“This isn’t political.” It seems I have been hearing this phrase (and others like it) a lot lately. People tend to utter this phrase when they support a cause or idea and don’t think another person’s political affiliation should determine whether or not the other person agrees with them. Let me give you two examples.
A few weeks ago, I went to hear an advocate from the Center for Water Security and Cooperation talk about the global legal challenges associated with accessing clean, reliable sources of drinking water to meet all of our varied industrial, agricultural, and recreational needs.
She said, “This isn’t a political issue,” meaning, it affects all of us and therefore we should all be invested in protecting and enhancing access to freshwater, regardless of where we fell on the political spectrum.
Then a few days ago, I came across a clip of Ellen DeGeneres making a statement opposing Mississippi’s new religious freedom/anti-LGBTQ state law. Maybe you’ve seen it. In explaining her position, she said: “This is not politics; it’s human rights.” And because this was Ellen, she included some clever jokes along with her plea for solidarity.
As far as an expression of sincerity, I cannot fault either of these statements. But as public—nay, political—discourse, I find them to be all-too-common examples of a troubling trend.
There are two problems with the “It’s not political” claim. The first is that it embodies a misunderstanding of the nature of politics. When people say an issue isn’t political, they generally mean that it is not partisan: it is not an issue to which one side or the other, or only one political party, has exclusive claim.
They may also mean that they do not want to see this issue get bogged down in our all-too-dysfunctional partisan system. Many advocates rightly fear that if their issue (whether it is water, or legalized discrimination, or protection of the poor and vulnerable) is picked up by one political party, it will become entangled in the political gridlock that has defined much of the last decade(s) in Washington, and all chance at progress will be lost.
Advocates hope that by saying it’s not “political,” people will judge the issue on the merits, rather than condemn it by association (as in, “that sounds too liberal” or “that sounds reactionary”).
Unfortunately for this strategy, both issues I gave as examples are political. Water, by its very nature, is a political issue: it is boundary-crossing and public, which means that it cannot be governed through individual action or virtue alone. And by involving the state in matters of gender and sexuality through myriad laws at the state and federal level, through the provision of government benefits, and through the courts, they are also political issues.
And there’s nothing wrong with that. Politics is how we adjudicate issues that cannot be resolved privately. If our politics is bad, it is because the people participating in our politics have abandoned the higher ideals of politics, public service and the common good, in favor of private or partisan gain.
So rather than apologize for making statements that might be perceived as political, advocates should affirm the positive role that politics can play in promoting the common good—which, in the full clip, DeGeneres does. She encourages people to speak up, not to abandon politics to people whose views may be harmful to the health of the polity.
However, there is a second, less positive interpretation of claims that “this isn’t political.” By implying that there is only one acceptable position on an issue—the speakers’—it can be a means to stifle or end debate on a topic. This approach implies that disagreement entails bad motives or bad judgment, and should not be allowed.
In that sense, they’re right: it’s not politics. At least, not the democratic kind.
Ethics and Politics Blog 