When writing and publishing an article, there comes a moment when you have to categorize it within a group of articles with a similar theme. For instance, I was called out for placing an article in a category under the umbrella term "Relationships." In the reader's eyes (and understandably so, from their perspective), my inclusion of an article titled "Why does my work receive so little attention while thoughtless productions seem to have no shortage of it?" was incorrect. In their view, this does not relate to relationships, but rather to economics.

In politics, you regularly hear the accusation that someone has lost their ‘moral compass’. This article argues that there is only one guiding compass, and that is the one who sets the pointer with the Northern Lights as the starting point. Any compass that takes morality or an ideology as its starting point will cause any vessel to run aground or smash against the rocks. There are a few drunken sailors in politics, and what shall we do with the drunken sailor?

This essay draws on recent Dutch cases to make a broader point about how we talk about people in politics, media and AI. Names like Geert Wilders (far‑right party leader), Sigrid Kaag (former centrist foreign minister), and Dutch farmers in the nitrogen debate are local characters in a very specific political context.