Did you *READ* It?

All politics, they say, is local.

Eitan Hersh adds to that: All politics is action, not words. And that action occurs a lot more than at the polls.

Hersh, an associate professor of political science at Tufts University, writing for The Atlantic, argues that those who read about politics and discuss politics but don’t act by getting involved in their local community through volunteer work with a political bent to actually make things better are nothing more than political hobbyists who do more harm than good.

These hobbyists, he writes, “scroll through their news feeds, keeping up on all the dramatic turns in Washington that satiate their need for an emotional connection to politics but that help them not at all how to be good citizens. They can recite the ins and outs of Special Counsel Robert Mueller’s investigation or fondly recall old 24-hour scandals such as Sharpiegate, but they haven’t the faintest idea how to push for what they care about in their own communities.”

Even worse, Hersh argues “hobbyism also cultivates skills and attitudes that are counterproductive to building power. Rather than practicing patience and empathy . . . to win over supporters . . . hobbyists cultivate outrage and seek instant gratification.”

I see this on the local level – and even in myself. The local Republican Central Committee, the real power-brokers in a heavily Republican area, are the ones running the show. They nominate do-nothing candidates who fit their ideal for state politicians, and support candidates who make lip service to putting more power in local hands until those local hands enact laws they don’t agree with, then they want to take that power back to Boise. But what they’re doing that I’m not is getting involved. They’re doing a lot more than reading highfalutin’ stuff at The Atlantic and blogging about it.

What’s the threshold that pushes a hobbyist into real activism? I haven’t found it in myself yet. Too much else going on, I’ve got to admit. And I get the distinct feeling that if I were to go to the central committee, they’d smell a RINO and run me outta Dodge.

Hersh does point out the difference he sees between the hobbyists and those affecting real change is those who get things done are in the trenches wit those who need help – they’re actively helping fill out paperwork, advocate for language services, and other things. Not just sitting around uttering things like “the government ought to do this or that to help.” They’re actually helping.

I’d be curious to read Hirsch’s book and see what he advises in this arena of finding ways to engage. and then I’d revel in the irony.

He does say this at the end of the article:

College-educated hobbyists can engage in real politics, too. They’ll need to figure out what needs are unmet and how they can serve them. They’ll need to find local organizations in which they can serve. More fundamentally, they’ll have to figure out which communities they’re willing to fight for. As things stand, their apathy suggests that they already have figured that part out.