any culture that's not under control of the political edifice is, potentially, a method for alternative systems and resistance to organize and arise. The state would see this as an intolerable possible threat to sovereignty. On top of that any popular cultural edifice can be turned into a propaganda organ, can't expect them to ignore that.
I've arranged my immediate affairs so that I have as few as possible intersections with political authority. Quite literally, I chose the location of my house in large part because it has the fewest political bodies with jurisdiction over its physical location (i.e. it is outside of the nearest city's limits in unincorporated territory, has no HOA, and has extremely permissive zoning).
And yet, AND YET I know that I can't afford to ignore politics because the political-minded will constantly seek to bring me and my property under their ambit, and it is NOT enough to just retreat, run, and try to stay outside their grasp, it requires active, intelligent resistance and even then its not guaranteed b/c the state has infinite patience.
I agree with that, but I’m more thinking about cultural organs as well. Things like religion, particularly organized religion, the family, education, clubs, etc. are potentially points of resistance. I see this as a weak point of the Benedict option. Unless you’re living in a commune owned by a church and have no cell phones and filtered internet, the chances of keeping your community intact and fairly pure are small. Zoning laws, school testing requirements, nondiscrimination laws, and so on will conspire to force you to conform, and entryism will be tried.
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