how can i , a "normie" have deep political understanding ?

[Lauritz Bewer]

@Leo Gurai dont understand how i could develope an understanding of politics that is "valid" or true. an understanding that represents the actual situation. i have this thought that only politicians and such can have an accurate understanding of what they are doing, the same way as only a neurosurgeon can understand how the brain works. is my thinking biased here?, am i making mistakes in my thinking ?.  

Edited April 7, 2022 by Lauritz Bewer

[Preety_India]

Follow regular news and debate shows. 

[Godhead]

6 hours ago, Lauritz Bewer said:

i have this thought that only politicians and such can have an accurate understanding of what they are doing

Most of them have no idea what they are doing. 

It is essential to understand systems and patterns. This is where Spiral Dynamics and other models become useful. 

What do you think are the most important values a society should strive for and what are the best and most holistic solutions which lead to the greatest amount of freedom and happiness, and involve the least amount of suffering? 

Contemplate this.

Also, expose yourself to a variety of opinions. Question the motives and goals of different politicians and political commentators. 

Edited April 7, 2022 by Godhead

[Carl-Richard]

Find your deepest values and learn to talk about them. Politics comes after that.

[Victor van Rijn]

Watch Leo's 4 part consious politics series:
 

 

[Lyubov]

Education. Go to the library and start reading ! 

[DocWatts]

Conscious politics is built on top a foundation of ethics, media literacy, and historical / sociological knowledge, with some basic epistemology and meta-awareness to tie it all together.

Trying to delve in to politics prior to establishing this foundation will likely lead to hitching one's cart to an ideology in an unmindful way.

Being politically apathetic is a negation of the basic level of social responsibility that comes with living in a democracy (of course how much of a voice you actually have in your political system is a factor here, as democracy exists on a sliding scale).

Yet I'd argue that participating in politics in an unmindful way is arguably far more harmful than being apathetic and disengaged.

Edited April 7, 2022 by DocWatts

[itachi uchiha]

In the beginning u will read only propoganda.with time u will find truthful geo political sources.try to find authentic sources and learn things from there

[Carl-Richard]

1 hour ago, DocWatts said:

Yet I'd argue that participating in politics in an unmindful way is arguably far more harmful than being apathetic and disengaged.

I remember when I was like 14 when my friends started learning about political parties, and suddenly they all had a strong opinion on who to vote for. I try imagine what happened to the people who just stuck to it and eventually made it into a career. Actually, one of my closests friends became a deputy chairman for the largest youth party in our country at 16 years old, and let's just say that his strongest side was charisma (certainly not an A student ?).

[Husseinisdoingfine]

Through reading a lot of books, that’s the only way really.

Personally, that’s the way I found for me to have the greatest understanding of Politics. No amount of YouTube and twitch streamers will give you a deep understanding.

Start with the classical and move your way upwards, Conservative, Liberal, and Socialist literature. In that order.

[thisintegrated]

Develop a deep love for politics.

 

This happened to me when I was microdosing acid every day.  I completely fell in love with it.  No way could I have had the deep insights that lead to this without psychedelics.  I always had a slight interest, but on acid I understood politics as if I was the first person in the world to come up with the concept.

[Ryan_047]

Learn history (there are great history channels on YT, I suggest to look them up) and learn about political movements. What right means, what left means. What is valid and useful in both perspectives.

Also be in touch with the politics of your own country, because that's the country you know best and thus have a good foundation of understanding what is actually going on. Check the funding and journalists of your media outlets before believing them. If they ever lied with an important subject or received funding from corporations which have special interests I'd avoid them altogether. 

Also be very aware of the SD stages that you are in and what biases they encompass. 

But again, having a broad knowledge of history is the ultimate answer to your question. You can't judge the current events and the speeches of current politicians if you don't know what happened before and why it happened. You'll be on the right path once you can tear apart a country into smaller elements (justice, military, liberty, political movements, economy, geopolitics) and judge each element as being good, bad, efficient, oppressive etc. This will allow you to put a certain country on a scale, and not demonize it or praise it to high heaven.

Learn how propaganda works (this might the hardest of them all, everyone struggles with it). I suggest starting from the WW1 propaganda, which is easy to digest and learn. Also Riefenstahl's films are a good start.  

