LogFAQs > #966312045

PyroBlade1985 posted...

Yes and yes! Too bad Americans are to dumb to realize a two party system isn't working anymore.

The problem isn't that Americans are too dumb to realize that. Lots of people have realized that.

The problem is that the system itself is so entrenched it makes it nearly impossible to fight against. Potential "third-party" options are diffused to the point of having no realistic chance most of the time. The Internet makes it far more possible for grass-roots alternatives to build a strong support base (moreso than any other point in the last 150+ years), but there will always be too many candidates pulling in too many different directions, weakening any potential counter-movement. It's why parties like the Green Party and the Libertarians have always been more spoilers for the main parties than people with any real chance in hell of winning on their own.

It's also why most people who grow disillusioned with the system don't start voting for third-party alternatives to try and push for change, but instead stop voting entirely. Because once you start paying attention it becomes very obvious how worthless your vote really is.

And the only way to reform the system to make it easier for alternatives to have a chance would require the active participation of the two parties to undermine their own power-base. So it's almost certainly never going to change.

The other problem is that tons of people (especially in the age of curated social media and politically-aligned news channels) basically pick a political party and then root for "their side" the same way fanatic sports fans root for "their team". "The other team" does terrible things, but "our side" does what needs to be done. "The other team" is evil, unprincipled, and manipulative, "our side" is idealistic and try to do what's best for the country. "The other team" abuses the system and takes away our freedoms for their own selfish reasons, but "our team" does what they need to do to get the job done and only sacrifice freedoms when necessary to make things better. "The other team" does terrible things because they're bad people, "our side" occasionally makes mistakes because they're only human. When "the other team" does something wrong, they're obviously acting out of malice, when "our side" does something wrong, it's probably an accident or based on flawed information or because "those dastardly other guys" backed them into a corner and what other choice did "we" have?

Keep thinking that way long enough, and you become almost blind to anything other than the narrative you've already convinced yourself of. You have your villains, you have your heroes, and the fantasy world you're living in only bares the vaguest resemblance to actual reality. It's easy to hate entire groups of people when you've abstracted them to the most simplistic assumptions and make absolutely no effort to ever understand their point of view.

If you find yourself frequently saying "The Republicans do this" or "The Democrats are bad because" in political discussions, you are part of that problem. Because you've been programmed to see one party as "THE ENEMY" (and thus support the other party), which is exactly what both parties want you to do. Because when you're blaming one party over the other, you're not blaming politicians in general, or the system as a whole. Because if you were, you might try to actually fix it (and put them out of a job).

But when you can blame everything wrong on "The Democrats" or "The Republicans", then both parties can keep you distracted, at odds with your fellow citizens, and effectively powerless.