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I Vow To Stop Watching And Reading Politics
JaySon
Florida Veteran
I'm taking an oath to stop watching and reading politics.
Who's with me! Say eye!
2
Comments
May I ask why?
I appreciate your intention but from personal experience I have found making vows like this unskillful.
If reading and watching politics is something you've done regularly for a long time, going cold turkey will be difficult.
And, let's be honest, is reading about and watching politics that big a deal? I don't think so.
It's a source of stress and negativity for me. So I vow to banish it.
I am the least political person you could think of.
I cannot bring myself to trust a single one of them, no have I actually cast a Political vote in 30-odd years. to be honest, that figure varies because I cannot for the life of me remember exactly when I last voted.
Yet I know part of my responsibility to my peers, neighbours and society in general is at least to keep informed and thus be able to articulate opinions, points of view and some kind of personal conclusion.
Because to be non-political, is one thing.
To be misinformed and ignorant about the comings and goings of possibly the most corrupt, self-serving, two-faced power-hungry individuals, is quite another.
That's just a total no-no.
You have banished nothing. It is the equivalent of covering women in a Burka and pretending male lust has been overcome.
If you wish to devote more effort/time to practice, dharma study etc. Well done, good plan.
Mindful Consumption is what it is called. Controlling what you consume mentally.
Source: http://plumvillage.org/mindfulness-practice/the-5-mindfulness-trainings/
Mindful, yes.
Skillful...?
I'm unsure of that, myself.
But hey, it's your world....
To me, this is skillful: I will practice coming back to the present moment to be in touch with the refreshing, healing and nourishing elements in me and around me... I will contemplate interbeing and consume in a way that preserves peace, joy, and well-being in my body and consciousness, and in the collective body and consciousness of my family, my society and the Earth.
Filling your mind with virtuous objects that bring about a happier state of mind is skillful.
Fluffy Bunny Dharma? Not for me. I am made of harder stuff (I iz lobster). I vow to be Vowy.
I trust Thich Nhat Hanh dharma over lobster dharma.
I vowed to stop all media and political news once Mr. Trump became POTUS. After the previous 10 days of mass presidential mandates I have changed my stance. I try not to get upset but we cannot afford to live in a bubble. Let's make America Great Again may become Let's make America White Again. My heart is with everyone affected by the new laws.
Very well stated and I will strive to embrace your knowledge/awareness.
I'm of two minds. Without doubt politics is poison to the mind. I always come out feeling worse when reading political stuff. I also think it is important to be an informed citizen, and to be honest policy is very complex and its interesting to me trying to get to a "best" solution.
I avoid mean spirited and overly biased sources and if mental happiness is important I should avoid the comments section, that is the worst place for mental afflictions, but it has value in trying to understand where people are coming from.
I have little doubt that avoiding politics will make one happier, I have doubt though whether avoiding politics altogether is the better choice.
My thought is that we in the US just voted. We already rolled the dice. Getting stressed over an outcome I no longer have control over makes little sense to me.
Then there's the constant friction between parties.
I hear that, politics is particularly triggering. It does make sense to step away to try center and collect yourself.
An aye for an eye?
I'm with you for support.
If this is your path, then I hope you travel it well. For me, I think I can still follow but not stress over it. Mostly. But maybe I'm like the addict who says I can stop any time! Maybe I'm deluding myself and it will continue to torment me until I cut it out altogether. But for now I think I'm OK. And I hope you'll be too. Good luck!
Oh, an 'Armchair' citizen. All knowledge but no implementation.
Yes, seen a few of those too.
OK let's not get snarky folks. I for one have done a similar thing to @JaySon
I find reading about the Annoying Orange upsetting and stressful too. I make an effort to avoid online posts (including here) from friends and journalists alike. I know realistically I can't avoid everything, but I CAN make the effort.
_ /\ _
No snark added.
The entire post, except the single word 'citizen,' is direct quotes! And they're PERFECT!
But you're right. I don't descend to the low road very often, even for such an obvious target (and all in fun of course), but perhaps I could reduce the frequency even more . . . What do comedians do when they run out of raw material? (And is there any danger of that?)
OK, back to the positivity:
I understand what you're trying to say @JaySon. Since becoming a Buddhist I have noticed that certain things that used to entertain me now surround me with a negative feeling, politics is one of them. I think @JaySon isn't trying to be in denial or annihilate but surround himself with more positive energy, talk, action etc.
Positivity breeds positivity, negativity breeds negativity. For me it isn't about dealing with the news or not dealing with the news correctly but more not wanting to be exposed to wrong talk.
eye!
Good luck!
Be patient though.
