My grandparents paid attention to politics, as did many in the United States at the time. TV news was watched, no Internet, lot of newspaper reading.
They were sent to Tule Lake and interned for being Japanese-American all the same; their possessions stolen by a government who doesn't care if its citizens "care" about politics.
The average person has no control over "politics." Caring about it didn't save my grandparents, nor the protests of all of their friends.
No one took care of that dirty work. That's the great delusion.
Are you willing to die for what you believe in? And, before one answers this hastily, think about it.
I have come to realize most are quite selfish in various way, myself included.
Your point is well taken. Certainly there are issues and problems that gravely trouble people of integrity and good conscience.
However, while sometimes there are things we can do within our own lives to address those issues and problems, often there isn't any way to have a measurable impact.
That's not to say we should just give up. On the contrary, I think it's important to try to improve the lives of those around us within the scope of our focus, abilities and resources.
When I was a young man (in my twenties), I would often wonder if the work I was doing (tech) was really making the world a better place in a serious way. That really bothered me for a while.
But I came to realize that while we can't all have a measurable, global positive impact on the world, we most certainly can have a local positive impact on the people and world around us.
Do I create better working conditions for people in Bangladesh? No. Can I genetically engineer a more effective SARS-CoV2 vaccine? No.
But I can treat those around me with respect, act with integrity and support my community. I can do constructive work within my chosen profession. And I can speak out when I see injustice, intolerance and hate.
Will that end the pandemic or halt the war in Syria or end world hunger and poverty? No.
But if I can do my part to lift up those near me, act with honesty and integrity and create constructive solutions for the projects I contribute to, I can be satisfied that I'm having a positive impact on the world around me.
None of that requires that I be willing to die for that, but that doesn't mean I'm not having a measurable, positive impact on the world.
So, really, what you're asking is whether people are willing to, once they start acting in a way which risks their life, continue acting in that same way. And it turns out that the vast majority of people killed by this reasoning are killed by genocide or as collateral damage of war; they're swept away by hate and violence which they did not invite.
The question really should be, then, rather one is willing to risk their life for the specific action of interrupting those who are trying to kill others in this way. And such interruptions often turn out to not be very risky, unless the interruption is happening very late in the process, at the moment of violence. It was not risky to yell at street fascists in 2017, before they were creating so many street fights, because they were not yet strong enough to simply fight, but instead had to justify their hate before a largely non-violent crowd. Now in 2021, though, yelling at street fascists is dangerous, but referring them to the FBI is relatively safe. What was acceptable praxis has changed.
From this POV, we must recontextualize your original message. Who is pushing and shoving? Fascists. Who are they pushing and shoving? Undesired minorities. By what means are you allowed to be selfish? Well, you might not be in an affected class! This is a failure of solidarity. You must be willing to defend the rights of others, if you expect them to defend your rights as well.
Allow me to introduce a few samples who disagree with your nuanced analysis.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_genocides_by_death_tol...
Pragmatism cannot be escaped simply by complaining that I am pedantic. Saying something is an action. Practicing a ritual is an action. Dressing a certain way is an action. Eating certain foods is an action.
Recall that your original post insinuated that most people are too selfish to choose to die for their beliefs. I am trying to explain to you that people do not choose to die for their beliefs; rather, they choose to take certain actions, and then their killers choose to kill them because of those actions. It is the selfishness of those personal actions which we are considering.
And, once we have achieved this scale, we can clearly see that killing itself is an action. It is simply another tool for achieving our selfish ends. A person can choose to selfishly kill as many people as they can reach. This suggests that our morality needs to not just account for making the choice to "die for what you believe in", but also the choice to kill for what you believe in.
Finally, let us consider the context of your original comment. The comment recounted a tale of folks who were sent to concentration camps in the USA during WW2. They claimed that the average person has no control over federal politics; you agreed and asked people to consider how they would prefer selfishly to not stick their necks out for the sake of ending the concentration camps. However, there are two grand ironies there: first, that we today claim to have entered WW2 in order to destroy concentration camps; and second, that we today have concentration camps on our southern border.
I don't know exactly what your point is, since you're not using your words well, but I think that you should take a step back and try to figure out where you're headed. I have the luxury of an elected representative who already is trying to close down the concentration camps, so I know which side I'm on.
>I know that you want to have an attitude where you are indignant that I am minimizing genocide and war
No.
I re-read your original message. Your examples in some can be prevented by interrupting specific actions, as you describe it. Indeed speech, clothing, ritual, and any other behavior can be interrupted. For the OP, how would s/he interrupt being Asian?
>people do not choose to die for their beliefs; rather, they choose to take certain actions, and then their killers choose to kill them because of those actions
What is the substantive difference? I am also uncertain on "kill them because of those actions", or more precisely I do not believe there is a way for making such nuanced distinction. Looking through the list of genocides, I am hard pressed to find a set of actions that could have been interrupted to prevent death. At State level, maybe.
> This suggests that our morality needs to not just account for making the choice to "die for what you believe in", but also the choice to kill for what you believe in.
I had no disagreement with this statement in your first post, which is why I did not comment to it.
>concentration camps on our southern border
I do not know what country you live in.
>I don't know exactly what your point is
My original post was in response to describing the current willingness to '"care" about politics' but not to "die for" or "kill for".
(As part of the "kill for", I am certain neither of us are advocating murderous rampage, but more like a para-/military action to liberate.)
Again, appreciate your responses.
Also, please stop using HN primarily for political battle. We ban accounts that do that (regardless of which politics they're battling for), because it destroys what HN is supposed to be for. I had to go quite a way back in your comment history to get to a place where you weren't doing that. Fortunately I eventually found it so I'm not going to ban you right now, but can you please review https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html and use HN in the intended spirit?