[Max_V]

9 hours ago, Husseinisdoingfine said:

Start with the classical and move your way upwards, Conservative, Liberal, and Socialist literature. In that order.

Do you have top books for each of those categories you can recommend? 

[whatishappeningtome]

Reflect on how the government has impacted your life directly. Did you go to a public school? Did you ever receive any government assistance? 

[Yarco]

The opposite of a normie is an extremist. So become a political extremist . I never advocate political violence, but go about as extreme as you can without entering that territory, then over time maybe dial it back about 20% as you pick up more nuance and understanding.

If you think any of the existing political parties that you can vote for are even possible to be reformed into something good, then you need to keep searching and going more extreme. The system can be reformed (violent revolution is not required) but individual parties cannot. The existing parties regardless of your country are so corrupt and out of touch that they can't be reformed. We need to make new entirely ones and outcompete them. Anything outside of the current parties is inherently going to be labelled "radical". People think even AOC is too radical already. AOC is just starting to touch the edge of what I would consider extremism.

On 4/7/2022 at 5:16 AM, Lauritz Bewer said:

i have this thought that only politicians and such can have an accurate understanding of what they are doing, the same way as only a neurosurgeon can understand how the brain works. is my thinking biased here?, am i making mistakes in my thinking ?.  

This is the opposite way you want to be thinking about politicians. Don't give them ANY reverence or respect. Assume that most of them are more incompetent and corrupt than any random person off the street. Most of them are like 65 years old on average. Do you think your grandpa has a good understanding of how the world works and what's needed in 2022? I mean I'd probably rather take a random average employee at McDonalds and make them senators and congresspeople every 4 years than career politicians.

On 4/7/2022 at 5:19 AM, Preety_India said:

Follow regular news and debate shows. 

This is the worst thing you can do, and how you'll end up following status quo political parties and arguing about dumb issues that don't matter for your entire life. You need to shift the Overton Window about 10x further than where it currently sits and not waste your time arguing about stuff like Ukraine and trans issues, except to joke about how bad our current society is.

Edited April 8, 2022 by Yarco

[Preety_India]

56 minutes ago, Yarco said:

This is the worst thing you can do, and how you'll end up following status quo political parties and arguing about dumb issues that don't matter for your entire life. You need to shift the Overton Window about 10x further than where it currently sits and not waste your time arguing about stuff like Ukraine and trans issues, except to joke about how bad our current society is.

I did not understand this at all. Isn't the current situation the status quo anyway? 

[Gesundheit2]

1. Political knowledge is mostly useless for us normies.
2. It can also be a huge distraction.
3. Perfect understanding is impossible because of the extremely high levels of complexity. Even if you were a politician yourself, one mistake in your estimation could cost thousands or millions of lives.
4. Most modern politics is Machiavellian, and I don't think there's any reason for a normie to understand that in any more depth.
5. If you're determined, then I'd advise to learn about economy instead cuz it's basically the flip-side of politics with less BS (bias). But I don't have any English speaking recommendations, so I can't offer much help there.

Edited April 8, 2022 by Gesundheit2

[DocWatts]

I mentioned it in my earlier post, but it can't be overemphasized how import Media Literacy is if you wish to have an informed perspective on politics:

1. Can you analyze the style and tone of a piece of writing/video to get a sense of the author's pre-existing biases? Are you able to identify and be mindful of things such as emotionally charged language, for instance? Can you identify click-bait and sensationalism when you see it?
2. How much self awareness do you possess around your own biases?
3. Do you know how to fact check a claim made by an article or video? And are you able to employ good judgement about how to weigh credibility of a cited source?
4. Can you articulate the difference between direct reporting and an opinion piece? Can you articulate the difference between simple and complex news analysis?
5. Are you able to incorporate multiple different perspectives in to your view of a situation, and what are the internal mechanisms you're using to parse between those perspectives?
6. Are you able to identify propaganda? Can you articulate what propaganda is, and the ways that you yourself can fall victim to it?
7. Related to (6), can you articulate how it's possible to advance a misleading claim about something without necessarily having to directly lie? Can you articulate why context and emphasis is important to the way that information is communicated?
8. Can you articulate what bullshit is, and identify it when you see it being employed?

Edited April 8, 2022 by DocWatts