I guarantee you at some stage soon you will be tempted to click on that link or switch to that channel.
And if you do, don't beat yourself up about it.
Two steps forward, one step back...
Um @JaySon to take an 'extreme' measure is to take an 'extreme' measure.. However. tis best everything in moderation that is the middle way
Bearing in mind, the Buddha's wise words of wisdom
"Sabbe dhamma nalam abhinivesaya". lest one forgets ...Nothing whatsoever should be clung to ! One clings...One suffers (in this case, gets stressed out
Buddhists for Trump
http://hardcorezen.info/buddhists-for-trump/4994
I take your point, but in my view, that's not how I'm working.
I've had the comment "You have no right to a say, you didn't vote."
I counter that with "Oh I have every damn right, because while you affiliated yourself to the Policies of one party, and showed your support, you are therefore responsible to one voice, and one only: The one your party brays out. You showed your support for them by voting for them - and now look at you. Condemning their every move and holding them up to strong criticism. My friend - your vote helped put them there - so you are as responsible for this unholy mess as they are. Put your money where your mouth - or vote - is.
I, on the other hand, sitting as an observer of everyone's wisdoms and follies, and having refused to subscribe to this voting mess and folly - which is both confusing and illogical (our voting system screws the true outcome up, big time) - I am perfectly entitled to stand in praise or condemnation of what you, and others have created.
By very virtue of the fact that Politics is a 'hot potato' subject, and that by and large at some point, the majority come to regret their vote, damn right I'm entitled. That's what democracy is about, isn't it? The right to have an opinion? I have an opinion. I try to make sure, as best I can, that it's an INFORMED opinion, but I have as much right to voice it as anyone else. Because people voted for it to be my right."
Dissent by non-participation is a perfectly valid stance. And it is a perfectly acceptable stance to take, and there is no way it bars me from complaining or praising the people I didn't vote for.
Freedom of speech and opinion is worth so much more than what people are paid with a Government pay cheque. And if a person doesn't vote, they still have the right to complain about the awful state of politics because honestly, voting doesn't change that all Politics ultimately corrupts the politicians running anyway. If you think voting actually causes change, then you haven't been paying attention.
There's this idea that it's responsible to vote because it's what all adults have been conditioned to do.
For Goodness' sake, a vast majority of people on this forum were indoctrinated without being asked, into a particular religion, and you were brought up, or conditioned, or instructed in this particular religion, and you voted with your feet, and left it behind. That was YOUR vote. Non-participation, non-agreement, was your vote, and you turned your backs on it.
Now you're telling me that it's my responsibility to vote for "the lesser of 2/3 evils"..? When I don't agree with any of them or subscribe to any of them?
How often does any specific religion come under fire here, and we don't either belong to it or believe it? We're quite happy to aim the accusatory finger at Callings we have nothing to do with. But accuse me of being an 'armchair citizen' because I refuse to be a sacrificial sheep and follow the masses and cast a vote for something I neither agree with or support - and suddenly, I'm accountable?
I'll tell you who's accountable. The people who vote because thy say it's the right and responsible thing to do.
But look who gets in.
And then tell me that those who voted for the winner, were either right, or responsible.
They recently took my vote away for a while. I now have it back.
Basically I was voting in a way my local council did not like but is totally acceptable. I required a postal vote (yep armchair voting). Councils are responsible for voting, referendums like Brexit, European elections, local elections, census/data collecting. I am nudging them about internet voting but that needs various security structures and is a way away ...
Anyway ... postal vote but I did not want my electoral register details (name and address) to be available or for sale. I am entitled to that and now have it.
Now that means if I write to my local representative, they have to answer (by law) BUT they have not up to now because they have to take my word that they represent me ... checking the electoral register is not open to them ... Yep the change begins, as always, with us trouble makers.
Part of my borough/council is becoming American by hosting the USA embassy - most green building in the world. Hopefully it will have a thatched roof in honour of POTUS trumpe ...
I also hope we become a full American State. Thus being British, European (for the moment) and American. Plus of course ethnically global ...
https://uk.usembassy.gov/our-relationship/new-embassy/
Making America British Again
Here are pics of the new emerging American soil/British soil, I took this summer ..
We the people
^^ Read all about it!! ^^
I often feel like this. If I'm not going to actually do anything about this or that issue, it seems pointless getting agitated about it. And of course many of these issues are so large and complicated that it is difficult to see what personal difference I could make anyway.
Ah, I seem to be guilty of not making my context clear. My intended point was not whether you choose to participate in the democracy your country maintains for you.
I am merely the kettle, declining the pot's black words of insult, saying gently and with a smile "I do not accept these, they are still yours."
