Bad rap for politics

politics have a bad rap, i cant tell you how many times i hear "politicians are all liars and crooks" or "voting doesn't matter, its not like my one vote counts" and those statements always piss me off. Here's why... first off not all politicians are liars, you can roll your eyes if you want and be cynical but that's an overblown statement, second, one vote does matter especially since not voting is an epidemic and no one has a good reason for not doing it. It seems to me people thinks its cool to knock the system, by not voting they are somehow protesting what they see as a broken system, well sorry to break the news to you but not voting is the least effective form of protest, by not voting you have no voice at all. It's not cool to be lazy or uninformed, i also know several people who vote blindly, because of their parents,friends,church or just what they hear from a single source without educating themselves on the whole picture. That is even worse than not voting at all.  Fact is people that don't vote because it "doesn't matter" are just too lazy or stupid to do any real investigation into things, and people who don't learn all sides and instead just listen to someone else's unfounded or ill informed views are again too lazy or stupid to do the work, and both are selfish.

Also, politics are a part of everything, from education to science to religion to business, to families, all are run politically, think about in all of those things i mentioned there is a pecking order, a hierarchy, someones in charge and some are members and others just do as their told. families,churches,schools all vote on things, whether formally or informally they all decide what to do either through democracy (e.g. a vote at church by leaders and members) or through a dictatorship (e.g. parents/teachers telling kids what to do) both are political systems, politics have been around longer than anything else, its the structure of things, and whether you are conformist or rebel you have  political structure you live by, yes rebels even you have rules, less rules are still rules.

I'm not saying politics are perfect, nothing in this world is because everything is run by people and we are flawed, but we cant throw out the baby with the bath water... if there is something we like or dont like we need to be vocal, not disrespectful, or overly quick to judge, but a healthy debate on things is lacking in today's world, i don't see many examples of people being able to question something without being condemned to hell or called "un-American" or accused of being a Nazi or a communist, what the hell, is this 40s/50s WWII /Sputnik paranoia all over again??? wake up people, politics aren't perfect but they are a vital tool of life, religion,science,politics,math cant save the world by themselves, that's not how it works, they all work together, its like a hammer,nails,screwdriver and saw, alone they can each do their jobs but together they can help build something bigger than themselves, don't you want that? don't you want to be more?