Why I Still Believe in Ideas
I’m not a political scientist. I’m not a pundit or a strategist. I’m a citizen—a father, a writer, a teacher—trying to make sense of the world I’ve inherited and the world I’m handing to the next generation.
And here’s what I see:
We are drowning in noise and starving for ideas.
We are so busy defending teams, slogans, and party lines that we’ve forgotten what politics is for.
Politics, at its core, is supposed to be the moral imagination applied to reality. It’s where we decide, together, how we will live, care, build, and protect each other. But somewhere along the way, politics became a performance—louder, meaner, emptier—until it stopped being about ideas and started being about winning.
And if we don’t reclaim it, we will lose not just elections, but the world we live in.
The Empathy War
When did empathy become controversial?
I’ve felt it as a writer, a teacher, and now as a father watching books disappear from shelves. Stories that once taught us to love the outsider—mutants, rebels, prophets, misfits—are now labeled “too political.” X-Men, once a tale of survival and identity, now seen as subversion. Star Wars, once about rebellion, now dismissed as “woke” when it dares to diversify.
But stories have always been political. They teach us how to see each other. They teach us how to care. And if caring is now a political act, then let me be political.
Because empathy isn’t weakness. It’s the most radical thing we can offer in an age determined to starve us of it.
Who Owns the Myth?
Myths are not static. Every generation remixes them. But today, we’re watching a hostile takeover of the myths we live by.
Star Wars was never just about space wizards. It was about fighting empire. X-Men was never just about superpowers. It was about the pain and power of difference. Even Christianity, at its root, was a radical call to mercy, to care for the hungry, the prisoner, the outcast.
But these myths are being privatized, turned into brands and power tools, stripped of their empathy until all that remains is nostalgia without substance.
And it’s not just stories. It’s us. It’s what we’re willing to see in the mirror, and what we’re willing to fight for.
The Collapse of Redemption Culture
We used to love redemption arcs. Now we’re terrified of them.
We cancel people not only for what they do, but for what they symbolize. We exile, erase, and move on, because it’s easier than wrestling with the truth that people are complicated, change is messy, and growth hurts.
Stories taught us how to hold people accountable and still root for their future. We need to remember that.
Why We’re So Afraid
I get it. We’ve lived through 9/11, endless wars, recessions, pandemics, January 6th. The ground never stops moving, so we cling to what we know: purity, outrage, mythic simplicity.
But complexity is the only way through. It’s the only path to a politics rooted in reality.
Reimagining the Civic Contract
Government is not the enemy. At its best, it is the collective will to protect, support, and build.
Yet the right obsesses over tearing things down in the name of “freedom” while ignoring that true freedom requires stability and opportunity. The left, meanwhile, has failed to defend the value of government itself, letting “government is the problem” become the dominant narrative.
It’s time to reclaim the idea that good government is infrastructure for human flourishing.
The Impossible Blueprint
We are told that systemic change is impossible. But systems are only untouchable when we agree not to touch them.
So here’s what I believe:
- Lifelong, mastery-based education: Learning should never stop, and it should be about mastery, not competition. Education should be a platform, not a funnel.
- Basic Civic Income: Value the invisible labor that holds communities together—care, creativity, service—and ensure everyone has a stable floor, not as charity, but as respect.
- Wealth Without Exploitation: Wealth is not the enemy; exploitation is. Let’s dismantle the scaffolding of cruelty that ambition climbs.
- The Advocate–Listener Class: Human systems need human witnesses. Establish paid, trained, embedded community listeners and helpers who ensure people are seen and heard.
These ideas aren’t radical because they’re wrong; they’re radical because the current system is broken.
America First, But Which America?
“Make America Great Again.” Okay, but when?
Was it during slavery? Jim Crow? When women couldn’t vote? When LGBTQ people had to live in hiding?
If your nostalgia only works when others are erased, it’s not greatness. It’s dominance.
America is beautiful not because of what it is, but because of what it says it wants to be. A country built on an aspiration: democracy, justice, equality. It’s time to live up to that, not hide behind slogans.
Greenville as Microcosm
I live in Greenville, SC, a city that looks like it’s thriving, but is deeply segregated beneath the surface. The wealth of the city depends on the labor of those it refuses to see.
We mistake privilege for progress. We polish the surface while ignoring what’s rotting underneath. And if we don’t build bridges across these divides, we will collapse under our own hypocrisy.
The Untouchable Hydra
The military-industrial complex is the clearest example of our contradictions: a socialist system that exists only to preserve global capitalism through force. We fund war while starving schools, healthcare, and the systems that make a society worth defending.
If we can’t care for veterans after they serve, if we can’t care for our own people, what exactly are we defending?
This Is About Balance
I don’t want to burn down capitalism, but I don’t want to bow to it either. I don’t want endless government, but I don’t want its absence. We need a society where people can grow, create, contribute, and live with dignity.
We are not demanding equality of outcome, but we must demand dignity of access.
We don’t need more consumers. We need more creators.
We don’t need obedience to a system. We need participation with it.
This is not utopia. It’s a functional future. And it’s worth fighting for.
Why I’m Writing This
I’m writing this because I’m tired of pretending that what we have is good enough.
I’m tired of pretending that parties will save us, that brands will save us, that nostalgia will save us.
They won’t.
Only we can do that, by reclaiming politics as the place where ideas matter again.
We have to remember: We still have a choice.
We can live under the hydra of systems designed to keep us divided, exhausted, and small.
Or we can build something better. Together.
If you’re tired, I see you. If you’re afraid, I hear you. If you’re ready, let’s start.
We have stories to tell, ideas to test, systems to reimagine, and a world to build.
Not for the sake of winning arguments, but for the sake of becoming more human, together.
Frank M. Anderson's Writing 
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