Perhaps the gentle smile is hard to see via written words, or perhaps the context was unclear because of the location within a thread on politics. If either of these (or both) I apologize.
I misunderstood your intention. The error is also mine. I meet your apology and match it.
...And being extremely slow off the mark, I suddenly appreciated where you got your quote from.
I'm not awake yet, as is abundantly evident!
Touché Monsieur!
(in hindsight, 'citizen' is too kind a term... 'Soapbox ranting maniac' might be more apt, under the circumstances!
)
Aye.
Is politics really the issue? or is it your reaction to the politics that is the issue? It is completely fine to do what is right for you, including taking breaks which I do fairly often. But aversion is the flip side to attachment, remember. I think if one were to stick to reading unbiased (as much as is possible which limits your choices pretty strictly) than you are able to get information without needing to be so reactionary to it, unlike when you get news from FB, twitter, forums, and so on.
I prefer to stay informed, but I can do so without letting it affect me, when I am in a good place. I do disagree that there is nothing we can do. No, we can't do anything directly about who is in office. But there is a lot going on behind the scenes in many areas, planning for the next 2 and 4 years and having an influence on who is put up in the next elections. I choose to stay informed so that I can be involved in the process. Because if everyone puts their hands over their ears and eyes, nothing will change.
I can't speak for @JaySon but for me it's the actual politics itself. I'm happy to let others like yourself go out and change it. I support you all 100%, but for my sanity's sake, I can't watch it everyday. From my family history, I just can't watch people in your country repeat the past. Thankfully a majority of you (so it appears) are standing up against it.
The last time non Christians were registered it ended up like this....
I'm not trying to convince you, just so that's clear, just discussing, lol. I don't think one has to watch every day. I've put a browser extension on my FB so that I can filter posts in the feed by keyword. I am in a local political group (that isn't in my feed, so I have to actively go to the page to keep updated on local happenings). It's been a Buddhasend
I filtered all posts that have anything to do with politics. Trump, Clinton, politics, abortion, immigration, all of it. I don't want to see it in my feed. I'll read elsewhere if I need a news update. I want to see my family, my friends and their new little babies, pets, funny uplifting videos, etc. I unfollowed and unliked all the clickbaity pages like Upworthy. I unfollowed friends who post nothing but politics. It's quite nice. Now I control what I consume and when. When something shows up that isn't filtered, I add a new filter. It lets me keep my FB for what I want to use it for, which is nice. it's funny how much it filters (including ads and sponsored posts). For every one good post I get 3 that were filtered (you get a tiny notification saying "post filtered due to keyword Trump" so you can opt to see it if you want to.
ANYHOW. Everyone has to know what works, I'm able to be involved, so I feel like I should. If all I do is set a good example for my kids and they learn how politics work a bit more, then that's good enough for me.
-When I was a small boy, my older sister's friend's father showed me a tattoo like that on his forearm. He was a polish catholic...
Millions of non Jews were incarcerated as well. 5 million in fact - Roma gypsies, homosexuals and anyone willing to a stand up to Hitler. However, they weren't the target of Hitler, as we all know.
Thank you for taking away from the meaning of my post though.
EDITED TO ADD: your friend's father could have also been a Jewish child smuggled out and given to Catholic people to raise, as was common practise to save as many children as possible. Not knowing his background though, it's only speculation at this point.
-It wasn't my intention to derail your post. I apologize. My speech wasn't skillful...
Don't forget all the schizophrenics who were also casually killed off in large numbers at the time. Which notably didn't do anything to bring numbers down in post-war Germany, argueing that the condition is not significantly genetic in nature.
https://academic.oup.com/schizophreniabulletin/article/36/1/26/1868974/Psychiatric-Genocide-Nazi-Attempts-to-Eradicate
Get radical: give away your TV. That makes it really easy to avoid political news. Also: zoning out to the TV in general, just because it's on. You end up spending your time more mindfully. Unless you're one of those super-disciplined types, who can watch one favorite show, then turn the TV off and go attend to other things. Most people just keep staring at the box, though, even when their one show is over.
One of Trump's appointees, I forget which one, said there's a precedent in American history for registering "foreigners" or "immigrants" or whatever he called them, because of the Japanese internment camps. He was explaining there's a legal precedent, and he was serious.
Chilling.
Again, this is detouring from the point I was making. But I can use it to expand I guess. My original point was this:
A leader elected by populist vote in 1933 by promising to make a country great started off with registering those of a different brief and it snowballed into what we saw during WWII. 6 million Jews murdered for being born Jewish. Then another 5 million were killed because they were "defective" in the leader's hindsight view.
