It is kinda funny how a forum which prides itself on not discussing politics is based on a political system (the anonymous democracy of karma). Every time a poster stops to consider whether his post will be upvoted or downvoted, he is engaging in politics.
Politics as in “politics is the mind-killer” doesn’t mean “involvement with the polis”; it means “entanglement with factional identity”. We routinely touch on the former; insofar as “raising the sanity waterline” can be taken as a goal, for example, it’s inextricably political in that sense. But most of the stuff we’ve historically talked about here isn’t strongly factionalized in the mainstream.
If you’re posting on something that is and you stop to consider its reception, of course, you’re engaging in politics in both senses. But that’s the exception here, not the rule.
Politics as in “politics is the mind-killer” doesn’t mean “involvement with the polis”; it means “entanglement with factional identity”. We routinely touch on the former; insofar as “raising the sanity waterline” can be taken as a goal, for example, it’s inextricably political in that sense. But most of the stuff we’ve historically talked about here isn’t strongly factionalized in the mainstream.
If you’re posting on something that is and you stop to consider its reception, of course, you’re engaging in politics in both senses. But that’s the exception here, not the rule.