Beware the Current Poly Sci Model

Jack R. Noel
September 20, 2023

When I say “poly sci model” I mean the way of thinking among those of us who are interested in politics. I do not mean “one side has it wrong” because all sides have it wrong. It’s wrong because it focuses on “destroying the other side” but more so because it has a built-in assumption about the rightness of the speaker’s side and wrongness about the other side.

Examples

From Facebook today: “The idea of free stuff in Canada, the Nordic states and elsewhere is a fantasy. Ask people who have been there. Central planning and big government monopolies don’t work. They survive by rationing services and euthanizing people if they are too expensive to maintain.”

From Medium today: “While there could still be surprises in store in Iowa or New Hampshire, at this point, it feels less and less likely to change the ultimate outcome of this primary. Rather, Trump looks set to claim his third nomination by a wide margin in a party that has never been able to resist his dark political gifts, and which remains his plaything, entirely at his disposal.”

Notice here that both statements are rock solid certain that the other side is utterly stupid and evil at the same time. I believe this is an unconscious adoption of assumed righteousness. In other words, an assumed superiority for the individual speaking (or writing). That is nothing but poisonous egoism.

All the subtlety and nuance is lost when someone goes all ego like this. Self-serving literally means abandonment of unity for the sake of personal gain. All involved become sealed in their own personal bubble. But then they become persuaded that it’s safe to let in one ideology but that one alone. And they always know they are right. This of course is an obvious contradiction: two opposing ideologies cannot both be right. Yet the U.S. is split almost equally with season-to-season variations.

Unity
The United States got its name because, post-revolution, it was discovered that each state acting separately developed its own tax system and rejected taxation by the federal government. Each state began issuing its own currency. United we stand, divided we fall.

Freedom
The quality or state of being free: such as [a} : the absence of necessity, coercion, or constraint in choice or action [b] : liberation from slavery or restraint or from the…