Claiming the outdoors is not a political space, is in fact a very political statement.

There’s always been a contingent of folks who label themselves as “not into politics.” Folks who are ignorant of the things in life they take for granted that are only available explicitly because of politics. This belief persists especially egregiously within the hiking community. “The outdoors doesn’t care if you’re [insert identity here]” is a popular recurring statement. Or, “I go outside to get away from that.” And of course the, “I followed you for your hiking content, not politics.” All conveniently ignoring or failing to understand that the outdoors, as we know it, exists because of politics.

National Parks established on the back of slaves. Swathes of lands stolen from murdered and impoverished indigenous tribes (and lands subsequently diminished through lack of the care and understanding held by the indigenous peoples when they were stewarding the land). Some recreationalists like to imagine this as ancient history. A bad thing that happened, sure, but not a thing to be dwelled on. Not their fault. They don’t like being made uncomfortable about it, don’t think it’s their problem to solve, and therefore can’t imagine that anyone else is still directly impacted by this. Yet none of it is ancient history at all. America as a country is incredibly young, and within our and our parent’s living memories many things driven by politics have affected who gets to enjoy the outdoors and how they get to do it.

Women have only been able to apply for credit cards and open their own bank accounts since 1974. Segregation ended only shortly before that in 1964, and it took even longer for actual enforcement, voting rights, and ending housing discrimination for Black Americans. Federal boarding schools for indigenous children forcibly removed from their parents and communities persisted into the 2000s.

The impact of these things on the care and maintenance of outdoor spaces, and who gets to enjoy them, is huge. Robert Moses was an urban planner often credited as the single most influential person on the infrastructure New York, the tri-state area, and the North Eastern US in general. He was most active from the 1920s through the 1960s, a period where racism is often handwaved as “a product of their time.” But even some of Moses’ contemporaries described him as “the most racist man they ever met.” Moses’ discrimination against Blacks, Puerto Ricans, and other minorities wasn’t simply a failure of personality. It directly influenced how he designed infrastructure and created real barriers for the communities he was prejudiced against.

Robert Moses designed low bridges over parkways, preventing buses – utilized primarily by those Black and Puerto Rican communities – from accessing beaches. Even when “whites only” beaches were no longer legal, they were functionally enforced through intentionally designed lack of access. This approach to infrastructure persisted through Moses’ designs. Unreachable, rich white neighborhoods. Dense, poor, slums funneling Black and brown communities in on themselves.

As New York has transformed over the years into its outward and upward urban sprawl, it has continued to build upon Moses’ foundation. These intentional choices persist. Someone who lives in the inner city is still more likely to be Black and poor than they are likely to be white and wealthy. They are less likely to have access to outdoor spaces as remaining tracts of greenery are paved for denser and denser housing. Less likely to have the time, money, or education to travel to parks or trails. And regardless of the insistence that “you don’t need money to go outside” and that “the outdoors doesn’t care if you’re poor,” if you do not have accessible trails within walking distance: yes, you do need at least some degree of wealth to go outside. To be able to take time off of work. To have appropriate footwear. To receive the education about how to stay safe outdoors. To have a car to drive to a trailhead, since bus routes are largely focused on urban hotspots. This isn’t only happening New York, and none of it touches on how the behavior, beliefs, and yes – politics – of other people also affect the outdoor experience of Black, brown, visibly queer, female, or other minority hikers.

When homes and businesses along a trail fly confederate flags, when other hikers recommend an American Legion as a safe resting spot while the bartender casually throws out racial slurs like candy. When men prey on solo women hikers and it is never suggested that other men should shutdown this behavior, only that women are responsible for not hiking alone.

And now, in an age where anyone even remotely interpreted as brown is at risk of getting abducted and disappeared away on the accusation of being “illegal,” how comfortable can we imagine that BIPOC hikers – immigrant, citizen, or not – feel at embracing the optics of being brown and living a visibly vagrant backpacking lifestyle? Whatever we think the outdoors knows or thinks about us or not, thru hiking is inherently reliant on the towns and communities that border and support the trail. Resupplies, laundry, rest days. For the vast majority, these take place in small towns. Many of which skew politically conservative.

Everyone who decides to thru hike must navigate an element of fear. There’s pride in acknowledging this fear in ourselves. The idea that we are leaving everything we know behind in pursuit of accomplishment. Accepting that injury or illness may come for us along the way. At times condescension presents itself for those who cannot or will not embrace that fear. Too many ignore that some people are facing much larger barriers. Much bigger fear. That caring for yourself and your community is absolutely a valid reason to not be able to thru hike, whether that’s an active choice or simple reality. Politics has a significant say in how big those barriers and their consequences are.

