Katie+S’s+Final+AmEx+2013+Speech

=Political Hostility =

So over the past three years, I’ve been noticing something here at school that really makes me want to rip my hair out every time I overhear it (which is constantly) What I have noticed is students being openly hostile to each other over their differing political views. The worst is when someone calls someone else “stupid.” There are two glaring issues with this. The first being that we’re ALL stupid. Do you know how I know we’re all stupid? Because we’re all sixteen. Some people have done more research than others on some subjects, but since we're all children, we haven't REALLY had the responsibilities that give us the experiences needed to validate any political views we may have prematurely formed. This second issue with this is that usually, when someone calls someone else stupid, it's simply because they disagree with that person. They cannot fathom the fact that someone doesn’t agree with them, so they have to make up reasons as to why: they’re religious fanatic, they’re communist, they’re stupid. Not only is this blatant disrespect very immature, but it’s also completely pointless. Yelling and insulting a person about their ideas is NOT going to get them to change their mind, I promise. Why can’t we just accept that sometimes other people think other things? Just because someone's view or belief is different from yours doesn't make either one of you any more or less correct. If you want to get existential, you could go as far as saying the concept of "right" doesn't even exist. Nevertheless, people are going to have a wide range of opinions on things, and I’m not trying to use this speech to say that people shouldn’t have strong opinions or argue their positions. I’m just trying to say that people should be respectful when doing so. Just don’t bring ad-hominem attacks into your political arguments. It’s that easy. Another problem is that people also have prejudices against their opposition. Recently, someone assumed that I was a democrat. It wasn’t a big deal, but I was curious as to why they had assumed that. I have yet to affiliate myself with either party, and hardly voice my opinions because I haven’t formed very many yet. So what information was this person going off of to guess my political affiliations? Political differences can create (sometimes subconscious) passive aggression between people with opposing views. This is, in a way, worse than up-front hostility because it’s the permeation of politics in personal affairs. If a person meets someone from an opposing political party, they tend to subconsciously begin disagree with everything they say, because they feel like they should be disagreeing with someone of an opposite political party?  Strong opinions are great, they’re what make up our political system. But we shouldn’t let opposing political views determine our personal friendships, nor should we let them determine our willingness to come to a civil compromise with people in arguments. If we handled our affairs in a civilized manner, without either side exploding at the other and both sides being respectful of each other, not only would things get done a lot faster, but both sides could learn a lot from each other if they gave each other a chance In the America I want to grow old in, I hope there is less hostile political fighting amongst citizens and we can peacefully accept and embrace our differences.

=Cite Your Sources=