Stealth politics

Tonight, upon going back to my friends' flat for a post-drinks drink, I found myself engaged in Unexpected Political Conversation. Stealth politics is the worst kind in my opinion, catching you unawares as you slip into a vodka haze and attempting, with indifferent success, to wrench you back into the real world. I'm the first to admit I know nothing of politics. I don't watch the news or read the papers if I can possibly avoid it. What little I do know has been gleaned from such reliable sources as Mock the Week and GMTV. Yet somehow I found myself attempting to defend my determination not to apply to be a justice of the peace. The debate was confused by my never having heard of the term before tonight, but relieved by the tendency of my challengers to fight amongst themselves. Despite this, the more I tried to explain myself, the more I was backed into a corner. Every reason I gave to express my reasoning for not believeing myself to be a suitable candidate was turned against me. Apparently, in some kind of bizarre Catch 22 scenario, it is my very conviction of my unsuitability that makes me ideally suited to such a position. Personally I don't believe that the asylum would be any better served by putting the lunatics in charge, however corrupt the current administration, but I'm reliably informed that my tendency to think this way is due to some kind of social conditioning. Drunk as I was - and still am as it happens - I found it hard to articulate my feelings on the subject. In fact, I find it hard to articulate my feelings on such subjects generally, because I'm not actually sure what my feelings are. I admire these friends enormously for their strength of belief and courage of conviction, but it is something that seems to be lacking in myself. I don't know whether I suffer from a generationally inherent apathetic malaise, whether I'm lazy, or whether I just dont care enough, but I find it hard to summon up much feeling about politics. I care enormously for the rights of individuals, but can't seem to concern myself about the public at large. I wonder sometimes what it would take to make me really angry on a political level. I also fear that I may be soon to find out, if the Tories get back into power at the upcoing election. Is it so very naive of me to wish that things could just be simple? That the country could be ruled by good, well-informed types who have the best interests of the people at heart? That the justice system could operate for the good of all, with 'good' and 'bad' functioning as perfect binary opposites with no murky shades of grey? I don't know why I even express it as a question. Of course it's naive. But that doesn't stop me wishing. And deep down I know why I could never be a justice of the peace. Because it would break my heart to have to see the way that people are failed every day by the systems that are supposed to be there to support them. I have no faith in my own ability to change things, and no courage to force myself to watch what I can't change.