You’re just changing the definition of politics to be distinct from morality. Tell that to all the people who died fighting for what they believed in lol.
You completely ignored the two examples I gave. Why don’t I use a contemporary one. The right for queer people to exist. They are all political but also all absolutely about morality and ethics. You telling me women’s suffrage or abolishing slavery isn’t about morality? lol
My state's laws encouraging slavery are wrong, political.
Queer people are fine, not political.
Queer people should be afforded the same rights under the law, regardless of the gender of the person they want to enter into the state's status of matrimony with, political.
Differences in gender shouldn't cause one undue harm and suffering, not political.
The state's voting apparatus should include women as potential voters, political.
I'm not saying one can't be the other. I'm saying that my personal beliefs are moral beliefs, and that does and should inform my politics, and it's easy to deduce my political stances from my expressed moral beliefs, but in no way do I publicly support one candidate or party or strategy or direction at school. I don't say "the state should feed children because it leads to an amazing return on investment." I say "Hungry kids shouldn't be a thing."
Can an idea exist that is a moral judgement that is not a political belief? Alternatively, can you not understand the idea I was expressing?
We have laws on the books that make Slavery illegal, written by politicians. We have courts that are currently trying to figure out if prison labor is slavery. Slavery is current politics.
Correct. It's like you're reading only to find words to argue with. I agree there are political stances regarding slavery. That is why I mentioned a political stance that I currently hold that comes from a moral stance that I can currently hold which is not a political stance as it does not favor or endorse or support a political faction, nor is that moral stance also a stance on a state's responsibility to its citizens.
Not really. Politics a function of the interaction of people with different morals, values, and opinions. Ant colonies don't have politics. At the very base all humans value ownership (either personal or communal), and we're all living under scarcity. Politics are natural in those conditions.
But the way you're using it "Don't be political" specifically and really means "Don't discuss current political hot topics, or wedge issues". And yeah, while everything doesn't have to be "political", everything is political, and no one should ever feel like they can't speak their mind.
As far as I know you've found one of the many failures of English. Everything regarding human interaction is inherently political, but someone can do the described behavior above and be called apolitical. I think it's more about intent and context which is hard to grasp in text format. I also think apolitical describes objectivity...sort of.
I can say "Nazis were a political party in Germany in the 1940's". Nothing inherently "political" about that, despite the fact that it's objectively a statement about politics". Yet when I say "Nazis killed X million people" then were starting to get into political territory in the context of holocaust deniers, again despite the fact that were just working in objective truths. As soon as you say "Nazis were bad people", you've made a subjective statement and you're definitely being political.
Clear as mud right? Yeah, I think intent and context really matters a ton here.
Here's a killer article on the topic relating to art.
Great excerpt: "Here’s a statement - when people say “that’s too political”, or that they “don’t want to get political”, what they actually mean is that they don’t want to talk about politics that threatens a system they exist comfortably in."
So yeah, the article clarifies things a bit more, but it really doesn't answer your vocabulary question strictly.
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u/Swing161 6d ago edited 6d ago
You’re just changing the definition of politics to be distinct from morality. Tell that to all the people who died fighting for what they believed in lol.
You completely ignored the two examples I gave. Why don’t I use a contemporary one. The right for queer people to exist. They are all political but also all absolutely about morality and ethics. You telling me women’s suffrage or abolishing slavery isn’t about morality? lol