Are you paying more/less attention to news? Planning any specific action?

As many on these boards, I find many recent political events in the US quite distressing. Yet, I’m not sure what - if anything - I can do about them, and I’m not sure that my becoming more “expert” on specific developments is helping myself or anything else.

So I find myself somewhat intentionally NOT reading up on the specifics of each subsequent Supreme Court ruling, NOT following the ins and outs of Trump’s various prosecutions, NOT trying to interpret the polls, NOT sharing my feelings of dismay in conversations with like-minded persons… Being more informed about such matters seems to do little to improve my mindset, and seems unlikely to have any meaningful impact beyond myself and my immediate household.

Instead, I’ve reaffirmed my belief that all I can do is try to lead the best life I can, by my understanding of whatever that means.

How about you? Do these challenging times encourage you to become more or less involved and informed. Ae you planning any specific actions to try to exert any positive influence on any political/social issue?

For the moment I’m doing less political reading. I would love to be brave enough to go out and be a loud, confident voice of sanity, speak up for Biden who HAS done a good job, and is still a very viable President. But I live in a Trump-loving state and I do actually fear violent retaliation (which saddens me more than almost anything).

So I’m going to be a quiet voice when I can, and just do my best to be a good and caring person who supports all the things and people the MAGA fringe hate.

This is a very scary time.

Exert positive influence? No. But we are taking steps to remove the last of our money from the US and we’re accelerating our pursuit of European citizenship.

It’s not perfect here by any means. But it’s definitely got a better outlook.

Paying less attention to the news. Much, much less.

I thing we’re all headed to hell in a handcart. Rightwing media in Canada is positively thrilled at the possibility of a far right Canadian government, hand in glove with a totalitarian one party US country. This is the dream scenario for them.

I’m out.

I’m doing more arguing on Reddit these days. Sure, it may seem futile, but I know there’ve been multiple times when I’ve had my mind changed on a topic by a good online argument made by someone else, so I try to do my best.

I don’t have any illusions that I’ll change any Trumpers’ minds, but I am seeing more and more pushback on liberal Reddit subs against the DNC and its ways. I’ve seen comments made by some people get hundreds of upvotes whereas previously, even just a week ago, they’d have gotten none or would have been heavily downvoted. Progress is happening.

If only every Democratic voter had your incredible wisdom and knowledge about political strategy… thank you so much for sharing your expertise with the rest of us.

I pay attention. But I rarely get into political arguments anymore, with anyone.

I barely pay attention these days. I just cannot absorb it all right now. I will vote and hope for the best.

If the worst happens I will just accelerate my traveling because I am too old and tied to this country to move at this point.

I’ve been thinking about what I can do on Election Day to avoid the news altogether. Ideally I’d like to go somewhere without any internet connection, TV, and other people who might have access to either one of those even if I somehow forcibly limit myself on that day. On the other hand, should Biden lose, I’d probably have a bad association with whatever activity it is I choose to engage in that day.

I still have bad associations with the movie Beetlejuice, which I watched starting at around 8:30 PM Central time on election night in '16 when things were starting to look bad for Clinton. I thought that I’d have a nice distracting 1 1/2 hours to ease my anxiety, and that when I would tune back in things would look different. Needless to say that didn’t happen. I hope to avoid creating another negative association with an otherwise pleasant activity.

I am thinking the same thing but it’s almost unavoidable for me. Unless I go hibernate somewhere far away and purposefully disconnect.

Probably won’t happen.

I will likely just lean on my anxiolytic medical supply.

I don’t have those, but I might need some by then. Alternatively, I could find a DVD of Beetlejuice and watch it on loop the whole evening on a device that doesn’t have any internet access.

Less informed? Sort of: there have been quite a few SCOTUS news drops in the past fortnight that I haven’t dug deeply into.

Less involved? No. My current political involvement as of last month was near zero. No I don’t count talking to friends who agree with me, posting on this message board, or my uptick in twitter-X retweets over the past week.

What does count? Volunteering with a campaign, pressure group, or GOTV operation. I did that in 2018, 2020, and 2022. Also donating, to the extent that I’m able. Also helping others to volunteer, covering for them when needed. Politics is about power:

If my grandfather could leave his law firm when he was in his 40s to fight in WWII I can jolly well volunteer to fight fascism in 2024.

