As the 2024 election season is in full swing in the United States, the dynamics are even more interesting when one steps back and surveys the situation as an observer, not a participant. For the past 30+ years, I’ve maintained what is essentially an “apolitical” approach to government and elections. What led to this stance was discovering the writings of the late author Stuart Wilde, for among other things he taught readers to look deeper into the world of politics in order to see who is really pulling the strings behind the scenes.
In this regard, it’s no secret that very wealthy people, large corporations, and mainstream media organizations collude to create narratives (i.e., programming) that favor one so-called party or the other. These stories often focus on differentiating the two major parties in terms of their alleged platforms, and constantly reinforcing the concept that people must be on one side or the other. This type of programming often starts very early in life, with parents and adult family members being the primary sources to convince young people to “identify” with one of these parties. This anecdote from the late Fr. Anthony DeMello brings a bit of humor to the circumstances:
“Labels are so important to us. “I am a Republican,” we say. But are you really? You can’t mean that when you switch parties you have a new “I.” Isn’t it the same old “I” with new political convictions? I remember hearing about a man who asks his friend, “Are you planning to vote Republican? The friend says, “No, I’m planning to vote Democratic. My father was a Democrat, my grandfather was a Democrat, and my great-grandfather was a Democrat.”
The man says, “That is crazy logic, I mean, if your father was a horse thief, and your grandfather was a horse thief, and your great-grandfather was a horse thief, what would you be?” “Ah,” the friend answered, “then I’d be a Republican.”
We spend so much of our lives reacting to labels, our own and others’. We identify the labels with the “I.” (i.e., who we believe we are). – Fr. Anthony DeMello, S.J., in “Awareness”
It is this “labeling” that is constantly reinforced in a person’s life until they truly believe that they are, at their very essence, a Democrat or a Republican. What’s really unfortunate, is that the emotional attachment to the label is so strong, that individuals will maintain that identification even when their party of choice implements policies that clearly work against their own self-interests. It’s honestly mind-boggling how millions of people don’t see the con being run on them.
Sadly, people are being played by both parties because they cannot “see the forest for the trees.” They will vote for their party of choice no matter how much that selection has (or will) harm them personally. With just a modest amount of study and research, those identifying as being a member of either party would come to find that at the base level there is zero difference between the two U.S. parties “in practice.” Other than a handful of U.S. congressmen and senators who truly care about their constituents and endeavor to do what’s best for them (and the entire country), the vast majority of these public servants belong to a “Uni-party” whose actual primary focus is on personal financial enrichment, self-magnification, and the accumulation of power and influence.
The key to ending this cycle of Uni-party control is for a majority of people to develop the critical thinking skills necessary to look deeper into the prepared narratives and see them for what they are – a means to divide and conquer. As long as people are divided along “fake” party lines, they won’t see the nefarious agenda of those creating the narratives, which are ultimately designed to imprison not empower the populace. The contrived division also serves to distract people from seeing the real truth, that at the fundamental level everyone wants the same thing – to be able to live happy, healthy, and productive lives.
This song quote kind of sums things up nicely me thinks:
“You think that you’re so smart, but you don’t have a #&@$-ing clue, what those men up in the towers are doing to me and you, and they’ll keep doing it, and doing it, and doing it, till we all wake up, wake up, wake up.” – Don Henley, in “Inside Job”
