Hillhead Review

One of my first politics lectures opened with a question: what is politics? Of course, every excited fresher searched their brain for the most intellectual sounding answer to prove their knowledge to either themselves, the person beside them, or perhaps both, therefore proving their right to be in that lecture theatre. Politics is your healthcare, your safety, your security, your finances, your freedoms, and even your ability to travel.

Despite its vast impact, many people continue to overlook their own social positions and privilege in our political world. They will reject harsh realities with claims of fearmongering or hide beneath the saying “ignorance is bliss”. Thomas Gray’s poem originated this phrase as he reminisced upon joyous, youthful memories in contrast with the gloom of adulthood responsibilities. However, we should remember that perspective is everything. It’s idealisation vs. reality, Hobbes vs. Locke, and Radiohead vs. Chappel Roan.

Experience determines how you view the world as it pushes the direction of your consciousness towards optimism or pessimism and self-awareness or self-absorption. Where Thomas Gray describes joy and innocence as childhood memories, someone else may remember hunger and disappointment. It’s easy to say that a balanced outlook on the past is better than complete optimism or pessimism, but then perhaps we could apply the same logic to the future, rather than the extremism that is currently rising.  

Some people will view feminism as decreasing in its necessity now that some women have more rights than they used to. Others will view the need for feminism to be as strong as ever, as they wish to feel safe walking alone and consider the lives of women globally, including women in Afghanistan, who are no longer able to speak in public.

Some people will look at the Palestine-Israel war and see the death toll as just numbers on a screen, completely desensitised to the destruction. Others will see the individuals that the numbers reflect and the future that was violently taken from them through war.

Some people will look at the Palestine-Israel war and see the death toll as just numbers on a screen, completely desensitised to the destruction.

To believe politics isn’t important and doesn’t affect you is to be naïve. It’s seldom to find a concept that entails almost every aspect of life, yet it is a challenge that politics fulfils. The blissful ignorance that some may preach can serve as a disguise for complicity. As children, we’re often taught that ignoring problems won’t make them go away. Yet as economies struggle and inequalities grow, people in privileged positions, who are able to educate themselves on causes of this or generate change, often fail to do so.

It’s too easy to take for granted the things you have that others don’t, through no fault of their own but due to a difference in circumstance. This is larger than if you can afford the latest iPhone, it’s the privilege you receive through education, internet access, freedom of speech, and more. What must be acknowledged but often goes disregarded, is that even without these, someone’s life is just as valuable as yours. We are all equally deserving of human rights and respect. Let the veil of idealisation fall away, not to crush your optimism but to adjust to a method that will work with all unbiased factors considered, to maximise success and display empathy and humanity. Learn to care and to be adaptable rather than becoming shaken by unforeseen consequences and being forced to learn.

It’s too easy to take for granted the things you have that others don’t, through no fault of their own but due to a difference in circumstance.

Whether you’re left or right-wing, both sides of the political scale demand respect from the other. The debates are endless as they go in circles, forwards and backwards, then backwards and forwards and side to side but satisfaction is yet to be found.

There are left-wing supporters who portray disappointment to anyone believing misinformation without fact checking it first, but then display their resentment for the barriers to education and information. There are right-wing supporters who use women’s safety to reason their discontent with immigration. Yet research shows that foreign nationals only made up between 15% and 22% of sexual offence convictions in 2024. It is as political debates ensue that we continue to mock one another in astonishment that we don’t all view the world through an identical lens, all while inequalities and the issues that aggravated us in the first place persist.

It is as political debates ensue that we continue to mock one another in astonishment that we don’t all view the world through an identical lens, all while inequalities and the issues that aggravated us in the first place persist.

In 1999 David Dunning and Justin Kruger introduced the Dunning-Kruger effect, a cognitive bias where a person overestimates their knowledge in a certain area, as a lack of self-awareness prevents them from forming a more accurate assessment of their knowledge. Prevention or resolution can be created through unbiased and periodic questioning of your own knowledge, as well as openly accepting advice and constructive criticism from those with more expertise on the subject. This is certainly a lot easier said than done and is a concept that lots of people probably don’t want to hear, possibly because it impacts most of us.It is as political debates ensue that we continue to mock one another in astonishment that we don’t all view the world through an identical lens, all while inequalities and the issues that aggravated us in the first place persist.

Privilege isn’t just about the people who are able to pay their problems away, even at the expense of achieving justice. It includes the people who understand politics, who have the time, the resources and the encouragement to read the news and remain up to date but choose to ignore it until it directly impacts them, while others are busy surviving or making ends meet. The ongoing problems on an individual, national or global level aren’t always the responsibility of one person, or even one politician, but the people that enable it too.

It is as extremism rises that I seem to be left wondering at what point the concept of humanity began to disappear and hatred took its place. Although that doesn’t apply to everyone, so many people claim that the world has gone mad with woke culture and extremism, discussing it as though nothing can be done. However instead we should consider how we ended up here, and try to find benevolence once again.