WP support thread for apoliticals or ppl w/unusual views

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The title of this thread is : "A support thread for..". Your post does not feel supportive.

I don't think that there was anywhere the suggestion that we were inherently smarter than people with traditional or categorisable or clear political views. In fact one reason for this thread may be because people with odd or non-existent, or confused, or undefinable or different/difficult to place, political views frequently feel stupid, left out, lost, trivial, silly or otherwise not-great, faced with all the threads discussing with conviction, and sometimes with apparent sublety, intelligence, experience, etc, the great political issues of the day, or of all time.( ).

Your post is a perfect example of the attitude that to be "a responsible citizen one should have some consistent/comprehensible position on political issues". And is one huge great big prejudice/assumption in itself.

Nor do I think that there was any contempt or scorn expressed, you say "despise". Miss Pickwickian's comment about "reps and dems" , being seems nothing but the truth.

Everything that i have seen and experienced of politics has simply and powerfully put me off any engagement in it. In theory I understand the great progress, strides, advance, improvement etc which politics has achieved, I think..... but in practice?

The actual physical reality of politics seems like NT people messing about being so NT it's not true, and I am not interested. I think this thread is very good idea, for people feeling alienated by popular/visible "politics".

Well, this was precisely the reason for my rant. Articulating one's internal thought processes is an imperfect art, and it is oft prone to awkwardness or miswording. This presents a problem for people who actually have internal thought processes and are more interested in sharing them than the words of some charismatic ideologue.

I don't follow you. How does that explain your accusing us on the thread of being "lackwits"?

My score on the Political Compass site test didn't come from voting for one or another idealogue, but as a result of ticking various opinion/preference boxes, and the sum of mine is apparently similar to Gandhi and the Dalai Lama, and so it's not surprising that I do not find the argument between reps and dems terribly interesting.

In fact the whole regular political world just seems to be, as Miss Pickwickian said " corrupt, annoying, and conformist". There is noone on the forefront of politics today who seems to have anything ( very) interesting to say.

So could we explore this frequently painful alienation/disaffection/disenchantment without your disapproval/contempt. Thank you.

Last edited by ouinon on 18 Mar 2008, 11:56 am, edited 2 times in total.

There are a lot of disaffected/disillusioned/alienated.

I don't know whether there is any practical way to reduce this, whether it is possible, or whether there will always be many such.

The biggest problem may be a system which expects or hopes or pretends that everyone/most people will participate, or expects and hopes they will not, but which supposedly depends on their participation, however partial, resentful, or ignorant, for its authority.

Maybe one reason for political disaffection is that have noticed that the participation is a pretence, and exposing that, by not voting, until the farce becomes too visible to ignore anymore, seems logical, even urgent

Last edited by ouinon on 18 Mar 2008, 11:57 am, edited 6 times in total.

Whether you agree or disagree with the above quote, you must admit that it was brilliantly worded.

Ok, you have nominalist sympathies, my mistake.

To rename an existing view seems to be sleight of hand to me.

Um... this ain't comp sci.

Yes. Explain how it is different rather than giving bull crap one to two word responses.


Well, the universe either works like that, or your own view is wrong. If your own view is wrong though, then why do hold to it, why do you vote on it? Frankly, my response is a Sartre quote:
"To choose this or that is to affirm at the same time the value of what we choose, because we can never choose evil. We always choose the good, and nothing can be good for us without being good for all."

I see your point but then it still isn't conflict resolution, as the conflict has not been resolved, it is oppression via control of the masses.


So, the other conclusion is that one of the groups will end up so marginalized that a civil war cannot occur? I would argue that such a solution would be a destruction of that pre-existing balance that was supposed at the beginning. Especially given that I don't think we see such shifts happen frequently and swiftly between such opposites and the real stability in the US comes from the fact that most people are centrists.

Yes, it really does. Perhaps "good" is the wrong term, but still, you are promoting a politically based process to achieve ends when anarchists and libertarians still tend to disagree with the value of a political system.

Yeah, Griff, frankly, I would not be so easy on the insults. I have actually been holding back simply because once I start we are going to see a 44 page post on how much you suck.


Griff, "platonic realism" is not what is being invoked. What is being invoked is this: I have an idea that is defined as "X" and I think that X maximizes good trait Y, therefore I want a society that is most similar in structure to the mental construct X so that way society will maximize good trait Y. It isn't a matter of platonic realism at all. Griff, the notion "ideal society" does not presuppose platonic realism at all, no more than a calculus optimization problem presupposes platonic realism. Your stance is nonsense and I don't accept its foundations as logically rigorous, and yes, this is based upon the stance found in the Sartre quote about human action.


