What is most disconcerting about the political reasoning of this place is that it actually isn't happening. This is not to condemn the people here or to dismiss them as 'stupid' or 'ignorant,' for their tendency is far more common and widespread than any of us would like to believe, being good citizens constituting a democracy who proudly wear "I voted" stickers. It is to say that people here appear to be decided before argument or debate; that argument or debate is not seen as an opportunity for mutual learning and possibility, and so, the very quality of the realm of the political as being uncertain is lost, perhaps without restitution. The common prejudice that the conditions or opportunities for putting forth, reviewing and updating opinion are to be avoided and if engaged in at all should merely involve two parties that steadfastly maintain their positions of disagreement is sad testament to the state of what we call a 'democracy' but not, by any measure, grounds for forsaking the project.
Their idols and party provide them with no better model. House Republicans (amongst others) have been incorrigibly and obdurately refusing to talk about several issues, using even extortionate tactics to achieve their aims. A new level of desperation has been disclosed. But this is not where the political is, as the political was never about force but about power, turning to H. Arendt for the distinction, meaning the creation of spaces of debate and argumentative play whereby the multiple parties to the event might be able to put forth their respective positions and learn from those of others in the pursuit of fashioning decisions or policies that might satisfy as many as possible. This is not what is occurring any longer and appears to be a sad reminder of what could be.
There are reasons that this is happening, too. Adherence to the line of a party is held in such high regard that deviation is treated as betrayal, which, interestingly sheds light on a novel understanding of what membership in a party means. Parties are not teams, and we are not playing sports; as tempting and intuitive as it might seem, we are not merely democratic participants who are supposed to indefatigably defend positions with little consideration of what is resisting that defense or opposing us.
There is also a failure to appreciate the uncertain aspect of the realm of the political. Outcomes are not supposed to be infinitely or completely determined, if at all, and instead are supposed to result from the play of opinion and difference in a given forum. Sure, constituencies elect members to congress and elsewhere, and these elections are supposed to charge their representatives with certain responsibilities. But holding to these constituencies should not preclude representatives from embracing difference and discussion, the kind that might even uproot and shift opinion, creating the space for new possible political outcomes. But this is not how our political system works for various reasons and may present good reason to reflect on a re-engineer it or our expectations of it.
Furthermore, the likely outcome of difference and disagreement that already exists based the ineluctable fact of a plethora of different doxa (perspectives, worldviews that inhabit the world) coming to a head in discussion is, in fact, avoided at all costs, seen not as inevitable based on ineradicable disagreement (and dare I say natural?) but as merely gratuitous and violently masturbatory, just argumentative fun and games really. But this account fails to appreciate the realness of perspectives and their distribution across space and time and the likely inability to reconcile parts of them. Quite possibly, without forums like this, that is, spaces of the political, something much more terrible might result.
Even more insidious and disconcerting is what this practice (or evasion of it) does for the realm of uncertainty. If we are no longer creating spaces for the presentation, negotiation and resolution of political difference, then we have deluded ourselves into believing either that the space is unnecessary or that such engagement is not expedient and captures time better spent elsewhere.
Explanations such as these have their implications. If we've lost an appreciation for the significance of this space, then Arendt is correct and what political conflicts have happened this century (and really, much earlier than that) have traumatized 'us' to the point of feeling the need to avoid all conflict. Perhaps, as well, it has done so permanently (but never irreparably).
If, on the other hand, it merely seems expedient to give up participation and engagement in the realm of the political (which can be anywhere really, where difference and disagreement are acknowledged, disclosed and confronted), the private industry has triumphed and overcome the priorities of resolving political difference. In this case, we have become more concerned with efficacy, productivity, profit and eliminating risk (and its attendant uncertainty) than with examining and scrutinizing the fissures that inevitably characterize, and without serious consideration, potentially endanger own communities.
As part of this trend, difference from one another itself seems to be ignored as a fundamental quality of how we live, of how we are and the fact that we each possess original, unique and infinitely distinguishable histories that are at once both constructed and already present. We must seek to rectify this lack of appreciation for the realm of the political, to show the world what we are losing when we ignore it. For the conditions that encourage and engender it remain. Difference is a function of our existence and failing to give forum to it is dangerous and short-sighted and would only ever seem proper if parties to the debate failed to appreciate the significance of the conditions that gave rise to it.
And yet, we wonder why 'talking politics' has become taboo, left only to cocktail parties and places where we might expect sameness. But this does not have to be.
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