Politically Homeless - It's Like Harry Potter
Politically Homeless - It's Like Harry Potter
Real people, real letters, real problems, no solutions.
Politics these days have become so divided and divisive that it’s become the norm to view the other side of the aisle as “the enemy”. People are being told to “pick a side” and that there’s no room for middle ground. We here at Phetasy believe that there are a lot more people in the middle than politicians and the media would have us believe.
We’re collecting stories from the ever growing number of people who are finding themselves Politically Homeless and posting them here on Substack. If you have moved from conservative to liberal, or liberal to conservative, if you feel you’ve stayed in the same place and your party has swerved drastically away from you, if you had a moment that awakened you to the insanity and hypocrisy on both sides, if you keep your mouth shut anytime a political topic comes up because you’re afraid your opinion will cause you to lose friends or your job, you’re not as alone as you might think.
Our goal is to shine a light on people’s earnest, individual experiences and show them they’re not alone.
Some letters have been edited for clarity and brevity. If you’re politically homeless and would like to share your story, please email us at iampoliticallyhomeless@gmail.com. All submissions will remain anonymous.
Letter 44:
3/3/23
Hear me out. I’ve read comments on your posts and I’ve noticed a few common threads. The one I’ll bring up now is that people are waiting on someone to step up and be the good leader they’ve been waiting on to bring forth the enlightenment.
It made me think of the scene in Harry Potter and Prisoner of Azkaban where he believes his father is going to rescue him. He waits, he hopes, and then he takes matters into his own hands. He wasn’t actually waiting on his father. He was waiting on himself to step up; to enter the arena has Teddy Roosevelt famously stated.
I guess what I am saying is that we can all play our own role. As a person who manages a team, I know I can’t do all the caring for them. I can’t do their work. It wouldn’t be a lasting effect to drag others along. What does work and what does last are a series of intentional nudges that will open their eyes to what the possibility of hard work can bring to their life. Individual success is the culmination many steps along a direction (not toward a destination).
If we want the world to be better, we must start with our own world. Our own household, and then maybe our household can influence others.
This is my first draft, and I have not edited (I’m at work so no time to make it pretty).
Cheers!
Politically Homeless
Some letters have been edited for clarity and brevity. If you'd like to share your story, email us at iampoliticallyhomeless@gmail.com. All submissions will remain anonymous.
Reminds me of the old saying about God opening the door but only you can walk through it. Barbara Bush said something to the effect of what happens in your house is far more important than what happens at the White House. I happen to agree. I think we as a society put far too much faith in politicians to get things done rather than rolling our sleeves up and doing something ourselves. I mean, if Chris Gardner can go from sleeping in public restrooms with a toddler to a multibillionaire in 20 years (starting in the early eighties no less), then I have no excuse.
What get me about these (mostly senseless) letters you're publishing is that they're nothing new. Politics has ALWAYS been corrupt, and a large segment of society hates whoever is in office at any one particular time. Abraham Lincoln is held up as a great and beloved president but he was originally elected with only 32% of the vote then went on to cause a war in which roughly 3/4's of a million Americans died fighting each other. Yeah, I know, the war was because the South seceded but Old Abe, who never spent one minute in combat, decided to force them back at the point of a bayonet. The fact is that Americans knew very little about the people who were in the White House before the advent of mass communications. Even then, the media covered up things such as JFK being a cockhound with a preference for young women. The average American doesn't even know today what the actual role of a president is, or what the qualifications are. It's more a personality contest then an actual contest "on the issues" as the media likes to say. The Founders set up a system where electors from each state would choose the president from men who were actually known and not campaigners. For about the first 40 years of the country's existence. voters didn't even play a role in choosing the electors, they were selected by the legislature in nearly every state. Electors voted for two people for president and the runner-up became vice-president. Only men with property had the right to vote. The term "popular vote" did not exist. Then along came political parties and now we have the popularity contest that serves as a national election we have today. And, you know what, there's not a damn thing voters can do about it! ANY changes have to come from the state legislatures.