Perhaps you have, it does not matter.


Depression can result in a lot of things, however, to simply label your opponent as maladapted and "depressed" to debunk a claim does seem like an ad hominem.

Actually, a lot of people I know who take that test come out right about where you did, including several who are perfectly content with mainstream politics. If you plot numerous people's results, you'll find a simple left-right pattern emerge that roughly matches the traditional one going from bottom-left (left on regular scale) to the top and middle-right (right on traditional scale). I score next to Milton Friedman, waaay out to the right on the horizontal scale and just slightly south of center on the vertical. Outside of the normal political spectrum entirely, so it ends up that Republicans think I'm a flaming liberal while Democrats think I'm an absolute neo-con.

I did not. It is you who said this.

Speak more clearly, then.

When you warrant better, certainly.

The conflict is still done, though, whether or not you are happy with the outcome. Eventually, you'll be smacked down enough times that you'll get tired of standing up. Conflict resolved. This is just going to happen sometimes, and we need to pick our battles and weigh our priorities.

I no more think that society should be "maladapted and depressed." It makes me feel sad for it. I want society to have good coping strategies. This is a complex question that has a complex answer, though.

Yes, I said that because that was what it appeared to be.

You mean "type" and frankly, my grammar was not indecipherable.

Given how little worth you have as a human being, I always deserve better from you.


Ah, so self-deception? I was not aware that delusion was really the ideal society despite how it helps people. Are any of the questions brought up really that simple? A major issue is that we are starting from explicitly different points.

I have never voted. I fail to "see" any connection between my voting and things/events "out there".

The first time I really understood that what I did might have a connection with things at more than one or two removes was after a very brief "out of body" experience 16 years ago, in which i ended up weeping for my poor abused body as if seeing it for the first time. It was in the months and even years which followed, of exploring the way my actions ( what I ate) rebounded invisibly and in all directions through my body, including my brain, that I first became at all politicised.

My body served as a lesson in environmental politics. And led me to my first political actions of any kind , buying local, seasonal, organic, etc. Walking and cycling. And changed my habits of consumption for ever. (even if am not buying organic or local so much right now, i no longer use heaps of products i used to buy like an automaton).

Teachers said i had lots of imagination, because i scribbled, for a few years at least, long fantastical tales for assignments. But my Dad remarked that I had very little, because I had a lot of difficulty seeing connections and consequences, and still do. Really seeing/feeling them, not just "thinking" them. I don't know how to translate ideals into practical concrete detail. I don't see the connection. I can organise in great detail small physical projects, cooking, moving house, etc, very well, but that's because they are never anything but physical/material .

However, it occurs to me that I only learned to cook well/at all ( almost) once I had understood the connection between mental health and diet. And the concrete reality of politics still seems utterly unconnected to "me". So although I have strong'ish, if confused, ideas about equal rights, and freedom, and justice, and peace, etc, I don't vote, and don't care about elections.

So is it possible that my political apathy is aspie?

Last edited by ouinon on 19 Mar 2008, 2:16 am, edited 2 times in total.

I meant "speak." Your typing is not the issue.


I didn't say "deserve." I said "warrant."

From the clear, blue sky...

Delusions aren't worth the comedown. Stick to pot.

Ten page research paper on the psychogenesis of schizophrenia and the pharmokinetics of cannabidiol. Mental energies elsewhere.

No, I am not conveying a message using my vocal cords.

Deserve is often considered a synonym of warrant.

Not really, many coping mechanisms are means of avoiding a problem.

Then be clear rather than sticking to meaningless vagaries.


Ah, so good sense there too. Got it.

The political position that one actually, really, concretely takes in the world might depend on one's state of mind, internal/external locus of control stuff, etc, more than any theoretical/idealistic attitude/philosophy. I might have lots of lovely ideals on the left-pacifist-etc etc, but my actual stance/political expression will be the same as other people with my cognitive/psychological wiring.

Last edited by ouinon on 19 Mar 2008, 2:10 am, edited 1 time in total.

And you wonder why I don't think you're worth the time.

I am.

Heck, between the 2 of us, you are the one who isn't worth the time.

This debate is productive.