Tuesday, May 16, 2006

I was thinking in this late hour.  Blogging is really a form of narcissism, yes?  I mean, why would I broadcast private thoughts if not to hope that the world notices them?  So, I HATE to get political, but something has been chiseling at my mind.  It's the political climate of our fair land.  I know you know what I'm talking about; the endless circle - left insults right, vice versa.  Republican prosecutes Democrat, vice versa.  Conservatives blame Liberals and vice versa.  But here's what bothers me and I beg of you to hear me out on this.  Who is most vocal in these arenas?  Often, I think you'll find a common denominator amongst these outspoken: they believe strongly in their side whatever that side happens to be.  I would not call them objective thinkers; I think there is a time that they consider their decision and choose, then years after they abandon this decisive capability in favor of political activism.
Here, I turn to the studies of the Gottman Institute.  After nearly 10 years of careful, concise study they've found that when an argument is taking place the blood pressure of all parties involved rises.  When this blood pressure rises above a certain point, the person is unable to think objectively - they will assert and re-assert their point repeatedly and without rationality and stop listening to the other party.  This is called "escalation".
The stronger a person feels about a particular thing, the quicker their blood pressure will climb and the quicker their reasoning capabilities disappear.  Outspoken people are passionate, and sometimes they simply can't be reasoned with.  We need these people, but entire systems of media and government can't be composed of these people.
So here I propose my first "Crazy Talk".  Why not create a party that intelligibly weighs policy, vote, and law not from traditional idealogy, but from wisdom itself?  A party that looks at issues very carefully in context to history and studies their results to see that their mechanisms behave as planned and that these plans insure longevity and sanity rather than the short-sighted victory of a side that is simply louder, more brash, and has more promotional money? These people would be zealots not of Liberalism, or Conservativism, or Democracy, or the Republic - but zealots of Rationalism.

2 comments:

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