I guess how I understand the “everything is political” thing is that every idea has a political angle. Maybe that is a helpful distinction. Like… the discovery of penicillin isn’t political - it’s the result of someone exploring the biological world looking for medically useful things - but the fact that we paid someone money to do that was the result of a bunch of political choices like money for hospitals and schools, a system of government and taxation to supply that money. And the consequences of it’s creation had geopolitical consequences like a change in the cost in lives of waging war, or changing some sexually transmitted infections from deadly to treatable which in turn changed our social values around sex.
The truth isn’t political. But what we choose to study, and what we do with the things we learn is political. Politics is just a second-order phenomenon. There is what is happening, and politics is how we feel about what’s happening and what we’d like the collective humanity to do about that.
The truth isn’t political. But what we choose to study, and what we do with the things we learn is political. Politics is just a second-order phenomenon. There is what is happening, and politics is how we feel about what’s happening and what we’d like the collective humanity to do about that.