Anatomy of a Political Shift

It's not that I've been indoctrinated by a "liberal" education...I've just begun to truly gain the resources to think for myself. I think of myself as one of the last people that will let the masses, others, society, anything beside my own values (while those are admittedly shaped in part by those things I just listed) shape my views on anything.

I always thought for myself...but those thoughts and the experiences that I could draw from to form my (I believe) well formed (based on what I knew) thoughts and opinions where severely limited by my conservative upbringing in Bell County Texas, which could best be described as "infa-red America". Everyone there, it seems, is conservative...everything I ever heard, from my family, friends, and most everyone I met was tainted with a severe bias...a bias I did not recognize because in the society I was in it was simply mainstream thought. Of course I was taught that Christianity (which I did not embrace finally and fully until age 19) and conservatism (i.e. voting Republican) were inseparable. God was a Republican, if you are a godly person you vote Republican, bottom line. Voting democratic in some circles there is tantamount to breaking all of the Ten Commandments.

Enter college...well, not community college, but real college at Texas State. It is fairly liberal by Texas standards and I was exposed to much more in the way of points of view that were radically different from my own. Being for the first time strongly exposed to different viewpoints will always have an affect on a person. For my first year at Texas State I pretty much stuck with the political philosophy that I came in with (strongly conservative) but I began to question things in my mind. To this day I haven't told anyone in my family that I have begun to depart from the political doctrine that I was raised with. My immediate family wouldn't shun me but I wonder what my grandparents and others in my extended family would think. Some of my friends that remain there are also disenchanted with neo-conservatism but they also keep that fact in seclusion around some other people.

Do I now vote Democratic...actually I'm not sure at this point. However, I no longer embrace the Republican Party. One of my first realizations (beside the fact that maybe Liberals weren’t wrong about everything just because they're liberals) is that we live in a society where societal pressures essentially bully people into taking strict political sides...you're either a republican or a democrat, hardcore liberal or hardcore conservative. For example, if you're strongly pro-life (as I still am) then you have to subscribe to all of the remaining doctrines of conservatism (such as reduced Government involvement in environmental policy, which I strongly oppose)...many of which I have rejected over the past couple of years. Power is maintained by the status quo by tricking people into thinking that they do not have other options than to join in the heavily sectarian and sharply two-sided political fray. I'm not going to go into the specifics of my newly forming (it is still very much in process) political philosophy...I will address that in another entry. What I am trying to detail here is the process that I have been going though for a couple of years now. It's hard to realize that you actually believe you have been wrong about things literally all of your life. That the philosophy that so dominated your upbringing is, in your eyes, heavily flawed and tainted.

So here I am...yes, my political views have taken a sharp left turn, but remember that I started out on the extreme far right...I don't know how far left this will take me. All I know at this point is that I have rejected neo-conservatism (with a few, mostly social, exceptions) in favor of still forming views that will better reflect my value system. You see, my personal value system (which was radically changed three years ago) and that of neo-conservative ideals have clashed for those two or three years...leading to ideological conflicts and increased frustration and anger when discussing politics with others. This irritation peaked during last November's elections...I was not happy with anything. I marked my vote solidly for George W. Bush the G.O.P. one last time but realized that my value system, my heart, even my head, where not making the called. I simply wanted to vote and those societal pressures from where I grew up were still calling the shots. I will close this thought by stating that, especially in light of the increasingly disastrous operation in Iraq, my increasing distain and distrust of the big business and corporations that this administration coddles, and the utterly horrific handling of the Gulf Coast devastation by the White House, I very much regret that vote. Sure I didn't think that John Kerry was a good alternative...but then again, was he the only alternative. Should I open my mind and free myself from this trap of taking sides? That is the process I am in at the moment.

There will be much more to come on this. I need to get these thoughts out.