Comments from the Peanut Gallery: Politics, satire and drinking

Since arriving in the United States, I’ve spent most of my summers living at home, in a suburb of DC. However, this past summer was the first time I felt tuned into popular life in our capital city. I commuted early in the morning in cramped Metro cars with hundreds of others, frequented happy hours with my coworkers at $3 margarita bars in DuPont Circle and donned “J-Crew hip” attire (think pattern pencil skirts and statement necklaces). But I quickly realized that election years bring an entirely different array of challenges for your token assimilating expat -- from understanding campaign finance and the Electoral College to Donald Trump.

Politics -- its satire and drinking -- became integral parts of the everyday, and the makers of any good weekend. Though when it came to the popular political debate drinking games, there was something about it that I just couldn’t stomach.

The more liberal side of the city (and honestly, the part I am more engaged with) went wild with parties and drinking events. Sponsored by local bars, CNN, Rolling Stone and even the DNC (Democratic National Committee), drinking games were said to be a “coping mechanism” for Democrats to listen to more conservative Republican politics.

With your $40 dollar purchase at the DNC (now on sale from its original $45 dollars) you will receive, according to their website, “Four (4) 'I survived the GOP Debates' 16 oz plastic cups, Four (4) "I survived the GOP Debates" lapel stickers (please only wear these if you do survive!), and One 50-sheet bingo pad to play our official GOP Debate Bingo game with your friends.”

While undeniably clever, both as humor and as a political maneuver, the phenomenon does enlighten a concerning lack of faith in the capacity of the opposition. For instance, The Rolling Stone drinking queues included, most notably, drink when “the crowd cheers a racist/bigoted statement by a candidate” or a candidate “tries to speak Spanish.” The games do not only focus on enduring the contrarian politics and policies, but instead imply the ineptitude, disrespect and immorality of the opposition party politicians.

In contrast, most Latin American countries do not function under a bipartisan system, but have an array of platform, ideology and candidate oriented parties. Primaries, therefore, do not have the political force or audience that they do in the United States. Perhaps as a consequence of the violence that has followed some of our democratic processes in the past, we have very strict dry laws when it comes to voting periods, a policy absence in the United States that my mother will often express outrage over. More importantly, though, while we have also claimed the ineptitude of our opposing parties’ politicians (and sadly, sometimes just all of our politicians), never have I heard of a massive organized and institutionally supported drinking game at the expense of the opposition.

My concern emerges from an understanding of American bipartisan politics as one that requires constant checking and engagement with the opposition party. The system intends for mutual thriving and balance of power through the encouraged competition. While in no way am I making the claim that politics in the past has been an institution characterized by mutual respect and transparency, the widespread comedy of the opposition is something else. It creates a human distancing from the opposition and in no way promotes actual engagement with candidates, issues and platforms.

What is more demoralizing than the attitude of the drinking games themselves is the accuracy in predictability that many of these have showed toward the debates. National politics are scripted: issues and platforms predictable and politicians comedic tropes.