How have your political views changed over time?
Political beliefs do not usually explode overnight. They seep. They shift. They crack quietly, then all at once you notice the entire thing shifted. The same thing usually goes when we notice any change. Mine did exactly that.
Childhood Beliefs
As a kid, I was patriotic in the way kids are taught to be patriotic. Loud. Certain. Clean. I stood for the Pledge of Allegiance without thinking twice. I believed the United States was the best country in the world because that was the only option I was ever given. I supported the war in Iraq because the adults around me did, because the news said we were protecting freedom, because flags were everywhere and fear was louder than nuance. I sang patriotic songs from people like Toby Keith.
Young Adulthood
I wanted to join the Air Force. I wanted structure, purpose, a uniform that meant something. Later, I even thought I wanted to be a cop. I studied criminal justice. I believed in law, order, and the idea that justice was something you could train into people if you followed the rules hard enough. Which actually lead me to believe even more radicalized than I already was as a young transgender man. I thought I could graduate with a degree become a cop and change the entire system. Me just one man. I had big dreams I still do. Just not those ones.
Adulthood
As an adult life gained nuance and truth with experience. I now understand propaganda. More importantly I understand power and who typically had it. Through learning all of this I understand myself more and my wants more.
This is not a redemption arc. This is a record of unlearning.
Growing Up Patriotic, On Purpose
My early political worldview was not accidental. It was engineered.
Schools taught compliance before curiosity. Stand up. Hand on your heart. Repeat the words. Do not ask why. Bow or curtsy. Television framed war like a necessary sacrifice, not a calculated decision. The soldiers were heroes, the enemy was faceless, and the reasons were always simplified into good versus evil.
As a child, I absorbed that without resistance. I supported the war in Iraq because I did not know what imperialism was. I did not know how oil shaped foreign policy. I did not know how easily fear can be weaponized when wrapped in red, white, and blue. Now I notice blending these colors forms a bruise kind of like we leave every where we go.
I believed service equaled morality. I believed uniforms meant integrity. I believed authority existed to protect.
Those beliefs did not come from critical thinking. They came from repetition.
Wanting to Serve, Wanting to Belong
The desire to join the Air Force was not just about patriotism. It was about belonging. About being part of something bigger. About having a role that came pre-approved, pre-valued, and pre-respected.
Later, when that shifted into wanting to be a police officer, the logic stayed the same. I wanted to help. I wanted to keep people safe. I believed the system worked because I had not yet seen how selectively it worked.
Studying criminal justice cracked that illusion faster than anything else. This was the same time the murder of George Floyd was happing so my own lived experiences were ripping apart the seams of what I thought was true.
The deeper I went into the material, the harder it became to ignore patterns. Who gets arrested. Who gets sentenced. Who gets believed. Who gets forgiven. The answers were not random. They were structural. My lived experiences at this time were echoing this. The story’s from my friends, the stories in the news they echoed the same thing the books did.
I walked away from the career.
Not because I was lazy. I was paying attention.
Education Did Not Radicalize Me, Reality Did
There is a popular myth that education brainwashes people into being critical of the state. That is backwards.
Learning exposed the contradictions that were already there. While lived experiences showed the full truth.
I learned how laws are written, who they benefit, and who they harm. I learned how policing evolved, not as a neutral force, but as a tool of control. I learned how prisons function less as rehabilitation and more as warehouses for poverty, mental illness, and systemic neglect.
Once you see that, you cannot unsee it.
I could not reconcile the version of justice I was promised as a kid with the version I was studying as an adult.
So I stopped pretending they were the same thing.
If you were raised to believe something politically that later fell apart, what was the first crack for you?
Was it education, identity, loss, or seeing the system up close?
Comment with the moment that made you stop and rethink everything.
Understanding Propaganda for What It Is
Propaganda is most effective when you do not know it is propaganda.
It taught me that war was necessary, not profitable. That American violence abroad was defensive, not strategic. That questioning authority was ungrateful. That loyalty mattered more than truth.
Now I understand war as business. Oil. Resources. Influence. Power disguised as protection. I understand that young people are recruited through patriotism because it is cheaper than honesty.
I do not romanticize service anymore. I do not confuse sacrifice with morality. I do not believe harm becomes noble just because it wears a uniform.
That shift was not cynical. It was clarifying.
Queer, Not Just LGBT, If You Know You Know
Coming into my queerness reshaped everything.
Not the sanitized, corporate version of LGBT that gets rolled out during Pride Month. Queer, as in disruptive. Queer, as in refusing neat categories. Queer, as in living outside the narratives that were built to control bodies, families, and futures.
Being queer taught me that the system was never built with me in mind. That my safety was conditional. That my acceptance depended on how quiet, palatable, and profitable I could be. Coming out as trans really opened up my eyes to this.
You do not grow up queer and still believe the state loves you unconditionally.
Once you realize your existence is political by default, you stop pretending politics are abstract.
Why I No Longer Believe in “The Best Country” Myth
Believing you live in the best country in the world requires comparison, honesty, and accountability. I was taught the phrase without any of those things.
Now I understand that calling a country “the best” while ignoring its violence, inequality, and exported harm is not pride. It is denial.
I can acknowledge where I live without worshipping it. I can critique systems without hating people. I can want better without pretending we are already there.
Patriotism that cannot survive criticism is not loyalty. It is fragility.
Walking Away From Uniforms and Authority
I no longer want to join the military. I no longer want to be a cop. I no longer believe authority automatically equals protection.
That does not mean I reject responsibility or community care. It means I understand that safety does not come from domination. It comes from resources, equity, and accountability.
I refused to participate in systems I no longer believed were just.
That choice cost me the easy path.
It gave me integrity.
Where My Politics Live Now
My political views today are rooted in skepticism, compassion, and lived experience. I know the left and the right are two sides of the same system. I know when democrats get elected we pause and when republicans get elected they more shit more to the right. I am leftist scum. I am not a democrat. I am not a liberal. I am anti capitalist.
I question power. I center marginalized voices. I reject simple answers to complex harm. I understand that systems can be designed to fail certain people on purpose.
I believe liberation is collective, not individual. I believe survival should not require conformity. I believe queerness, art, and dissent are forms of resistance.
I am not neutral. I am informed.
My political views did not change because I was influenced by trends. They changed because the stories I was told as a child collapsed under the weight of reality.
I grew up pledging allegiance. I grew into asking questions. I grew out of believing violence equals virtue. I grew into understanding that propaganda thrives on silence and obedience.
This evolution is not something I regret. It is something I earned.
And I am still learning.
If this hit uncomfortably close, share it with someone who is still where you used to be, or someone who is unlearning alongside you.
Not to argue. Not to convert.
Just to remind them they are not broken for changing their mind, and neither are you.
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