I've wished for decades that we would do away with political parties and ideological labels, and instead just convene as concerned citizens, discuss actual problems, work together to find solutions, be open to people poking holes into our arguments, all with a shared goal of making society better for us all. Unfortunately, it seems to be human nature to divide into cliques. I've seen this at every workplace I've ever been at. In politics, cliques often divide into smaller cliques. We already have this idea of American exceptionalism, which may be most pronounced on the right, but it very much exists on the left as well--this idea that America > everyone else. Then, within America, we of course have "the left" and "the right (and "moderates," which still suggests a political binary). Then you look within the two major sides, and there are even smaller divisions--fiefs within fiefs, if you will. The right has their more traditional small-government, low-taxes, church-going conservatives as well as MAGA, and I suppose libertarians as well (they could be considered their own thing, but most libertarians I know prefer non-MAGA Republicans over Democrats, and if they're non-religious, they're more likely to be part of this wing of "the right"). Among the left, we have liberals, leftists, progressives, welfare capitalists, democratic socialists--whatever label one prefers to differentiate from those liberals. That's not even getting into the single-issue voters (i.e. people who hate abortion but don't give a shit about same-sex marriage, or people who care about economic issues but are indifferent to immigration). Those divisions can also include other factors such as city dwellers vs. suburbanites vs. rural people, religious beliefs (and even sects within the same religion), racial divides... heck, even sportsball teams. We love to create our own divisions even when it comes to hobbies.
Even if the labels aren't anything officially recognized within our Constitution, we treat them as if they are part of the system by design, not just in the media (i.e. through televised debates to which third-party candidates are seldom ever invited), but even on various states' voting ballots, wherein candidates are labelled by political party. And yet, even if we put a stop to this practice, I feel like our political discourse would still be consumed by ideological labels, purity tests, and various cliques within cliques within cliques. This ideal system of "let's have a conversation to solve problems" may be a pipe dream, but I would love to be proven wrong.
Even if the labels aren't anything officially recognized within our Constitution, we treat them as if they are part of the system by design, not just in the media (i.e. through televised debates to which third-party candidates are seldom ever invited), but even on various states' voting ballots, wherein candidates are labelled by political party. And yet, even if we put a stop to this practice, I feel like our political discourse would still be consumed by ideological labels, purity tests, and various cliques within cliques within cliques. This ideal system of "let's have a conversation to solve problems" may be a pipe dream, but I would love to be proven wrong.