Without reading other replies, I have started to give this a great deal of thought. I had a recent conversation with one of our esteemed former posters and a good friend of mine, Least Original User Name Ever. He is both passionately and usefully engaged in Democratic politics both personally and professionally, and almost preternaturally unbothered by the opposition. He can talk to basically anyone in a reasonable, convincing way, without getting upset or taking things personally, and I greatly admire this in him. I assume this was a skill he acquired based on years knocking on people’s doors to try to convince them to vote for Democrats.

One of the things we agreed upon – something he has always known, and something I am just recently learning – is that taking meaningful action to address a social issue does not require hand-wringing, needless existential suffering, bedwetting or losing sleep. (Sort of - he did point out that these reactions can motivate people to take action, so they can be leveraged in other people when you’re community organizing.) But it’s not necessary. This is a truth I have uncovered with my own activist work, though it took years to get to this point. In fact, the sense of numbing despair is what Republicans want people to be feeling right now, so indulging in and ruminating on those feelings is likely to lead to a sense of helplessness and inaction.

When you can quiet your mind, or turn off the rumination, you get a sense of clarity about what needs to be done. I’m hardly a master, but I’ve seen this work in little ways in my own life.

I haven’t closely followed the news in quite some time, though I pick things up on this board and around. I haven’t been engaged in social media beyond this board in quite some time. I don’t think my social action has reached its full potential by a long shot, but I don’t really feel the need to add fuel to the already existing fire as I think about strategic direction.

My first instinct is to look to the masters - people throughout history who have faced political and social upheaval and made enduring change despite the challenges. I’m thinking Vietnamese social activist Thich Naht Hanh, Nelson Mandela, MLK, etc. So I guess what I’m going to do starts with that kind of research. I’m starting with Thich Naht Hanh’s model of engaged Buddhism, which will hopefully show me a path forward.

I have some personal issues to overcome if I’m going to do anything really useful, but this is my starting point. I may be shit at talking to people, but I’m always available in some behind-the-scenes administrative capacity, in the same way as my current activist work is in the form of grants administration.

Moderating:

Let’s dial back the snark, please. It’s not helpful in conversations where anxieties are already running high. Thanks.

I use my supply sparingly but it seems like this would be a very good reason to take something!

Do whatever you need for your sanity. Beetlejuice and a couple beers might do just as well.

I’m definitely going to vote (most likely as early as possible) and hope to be able with the vote count afterwards. I did that in a local election in 2022, and it was a great experience; that I was being paid helped a lot, but I would have done it on a volunteer basis.

I’ve been asked to be a poll worker, but you couldn’t pay me enough to do that.

I’m paying the same amount of attention to the news as usual. It’s probably too much, but that’s how it goes. And I’m planning a specific action.
I’m going to vote.
If only the rest of America would join me.

I recall one friend saying something like, “Me being upset about this won’t solve the problem.” Which made sense to me. Too much of my media consumption just makes me feel worse, rather than help me do anything positive.

WRT past elections/issues, I’ve intentionally fought the urge to make myself an expert on something I had no effect over, as that would not make me feel any better should the result turn out other than I believe is right.

I’m staying aware of the national news but skirting the details … articles like, “10 takeaways from the latest Supreme Court ruling” are a big nope for me right now.

If I were in a location where my activism might matter, I’d be out there working on things. But Hawaii is a very Democratic state, with no influence on presidential election outcomes (though god forbid Trump chooses Tulsi Gabbard for his VP).

I do pay close attention to local elections; luckily we have a really great news source that provides excellent coverage of where our mayor, County Council, and state legislative candidates stand. Usually in the week or two prior to election days I spend a lot of time reading the positions of all the candidates. I will do that again this year.

The outlook does seem incredibly bleak right now. Personally I will be okay, as I’m old, have enough savings to get by comfortably, and won’t live to see the worst impacts of global warming and right-wing dictatorial rule, but I am sorry about the world my son is inheriting. He doesn’t want to have children, and honestly that’s fine by me.

I hope things will improve, and it’s possible they will, but I’m not holding my breath.

I keep thinking how awful people felt during our other great horrific events. Since the Revolutionary war, The Civil war, the Great Wars, and all the devastating trials we’ve been through.

We survived, somehow we wormed our way out.
I don’t think the great experiment is over.

I still have hope.

I agree this is not a good time. I happen to believe Trump being president again is not the absolute worse thing that can happen. It will certainly set us back.

We must endeavor to perservere.