Instead of responding with something I’m sure you’ve heard before, consider this. You’re right, most people view politics as a group activity. They get a sense of community from participation. A lot of the times, their viewpoints aren’t as set in stone as you might think, and that goes in both political directions.
Now forming these communities, thats the hard part.
Well, yes, if third party was already a large enough community to even come close to rivaling the 2 established parties, people would be more likely to view it as an acceptable alternative, but that’s putting the cart before the horse - it requires success to have already been achieved in order to start seeing success. We would need to find a way to get people to convert without having an established community, because that’s how we would start building a community.
Sure, we’ve got over a million people who vote 3rd party in presidential elections, but that’s a tiny number when you’re spreading that group out across the entire US. I’m literally the only person I know in real life who thinks the Democratic party isn’t acceptably politically left, and I know a good amount of people - there simply isn’t a community for 3rd party in my social circle, and I’m in a blue state.
I’m tired of the whole “if a bunch of people suddenly start caring, we’ll change the world!” I just don’t believe that such a scenario will ever happen. People don’t just start caring out of the blue; we need to find a way of forcing real, observable change with only the numbers we already have right now. People will start to join in once that happens, but I just don’t have a clue how that can be done, or if it’s even possible.
Instead of responding with something I’m sure you’ve heard before, consider this. You’re right, most people view politics as a group activity. They get a sense of community from participation. A lot of the times, their viewpoints aren’t as set in stone as you might think, and that goes in both political directions. Now forming these communities, thats the hard part.
Well, yes, if third party was already a large enough community to even come close to rivaling the 2 established parties, people would be more likely to view it as an acceptable alternative, but that’s putting the cart before the horse - it requires success to have already been achieved in order to start seeing success. We would need to find a way to get people to convert without having an established community, because that’s how we would start building a community.
Sure, we’ve got over a million people who vote 3rd party in presidential elections, but that’s a tiny number when you’re spreading that group out across the entire US. I’m literally the only person I know in real life who thinks the Democratic party isn’t acceptably politically left, and I know a good amount of people - there simply isn’t a community for 3rd party in my social circle, and I’m in a blue state.
I’m tired of the whole “if a bunch of people suddenly start caring, we’ll change the world!” I just don’t believe that such a scenario will ever happen. People don’t just start caring out of the blue; we need to find a way of forcing real, observable change with only the numbers we already have right now. People will start to join in once that happens, but I just don’t have a clue how that can be done, or if it’s even possible.