I keep watching people dissect the differences between Democrats and Republicans, and the differences within the parties themselves. Who has moved too far left? Who is conservative enough? Who still belongs where?

Sometimes I wonder how much energy we spend trying to find the right political box, and how much we spend questioning what we actually believe.

Maybe those boxes once felt more comfortable. Maybe their contradictions were easier to overlook. Or maybe I’m questioning them more now.

Whatever the reason, I find myself coming back to something basic: people need healthcare. People need an education. People need food, shelter and the chance to live with dignity.

To me, those are fundamental human needs. They should be our starting point.

There is room for serious disagreement about how to meet them. How do we pay for healthcare? What makes education accessible and effective? Which policies actually help people, and how do we know?

Those questions matter. Shared moral intentions don’t automatically produce good policies. We still have to examine the evidence, the costs and the consequences.

Yet I worry that we sometimes start somewhere else entirely. We ask which party an idea belongs to before asking whether it makes sense. We hear a proposal and immediately begin deciding whether defending it would make us disloyal to our group.

That is the part I struggle with.

If I believe someone deserves access to healthcare, why should I have to check whether that belief fits comfortably inside my political identity?

Watching this administration, I find myself asking moral questions that a party label cannot answer for me. What treatment of another human being am I willing to accept? What am I willing to excuse? Would I accept the same conduct from someone I voted against?

I think we all need to ask ourselves those questions. I do too.

Voting for a party before does not oblige us to defend everything it does now. We should be able to say, “I supported this, and I disagree with what it has become.” We should also be able to recognise a good idea from someone we usually oppose.

That takes honesty. It means accepting that belonging to a group does not relieve us of the responsibility to think.

I’m not suggesting that both parties are the same, or that their actions have the same consequences. Specific actions deserve specific scrutiny. Accountability becomes weaker when we blur every difference together.

I’m questioning the loyalty that asks us to soften our judgment when the person responsible is one of our own.

Perhaps the parties make less sense to me now because I see people struggling to squeeze complicated beliefs into identities that demand too much allegiance. I recognise that tension in myself too: the wish to belong, alongside the need to remain honest.

I want my politics to begin with what I believe people deserve, then follow the evidence about how we get there. I want to keep checking whether the people asking for my vote are acting consistently with those values.

My conscience needs room to question my party.

Morality should span every damn human being and every party. Any political identity I hold has to leave room for that.