The Politician — How a Netflix Series Championed Climate Advocacy
By Aarushi Gurnani
Ryan Murphy’s show “The Politician” premiered its second season on Netflix a few months ago (June 2020). The show is a satire of the political world, in which candidates are known to do anything to get what they want. In this particular season, the show showcases itself as a political platform for what the world’s youth is most concerned about: climate change.
In the second season, the protagonist, Payton Hobart, played by Ben Platt, is running for state senator with the help of his high school friends after finishing college. Payton and his team aim to introduce a broad view of liberal politics in the US to a young audience. One of Payton’s key pillars in his run for the State Senate seat was climate change as mentioned above. Luckily, his good friend Infinity Jackson, played by Zoey Deutch, had become a leading activist in that field after going waste-free for an entire year, so he knew their friendship would be beneficial in turning people to his side. Infinity was thrilled to help out her friend, but she was not ready to compromise on her beliefs. She noted that Payton, even though he preached about going green, wasn’t taking all of the steps he could to reduce his own carbon footprint. To make sure Payton was serious about his commitment to the issue, she gave him and his campaign staffer Skye a checklist of 15 steps to cut out waste and reduce their carbon footprint to an “absolute minimum.” They both had to follow each rule to show their dedication to the cause, or they would risk losing support from Infinity and all of her followers.
We see Infinity’s complete transformation from Season 1 where she was ignorant to a climate change activist who decides to go zero-waste in Season 2. The inspiration to change comes from her trip to China, she was in a skyscraper in Beijing, trying to enjoy the view when she couldn’t breathe fresh air. Her stay in Beijing makes her aware of the fact that she filled three garbage bags with waste in just a week. This realization enables her to become more conscious of how a single person can contribute in reduce the amount of pollution they emit in their lifetime by just learning how to say no. The scene of Infinity with traces of her waste inspires young viewers to measure the levels of waste produced in their households, allowing room for changes in their waste culture.
The show later sheds light on the steps taken by Infinity to go zero — waste. She begins using reusable cups, containers, cutlery, and bags, avoiding anything that came in packaging. Infinity would reuse plastics as pots for her plants and other uses. She also introduces the public to her purchase of a compost worm farm in her kitchen, which makes you go straight to Amazon and purchase one from the couch of your living room. She also becomes vegan.
The Politician does a great job of demonstrating the extent to which the young generation is concerned about climate change. According to Collider : In fact, perhaps the most impactful episode is the one that focuses the least on the main characters: “The Voters,” Episode 5, instead introduces a mother-daughter pair played by Robin Weigert and Susannah Perkins, whose fights over their individual preferred candidates essentially boil down to a battle that contrasts millennial frustrations with the older generation’s fear that they’ve failed their children by leaving them to deal with a choking world. The climate change platform is one that unites because, as “The Politician” affirms, this generation is willing to put anything aside to provide for a collective future. It’s the classic distinction between a “we” (Gen Z) and an “I” mentality — one that older generations who have been calling the shots in New York come to recognize by the season’s end.
This episode was particularly profound, it accurately brought forth the frustration experienced by the younger generation over climate inaction, and the urgent need to see change, as portrayed through the young daughter Jayne felt like an accurate portrayal of the current movement of climate strikes and climate activism which is gaining momentum among young people.
I think what the show tries to communicate is the ushering in of a new generation of political campaigns which are based on popular issues like climate change which is gaining a lot of momentum among the younger population. It highlights how much climate change has become a topic of worry for this generation as it has to bear the brunt of actions undertaken by the older generation. It almost feels like the younger population has been left to deal with the mess of the older world. What The Politician succeeds in doing is promoting and possibly predicting future environmental campaigns around the world in which the youth show full support for a hopeful tomorrow. The Politician is larger-than-life fiction, and I doubt any real political campaign looks as flashy and extravagant as it is made out to be. However, if we can find real-life counterparts to Payton who care and implement real change, then that’s something that makes me optimistic for the future.
