Getting past the sexiness of controversy

The new generation of young voters has become obsessed with picking sides.

Everyone wants to make a statement, be it liberal, conservative or independent, and remind the other sides what their priorities are.

Consequently, especially with the help of social media, people everywhere are being educated on issues important to whatever group with which they identify and are looking for a chance to defend their stance.

While I certainly promote standing up for what you believe in despite the controversy it provokes, I think there is a downside to what has become a tendency of shortsightedness.

The idea of standing against the masses for your token cause, especially one that doesn’t directly affect you, is romantic.

But this noble social self-sacrifice often amounts to merely self-serving moral masturbation when the issue at hand serves to make the individual feel like a martyr more than acting as a cause with actual consequences for others.

The direct relationship between aggressive partisanship and inaction in the U.S. Congress has been an obvious cycle and should serve as a worst case scenario for Americans.

Instead, politicians talk about compromise in terms of weakness and seem to prefer arguing in circles about issues with extreme stances that inherently clash.

It is important to know what your priorities are as either a voter or a politician, and pushing for an end beyond one defined by compromise demonstrates strength of conviction, a sign of strong leadership.

But neglecting room for party overlap in causes such as veteran care, simple and inexpensive humanitarian endeavors and health and safety leaves room only for under-the-table manipulation of these very causes.

While everyone is busy arguing about social issues currently in the spotlight, eager to make an ideological statement, something that may affect them even more overtly — such as agribusiness’ dominance of the food market or massive pharmaceutical companies’ dominance of the medical market at the direct cost of consumer health — continues to silently plague the American public.

No one is immune to every illness, and public health as well as access to medications and treatments should be something everyone is talking about and agreeing upon.

If a politician is more interested in being paid than keeping such industries in check, that is just as worthwhile, if not more so in some cases, as a display of his quality as a representative than his stance on abortion.

Hot topic issues matter, and being fired up about them is productive.

Just don’t forget about everything else.

­— gcherney@indiana.edu