I agree that sometimes “everything is politics” might lead to unsavory conversations. My goal is not to defend that.

I think our goal in places like Lemmy is to communicate and understand each other, and, because of it (in the best of cases), live better lives.

How could “everything is politics” possibly lead to better lives? We may learn how our everyday actions —so-called “apolitical” actions— actually ripple out in ways that we actually care about.

For example, we may stop buying Awful Corp.'s bread and instead buy from our local bakery. We may stop assuming protein in our diet means misery-filled and climate-unfriendly meat and instead eat more healthy lentils, beans, and pea protein. We may stop buying purebred dogs from suffering-inducing puppy mills and instead adopt dogs. We may stop being brutal with ourselves because we didn’t turn out as the media says we should’ve turned out and instead hold ourselves wholly and kindly while we ourselves choose what kind of life we want.

Saying “everything is politics” opens up a door. We walk into a room in which we can choose. We can choose what kinds of stories we want more of and what kinds of stories we want less of.

Sometimes we cannot do anything about the things that hurt, but we can hold them in our hands as precious, fully aware of what it means to be human. Other times we can indeed get closer to the things we care about, and we can take steps toward it, confident that we are living lives worth living.