[jonathanwallace]

Politics, IMHO, are about applied relationship and applied power.

Ignoring the discussion of both relationships and power leads to an anemic understanding of freedom and what it takes to enable it which leaves us unbalanced and brittle as a civil society.

The exercise of this privilege is a systemic, cultural mistake and the tendency of conversations to often devolve into tribalism highlights our lack of sophistication and maturity when it comes to these topics.

[481092]

You could say the same of knowledge also as it is a power and one applied and accrued by relationship; by what material one reads, by whom and from which source it is linked from and to. Academics of various groups tend to have their own sort of tribalism. I think the mods came to the correct conclusion that politics, although annoying as hell sometimes, is a fabric of society which is nigh impossible to shed when discussing just about anything.