With the recent political debates and the upcoming elections, I often find myself tuning out from the news and trying my best to remain neutral to my friends and family, probably the opposite of what I should be doing. This is a time when citizens of the United States are supposed to celebrate Democracy and our ability to choose a leader based on what we, the people, want and need in the head of our country.
Unfortunately, U.S. politics has become a joke–a ruse in which punches are thrown below the belt and issues are sidestepped, and answers to any questions are rehearsed or completely devoid of thought. In short, the political atmosphere of our country is nothing short of an episode of Jersey Shore, complete with insults, drama, and incoherent thought.
The way it works now is simply one side against the other: Clinton v.s. Trump, Democrats v.s. Republicans, people v.s. people. An overall divide has been created in our country, one from which we cannot escape. I know people who will unfriend someone on Facebook simply because they have different political views, emphasizing that today we draw the line at what democracy is to us and what it should be.
Right now, democracy means choosing sides; it means pitting us against our fellow citizens all for some circus of a government that doesn’t focus on the real issues. When our country was founded, it was never intended to be divided into a two-party system. The downfall of a two party system is that people stop focusing on who’s best for the job of being president, and focus more on how they can adhere to their party’s belief system.
This is problematic, especially when you look at this election. Instead of focusing on the issues, the candidates focus on how they can tear each other down and build themselves up. If we want our country run by Neanderthals, we should just go to the Jerry Springer Show and pluck one of the dead-beats and their baby-mamma’s to face off in competition for the presidential seat. At least then we would know it was a joke, and not just laugh while silently crying inside at the state of our country.
What we have to remember is this: if we want our country to be run by the best person possible–that means the best person both politically and morally–we need to cast away the titles of Democrat and Republican; we need to look at the issues and how our two main choices are responding to them, and then perhaps branch outward, away from our political affiliations.
Nothing is going to change unless we the people change it. That’s what democracy is supposed to be about, right?
