Reaching For Tomorrow’s Utopia: Politics or politics

Sitting in anxiety as they count, I find it pressing to remind ourselves of the big picture. No matter which way this tips we still have some serious work to do. Granted one route may heavy the workload even further…Trump, yes, I’m talking about Trump. It is no secret which side I’m pulling for here. But here’s the thing… I am pulling for humanity. If you’re on humanity’s side then bear with me, even if just for a few moments.

Rutger Bregman is a Dutch historian and author who wrote Utopia for Realists, along with several other titles that cover history, philosophy, and economics. He is described as “one of Europe’s most prominent young thinkers” by TED Talks and as the “Dutch wunderkind of new ideas ” by The Guardian.

In Bregman’s Utopia for Realists he talks about the difference between politics with a lowercase p and Politics with an uppercase P. He quotes the Prussian statesman Otto von Bismarck when he said that, “politics is the art of the possible.” This politics with a lowercase p, “acts to reaffirm the status quo…” whereas, “Politics breaks free.” He describes Politics with a capital P as not being about, “the art of the possible, but about making the impossible inevitable.”

We can see it everyday on the news, “Politics has been watered down to problem management. Voters swing back and forth not because the parties are so different, but because it’s barely possible to tell them apart.” If you think about what each side is fighting for, it’s “freedom”. Two very different perceptions of freedom, but ultimately freedom. The problem is sadly not one-hundred percent with them, but with us. “Freedom may be our highest ideal, but ours has become an empty freedom.” What exactly is the promise land that we are surging towards? We cannot live off the American dreams of yestercentury. “If we want to change the world, we need to be unrealistic, unreasonable, and impossible. Remember: those who called for the abolition of slavery, for suffrage for women, and for same-sex marriage were also once branded lunatics. Until history proved them right.”

Ultimately we need to have our sights set on the farthest horizons. Even if Biden wins, we need to keep pressing. The results of this election won’t bring sudden peace and tranquility. We have “arrived in an era where life has been reduced to ‘economic calculation, the endless solving of technical problems, environmental concerns, and the satisfaction of sophisticated consumer demands.'” We want progress but we are so concerned with fixing the problems of yesterday that we can’t dream of a future that would rid us of those problems. A dream of the next utopia. Even Oscar Wilde famously said, “progress is the realization of utopias.” Humanity has done it before and we can do it again, but we need direction and vision.

While you may be thinking that utopias ultimately become dystopias, as they “are breeding ground for discord, violence, even genocide,” they are also much like that horizon. “I move two steps closer; it moves two steps further away…As much as I may walk, I’ll never reach it.” (Eduardo Galeano) The point is to keep walking. Dreaming of our next utopia is not about living in a perfect world, it’s about moving forward and making the world better with time. A “utopia is just a vague outline. It offers not solutions but guideposts.” We have stagnated in our “Land of Plenty” as Bregman calls it, and we need to once again hoist our sails for that far off horizon.

If you watched any of the debates you can see that the bar is set quite low. Trump has shifted political expectation by mastering the strategy of proclaiming, “ideas so shocking and subversive that anything less radical suddenly sounds sensible.” In other words, he is a master manipulator. However, to say with great displeasure, on the other side we have Biden trying to hold his grasp by keeping his, “ideas within the margins of what’s acceptable” so he doesn’t get branded a Bernie. What we need is some inconceivable cocktail of the two sides, someone to be realistic and demand the impossible for the good of humanity.

Demanding the abolition of slavery is not a utopian dream, it’s a basic civil right. Demanding women get the right to vote is not on the horizon any longer, it’s law. Demanding the right to same-sex marriage is not a distant accomplishment, however it is gaining strength in our midst. I want healthcare for all. I want to eradicate poverty. I want teachers and garbage men and woman to be respected for the role they play in our society by being paid a decent wage. I want to stop living to work in order to eat and start spending time doing what matters and what’s right because that is living. These are ideas still on the horizon and I couldn’t care less that they don’t fit the status quo. Politicians want to shut down the dreamers of radical ideas because that doesn’t fit their next campaign. Well I say let’s master Politics with a capital P. Don’t let them or their blind followers make you feel silly and stop spreading those ideas. Progress is the realization of utopias and I am ready to move towards an improved destination. Biden is our ticket onto the first train in that direction, but we have a long journey yet to go and this train doesn’t take us past the horizon.

If it hasn’t been made clear yet, I highly recommend this book! Back when COVID-19 first hit and George Floyd protests were filling the news I made a promise to myself to read more and educate myself about all that is going on. Urgent Lickings has become my way of processing as I read and learn. So thank you for reading and if this sparked any thoughts for you I would be thrilled to hear them.

Stay safe and healthy ❤