And yet self-labelled apolitical hikers persist. Ignoring the politics that have led them to learn about thru hiking in the first place. A famous hiking influencer will decline political discussion, while talking about how reading Wild is how she fell in love with the Pacific Crest Trail (PCT). A book she bought with her own money, with a credit card with her name on it, which she keeps in a small wallet in her pockets (oh yes, women’s pockets are political too). She will ignore how the accessibility of the PCT itself is informed by politics over and over again.

It is understandable, though, that people want an escape from the doom and gloom. If you had told me in 2020 that there would come a time when I would look back on the state of the world at that time with even a small amount of nostalgia, I would not have believed you. But since then the level of political division has exploded, with echoing effects across greater society and everyday life. On a personal level, I’ve since been dealing with debilitating, Post-Viral Syndrome triggered by a severe Covid infection.

I’ve been reading John Green’s Everything is Tuberculosis, which dives into how much of our history and society has been shaped by, you guessed it, tuberculosis. It’s been an impactful read in a lot of ways. Green’s writing is accessible and personable, and makes a potentially dry and heavy topic engaging and relatable.

A chapter that hit especially hard is around mid-book when Green segues into an anecdote about how patients of tuberculosis have historically been both romanticized and stigmatized – both to the patients’ detriment – and Green related that to his own experience with illness, and the way it affects both how the ill view themselves and how they are both viewed and treated by society.

While some of the health issues I navigate have been present to some extent my whole life, Covid was the trigger that exacerbated many things and triggered new and more debilitation health issues. The dual romanticism and stigmatism of illness is especially present with Long Covid, as the pandemic, 2020 shutdowns, and subsequent escalation in political tension have impacted whether people even believe that Long Covid is real and even the folks who do believe still often downplay it’s impact, or imply that you might just have to try harder to recover, or imply that to have gotten Long Covid you must have some physical or spiritual failing.

To have chronic illness of any kind is to have an inherently political life. To be chronically ill due to a severe Covid infection is doubly so. Your health, and the future of it, is directly impacted by the decisions of your friends, family, neighbors, and community. Your family’s every day choices towards illness prevention. Whether they mask while traveling through crowded airports or at large events. Whether they vaccinate. The politicians they elect, the decisions those elected officials make. Whether medical studies and treatments are enabled and funded. What kinds of disability supports, if any, are provided. What kind of healthcare and insurance are available. Whether your healthcare providers even acknowledge the existence of the root of your illness: even though Post-Viral Syndrome predates Covid, and is a known and validated systemic response to severe infections. Whether your healthcare providers not only acknowledge the existence of Long Covid or Post-Viral Syndrome, but understand the ways it can affect different systems and are willing and able coordinate with other doctors to address the cross-system impact versus leaving patients siloed between specialists who will not or cannot communicate.

And of course, anyone who is chronically ill knows that, despite the impacts of politics, you do not always have the energy or other resources to be politically vocal. The lack of bandwidth is also true for Black, queer, immigrant, indigenous, and other BIPOC communities, due to all their aforementioned barriers, and the physical and mental impact of those barriers, as well as the thousands of microaggressions they navigate just to live an every day life. And yet these groups still overwhelmingly end up being the faces of political change: because no one else will do it for them. Because the male hikers, the white hikers, the heterosexual hikers, the healthy hikers, and the hikers who cannot otherwise see or accept the ways in which politics has shaped their access to and experience within the outdoors, will not.

You hear so much advice around advocacy that sounds like “it’s a relay race, not a marathon,” because advocacy has been shaped by the people giving when they can, then passing the baton when they can’t. Burnout cycles through communities. Organizations for change start and stumble when they struggle with bandwidth. Those who persist are labeled as angry agitators. And hikers, instead of engaging, disengage further. They curate their feeds to show only good news. They unfollow activists that make them uncomfortable with the truth of their privilege – to the point that I’ve become loathe to even use the word “privilege” because too many tune out as soon as they hear it, already preparing themselves to dismiss what comes next, despite their undeniable privilege, regardless of whatever personal hardships they’ve experienced. Because that nuance is lost on so many – that you can have an imperfect life, and still have so much more privilege than others.

If that nuance is in fact not lost, then we have to accept that a non-significant part of the population knows they are profiting off the disadvantage of others. That they don’t simply want to escape the doom and gloom of a political Instagram feed, but in fact know it is wrong and are unwilling to inconvenience themselves for change.

This makes “I’m not political” in fact a very political statement.