Anti-Politics
January 16th, 2026
As an American citizen I am arguing not to participate in the political process. To disengage from civic involvement.
I recently subscribed to The Economist publication to gather more information on news. I've found that while I am more up-to-date on news, my behavior has not changed in a positive manner.
To learn something means to change your behavior, and what we choose to learn changes our behaviors in certain ways.
When I read the news, my mind spirals and loses control of my ability to influence and enact change.
I find that I am at my best whenever I choose the things I learn very carefully, and focus my mind on things that are within my control.
We engage in politics, to what end? Likely for the betterment of yourself. If it's for the betterment of your own position, why engage in politics since it's detrimental to mental and physical health? A publication from National Geographic confirms:
But it wasn’t until the 9/11 attacks that Silver, a professor of psychology, medicine, and public health at the University of California, Irvine, began to understand just how harmful the media could be. She discovered, after tracking people for three years, that the more people engaged with news about the terrorist attacks, the more likely they were to report mental and physical health problems over time.
It's not healthy to consume negative news all the time, flat out. There's something psychological at play, and it'd be inhumane to not recognize that all humans are succeptible to this.
Is it worth the tradeoff? On the internet, many people say there's not a choice, but is that really true? I believe there's always a choice.
I hear people on the internet say it's a "privilege" to not keep up with the news. Is it? I believe that if it's important enough that people around you will inform you. Sure, you're reliant on word of mouth, but hasn't it always been that that was the case? Since time to antiquity?
I'm starting to doubt the positive benefits of reading the news. Have I actually gained anything beneficial having engaged with the news cycle? The answer is no, and I think a lot of people on the internet especially don't want to admit this, since it invalidates their feelings of anxiety and concern.
I'm not saying that their concerns and anxieties aren't real, they very well are, but reality can be painted in many ways, and in many strokes. My question to you is, do you want to paint your reality with that stroke? And then proceed to have no power to change any of it.
Every minute a child dying of starvation in some third world country. Every minute someones civil liberties and freedoms are being overriden by a totalitarian government. And every minute there's some sort of issue out in the world where conflict is being enacted in the name of love.
It's true. There's a lot of evil in the world. And there's a lot of evil in our backyard. The news won't change that. The news won't change that fact either.
Let me ask you, what can you do to change that? By focusing on what you can control. By generating wealth and resources and helping people.
Why is California such a nice, liberal place to live? Because it's a rich state. Companies, trade, gold, the whole of it is materially wealthy. There's enough to go around, so there's little problems here.
That's why so many people want to live here. There's so much more opportunity.
Helping the generation of wealth and distribution of resources, that's what will bring prosperity.
I don't think you should read the news or engage deeply in politics. It engages stress, wears down the body, and creates unnecessary stress reminding yourself that it's a terrible world out there.
I do think it's a terrible world out there. I don't need to read news to reconfirm that fact.
I want to ask you though, what can you do when you hear terrible news?
Nothing. There's nothing you can do. And it only serves you worse to hear that, because you'll just hear that you are less and less capable. It's useless.
If you are one of the human beings who can compartmentalize the stress from reading news very easily, I applaud you. But I am not one of those human beings, and reading terrible news frankly makes me feel terrible.
If a loved one does present an article to me, I understand though that it's not my sadness they are looking for, it's to be seen. They want their suffering to be seen and acknowledged. I do not need to be sad with them, though I may be, but I must acknowledge the suffering they are experiencing.
Action
I spoke with ChatGPT and asked for critique. The biggest critique was me saying that "there was nothing I could do" wasn't necessarily true. That I could participate in rallies and consider a career shift.
Essentially, that there was something I could do, and the manifesto style essay here bleeds into learned helplessness, which isn't necessarily true. There's a lot that can be done.
But is it a lever worth pulling?
I think there are levers for sure, but is it worth the effort of me pulling? As far as the change I can enact, and the question is is how strongly do I feel to change my life to fix these issues?
Frankly, I don't think my life is bad enough for me to try and pull these levers.
If I wanted more power to change these things, it'd be more in my best interest to make more money, enough to make movement in these spheres. Or, consider a career change, of which I am unwilling to do.
Focus on getting a lot of money first, accumulating power, then I can make meaningful difference. Otherwise, do I really care? Not really.