As someone who lost family because of who they were born as, I find it very frightening to see Trump emulating Hitler. I also find it saddening that a number of Americans have embraced him the way Germans first embraced Hitler in 1933. By the time it went too far, anyone who want petrified of him and spoke up was murdered alongside the Jews.
I hope I've cleared up things.
Nay.
As has been pointed out, burying your head in the sand as a temporary measure may be required for the sake of your well being. My government is colluding and courting the emerging Dis-United Stats of Trumpland. Already the consequences and cost are emerging.
It starts with a silly but dangerous man, who hates and wears silly hair on his head or under his nose.
Passive assistance or passive resistance?
oh man I would love to not have a tv. I leave it off all day, so I am grateful for that time. My kids don't watch a lot of tv, but my husband is a sports nut and it's the only way currently to be able to watch our local teams. I look forward to the day when someone figures out that allowing people to pay for what they watch rather than keeping awful channels alive by forcing people to pay for them who never watch them is a better investment, lol. I enjoy a few shows, but prefer books any day. Interesting to note, Trump watches a lot of tv and never reads books (per his interview about his daily habits). No wonder he's so delusional.
We rarely hear about dissidents and what happened to them. I had an elderly friend who was part of the Nazi resistance in Austria and later, France, and he was lucky that an older relative put him on a boat for the US, for his own safety.
What I find alarming is the amount of blatant disinformation being promulgated by Trump supporters throughout the internet. And they're the ones who accuse mainstream news sources of generating "fake news".
IMO, life in the US is becoming gradually more Stalinesque. It started when GW Bush authorized the NSA to engage in domestic spying on citizens, and muzzled the media regarding global warming and other environmental news, the size of protests against his Presidency and the Near East wars, and other topics. Now, there seems to be a deliberate disinformation campaign, aimed at smearing centrists and liberals, and declaring them public enemies. It was Bush II, who, like Stalin before him, declared after 9/11, "You're either for us, or you're against us". Dissent became highly suspect.
I have the same struggle. News overwhelms me too easily and makes me a nervous wreck.
The most success managing this I have achieved is choosing one high quality news source and sticking with it (as an American, I can rely on NPR radio). It is really the act of following links one after another that carries me down the rabbit hole mentally and emotionally.
The really hard question is really this: what can I actually do about the direction of the country? At times it seems that it is most constructive to approach this purely as an external circumstance beyond my control, like a bad weather event or an illness in the family. In which case indeed, news intake should be minimized to the bare minimum so I can better attend to my "real" life.
But then what if there is something I can do to slow or stop the de-volution of our country pushed by our new government (beyond voting which I always do)? If that were the case, should it not be my first responsibility? ...this is really about that wisdom of knowing the difference between the things I can and cannot change.
Perhaps make a commitment not to go looking for information on politics but accept that it is there and if you happen across it then read/listen to it and be informed. I have done the same for a few years; I have a general awareness of the world around me but no attachment to how it should or shouldn't be because most of it has no direct influence on me or my life.
There isn't a lot we can do, but letters, emails and phone calls do have an impact. It's just a matter of doing the work, then setting the rest aside instead of immersing oneself in it. But, sometimes it is hard to find out what you should call about without paying attention to a lot of news. There are an astounding # of bills introduced and your representatives don't know what you think unless you call. The past 2 weeks, there have been record breaking numbers of calls to congress, coming from everyone. It does make a difference. 1.5 million calls just to senators just last week. When 95% of the people calling your office are in agreement on something, then it tends to make them listen a bit more.
We have a local group that helps organize all this, which makes it so much easier. Our town only has 3000 people so I'd bet most towns have these groups. They keep the contact info easy to find, bill #s and links to the bill so you can read about them, biographical links to nominations Trump has made, and so on. And there isn't any political news commentary or chatter. Just people who want to help and offering information on how to do so.
For me, it's too easy to make a choice not to help because something doesn't affect me. None of this directly impacts me. I'm not an immigrant or someone with family trying to come here. I'm not on the ACA (though some of the rules that go with it do impact my family). I'm not really at risk for needing an abortion. I don't even need birth control. But for me, to pretend these issues don't impact us all when they impact thousands and millions of people would be lying to myself.
JaySon if you are still reading comments on this thread then you are breaking your vow...Just thought I'd let you know ...me being the kindhearted [no]-soul that I am .
You know that's not fair. Tagging him and expecting him NOT to read, even in jest, is a bit of poor form
It would seem that you have also tag him, by quoting my post...So now the poor sod's been tagged twice, but I'm sure he will see the lighthearted joke, without having to read the political comments that came after his last post...
Bearing in mind my post/comment was not political