Pick a policy, not a team
Sorry, it means thinking.
In case you didn’t notice, things are a little, ‘politically charged’, shall we say, at the moment. And I’ve been thinking about this thing we do: pick a political side and then treat it like a lifelong brand loyalty programme. Like, “I’m left-wing, so I must agree with everything Labour says” or “I’m on the right, therefore Reform UK is basically Jesus with a Union Jack.” People seem to have given up thinking (more than usual) and just started to blindly align. It’s stopped being about politics and become everything about personality.
It doesn’t that at some point, the political sides stopped standing for anything and started existing purely to oppose each other. Politics became tribal. You can say that’s been a thing forever, and maybe it has, but with media ramming it down our throats, it feels so much more pronounced than I can remember. It’s ‘you’re either with us or you’re the enemy’. That’s why we’ve people from both sides of the political spectrum frothing at the mouth over policies they haven’t even read. Doesn’t matter if it’s good or bad – all that matters is which colour rosette proposed it. Everyone’s on ideological autopilot.
Picking a team is easier than thinking
And look, I get it. It’s comfortable. It saves time. Why bother wading through party manifestos that get discarded like late night kebabs, when you can just parrot whatever your side says and get that dopamine hit from being ‘on the right side of history’ (whichever side that is this week)?
But the thing is, political parties aren’t carved from moral granite. They’re a patchwork of humans with conflicting interests, bad ideas, good intentions, and a heavy dose of PR bollocks.
Blind loyalty means swallowing policy after policy without ever checking the label. You wouldn’t do that with food. You wouldn’t say, “Well, I’ve always loved Greggs, so I’ll eat this Chicken Bake even though it smells like bin juice and contains 4% actual chicken.”
So why do it with politics?
Your party isn’t your personality
It’s no secret I’m left-wing. I believe in public services, social welfare, progressive taxation and that human rights shouldn’t have footnotes. I like evidence-based democratic socialism. Socially progressive, economically left, science-led, allergic to bullshit – from all sides.
But I also think personal responsibility matters, the state should be effective – not bloated – and sometimes market competition can drive better results (just not for bloody water companies, it seems). I want a government that supports, not smothers. And I don’t think patriotism has to mean nationalism or nostalgia.
This doesn’t mean I co-sign every steaming turd Labour drops on the doorstep. Some of it’s timid. Some of it is plain old daft. Some of it feels like it’s been assembled by a focus group made entirely of Guardian columnists and soft-boiled eggs.
Same goes for the other side. I know people who’d be considered right-wing but have views that don’t fit the caricature. They think immigration is a good thing but should be managed better. They like the NHS but want more accountability. They don’t want tax breaks for billionaires, but they also don’t want to see their council tax funding another minister’s second luxury duck pond.
Because most people live somewhere in the ideological mushy middle. They’re not extremists. They just want housing that isn’t a clown show, schools that aren’t collapsing and a government that doesn’t actively siphon money into a flaming bin.
You’re allowed to like things from the ‘wrong’ side
There are left-wing policies that appeal to people on the right. And there are right-wing ideas that make sense to people on the left – even if they’d rather eat broken glass than admit it.
You can be pro-LGBT rights and still think biological sex matters in some discussions (I do). You can want strong environmental protections and still think some net-zero deadlines are performative fantasy. You can believe in a welfare state and still get pissed off at people gaming the system.
None of that makes you a traitor. It makes you a functioning adult who can hold more than one idea in your head without having a full meltdown. Shocker.
Think your own thoughts, ffs
This is probably the saddest part: far too many people haven’t actually thought about what they believe – why they believe it. They’ve just adopted the party line and reinforced it through social media bubbles, political influencers and increasingly unhinged podcasts.
Ask them about tax thresholds, and you’ll get a soundbite. Ask them why they oppose a policy and you’ll get “Well, you know…” and a harrumph. Ask them to name one thing their side got wrong and watch their eye glaze over as they quickly backtrack to some conjured-up bullshit.
But if your politics, your ideologies, can’t survive scrutiny, maybe they’re not actually yours.
You don’t have to agree with everything. In fact, you probably shouldn’t.
No party should have 100% of your allegiance. That’s not how representative democracy works. They represent you, not the other way around. You’re allowed to go, “Hmm, that bit’s bollocks,” even if it’s your team saying it.
Being politically engaged doesn’t mean picking a side and sticking with it no matter what. It means knowing what you believe and why. It means asking hard questions, even if the answers are uncomfortable. It means voting for policies, not personalities. And it definitely means not becoming a party mascot on Twitter/X, barking “WHAT ABOUT THE TORY SCUM?!” every time someone points out a flaw.
Parties don’t love you back
Political parties are not your friends. They don’t love you. They don’t owe you loyalty. They’ll U-turn, rebrand, sack leaders, adopt the opposite position in two years and pretend they never said the first thing. You’re a vote. A number. A demographic box.
So stop treating politics like a relationship you’re too scared to leave. You’re allowed to disagree. You’re allowed to demand better. You’re allowed to think.
Honestly, it’s encouraged.