In the current political climate, it has become increasingly easy to polarize one’s political opinions to one extreme or another. However, the question has to be proposed: how factual are your opinions?

Current president of the United States, Donald J. Trump, has capitalized on a hostile political environment of name-calling and unfact-checked statements. Except, this is an environment that has been growing long before Trump’s first years in office. The median between Democrats and Republicans has seen a radical shift away from each other since 2011, as indicated by the Pew Research Center. This has split Americans. No longer can the American people easily agree on key values, and our ability to hold positive discourse has somewhat dissolved.

Somewhere within this spectrum or even outside this spectrum is each individual’s political stance. In recent times, can you say that you have not contributed to this bipartisan decline? Have your political stances been based more on facts and evidence or opinion and pre-established bias? It is this ability to form political opinion based on reasonable grounds, despite party of origin, that has sustained the American form of government for the last 250 years. Now, the republic is seeing one of the most divided periods it has ever experienced.

Our ability to reasonably think has been assaulted by buzzwords and contentious topics. If you agree with one thing, then you must either be Democrat or Republican. If you want to take the initiative on climate change, then you must be a Democrat. If you disagree with the actions of ICE, then you could not possibly be a Republican.

The idea that these issues belong to one party rather than both has resulted in a pull away from each other so extreme that it has allowed our politics to become a mess. The idea of our system is not for one party to submit to another but for both to come together for the betterment of the people as a whole. When that system fails, then America runs the risk of losing what allowed America to come together as a strong community in the first place. Citizens are meant to disagree, but they are also meant to find middle ground.

Community is built on collaboration – not the absence of it. The ability to base political stances on facts is extremely important. It is those votes that influence the way citizens govern themselves and initiate change within our communities.

So what can you do? In this time of extreme political alienation, the biggest difference that can be made as an individual is to form political stances on reasonable grounds without the guidance of another’s stance. Double and triple-check your sources. Compare and contrast your ideas against each other, but most importantly, hold civil discourse. If the United States is to ever recover politically, then the ability for its people to speak to each other civilly must return first. Humble yourself, be willing to be wrong and be gracious when you are right. If the citizens of the United States cannot concur on healthy discourse, then there is no standard for Congress to uphold or be held to.

A portion of Tualatin High School’s student body will soon be or already is eligible to vote. Each and every vote counts for something; it is the way that a citizen is heard within America’s system of politics. Whether that vote is informed is the responsibility of the voter.

For the time being, the United States remains divided. Recently, the U.S. has entered into armed conflict with Iran, protests are happening country-wide regarding the deployment of ICE into communities, and the Epstein files have been partially released, implicating numerous high-profile individuals, all contributing to a cultural and social shift. So many things are happening at once, and there is so much to say. It is during this time that it is most important to be informed before taking a strong political stance.

Editorials represent the majority opinion of The Wolf staff and, therefore, remain unsigned. Any questions or comments can be submitted to Lisa Lacy’s mailbox in the main office or to [email protected].