Ripple effect -24
Mrs. Ramya Sethu Ram M.E
If you are thinking politics is only for grown-ups, pause for a moment. Politics doesn’t begin when you vote; it begins the day you are born.
Someone decides your name, the language you hear first, the food you eat, the stories you grow up with, what is encouraged, and what is silenced. These quiet decisions shape your world long before you are aware of them.
The Question of Belonging
At its core, politics is about belonging. It asks silent questions, Do I matter? Am I seen? Am I safe here?
These questions are not taught. They are felt. And the answers stay with us longer than we realise.
Fairness Is Our First Political Lesson
We first understand politics through fairness. On a playground, who gets a turn, who makes the rules, and who gets forgiven teaches us about power. When rules feel fair, trust grows. When they don’t, emotions rise. This is where politics begins to shape feelings.
Why Politics Is Emotional
Politics carries emotions because it touches real lives. It hurts when voices go unheard, when lived experiences are dismissed, and when decisions made far away shape everyday realities. Pain in politics is not weakness; it is proof of care.
But this emotional space often becomes crowded with conflict. Many people grow distant from politics not because they don’t care, but because of the constant fights that surround it. When conversations turn into battles, when opponents stop seeing each other as humans and start seeing only sides, politics begins to feel heavy and hostile.
Repeated arguments, broken relationships, and endless noise make people step back, not out of ignorance, but out of exhaustion. Dinner tables grow tense, family gatherings fall silent, friendships pause, and social spaces turn into arenas where winning matters more than understanding. Over time, this turns into dislike, even hatred, not for politics itself, but for the way it is practiced without empathy. What pushes people away is not disagreement, but disrespect.
