Why we are nowhere near the end of the fourth turning

[Mickey123]

In reading through this forum, there are many people here who either believe that we are near the end of the crisis, or that whatever is left of the crisis will feature minor problems like political protests or electing different people or defeating the coronavirus.  I think this is all completely wrong, that we can't be anywhere near the end of the crisis.

A first turning is a time of conformity, a time of cultural conservatism, a time when minority groups do their best to fit in, and who if not allowed to fit in will fight to show that they should be allowed to fit in.  It's a time when the group is more important than the individual.  A time when government and societal organizations are respected.

We are so far from that that it would seem impossible to get there from here. 

If the radical right succeeds to the farthest extent, they would expel many racial and religious minority groups entirely from western nations.  The remaining people would decide that, for better or worse, it was finished and it was time to move on with the new society.  We are clearly nowhere close to that happening, although it is a possibility in upcoming years.

So what does the left winning the culture wars look like?  It means the end of feminism, the end of the civil rights movement, the end of anti-capitalist sentiment.  Having achieved their goals, all of this has to stop.  There can be no more "smashing the patriarchy", as the patriarchy must be determined to no longer exist.  There can be no "defunding the police", as the police must be seen as a positive force in society.  It also means that the alt-right and other such groups must be thoroughly destroyed and discredited, so the new High conservatives will be conserving the new values.

Assuming the left is going to win (as it's safe to say this forum doesn't want to root for the alternative), how do we possibly get there from here?

The fact is that people are not ever going to be less sexist than they are now.  Men and women are going to continue to be different (and in fact, will be seen as far more different in the high than they are today), which will result in men's and women's careers having different outcomes.  Women are going to continue to dominate careers involving caring for small children, men will dominate jobs which are stressful and physically dangerous.  Unless some highly authoritarian system is put into place forcing everyone to work the job that society tells them to, men will continue to make more money than women do.  This will be accepted in the next High.

The police are not going to ever be any better than they are today.  Police officers are what they are, you can go anywhere across the world across time and you'll see the same thing.  They are rough, aggressive, and authoritarian, as this is the sort of person who wants to be a police officer, and they deal with criminals all day, which increases their already existing tendencies.  The way that police officers are will be accepted in the next High.

People in general will never be less racist than they are today, as the tendency to stick with one's own group and be mistrustful of outsiders is built into us.  Human beings were never designed to live in large societies of millions of people, and are doing their best to deal with it as well as they do today.

On the other hand, the left's goals of decreasing wealth disparity certainly can be achieved.  When individuals and corporations are expected to serve society, instead of everyone "doing your own thing", CEO salaries will be far lower than they are, and tax rates for the wealthy will be far higher, as this will be seen by all as being good for society.  Any number of social programs to decrease wealth disparity could be put into place which would redirect the wealth of society to the many instead of the few.

So how do we get there from here?  What sort of events have to take place which result in the current political right's goals being utterly invalidated and abandoned and a new society being born where feminism and civil rights protests are seen as no longer needed?  Whatever these events are, they will have to shake the foundations of the nation, far more than anything happening today.

[Bob Butler 54]

(06-08-2020, 08:05 PM)Mickey123 Wrote: The police are not going to ever be any better than they are today.  Police officers are what they are, you can go anywhere across the world across time and you'll see the same thing.  They are rough, aggressive, and authoritarian, as this is the sort of person who wants to be a police officer, and they deal with criminals all day, which increases their already existing tendencies.  The way that police officers are will be accepted in the next High.

People in general will never be less racist than they are today, as the tendency to stick with one's own group and be mistrustful of outsiders is built into us.  Human beings were never designed to live in large societies of millions of people, and are doing their best to deal with it as well as they do today.

I see the opposite.

The Enlightenment might have first suggested the three ideas which I call the arrow of progress:  equality, human rights, and democracy.  In each crisis since at least one of these ideas is pushed by the progressive faction and resisted by those who wish things to remain as they are.  You see in the last three American crises kings reduced in power, America freed from colonial imperialism, slaves freed and fascists defeated.

This ls all done over the dead bodies of people who want things to stay forever the same.  Kings are appointed by God.  Every major civilization if based on the cornerstone of slavery.  Wars are started whenever a nation can afford it and sees itself at an advantage.  Always there is a master race, and others to be subjugated.  Etc…

Racism is a non trivial problem.  It is very difficult to change a culture.  Still, every once in a while the people rise against it.  The American Civil War was one example.  The Civil Rights Movement is another.  The last few weeks seems mark another such time.  It is possible to say enough once in a while.  It is on rare occasion possible to take a few steps forward.  You can’t do it every day.  You may never be able to solve the problem completely.  But you can change the culture.

In the Civil Rights Movement, MLK had to march for years to finally get Congress to consider action.  The Black Lives Matter uprising seems to have taken less time to get serious attention.  We will see how hard the conservatives try to fight the people.  Some are very used to superiority.  Trump has pretty much been in their corner as much as he can without openly proclaiming himself a racist.  But I expect he is fighting history on this one.

[Mickey123]

(06-08-2020, 10:06 PM)Bob Butler 54 Wrote:

(06-08-2020, 08:05 PM)Mickey123 Wrote: The police are not going to ever be any better than they are today.  Police officers are what they are, you can go anywhere across the world across time and you'll see the same thing.  They are rough, aggressive, and authoritarian, as this is the sort of person who wants to be a police officer, and they deal with criminals all day, which increases their already existing tendencies.  The way that police officers are will be accepted in the next High.

People in general will never be less racist than they are today, as the tendency to stick with one's own group and be mistrustful of outsiders is built into us.  Human beings were never designed to live in large societies of millions of people, and are doing their best to deal with it as well as they do today.

I see the opposite.

The Enlightenment might have first suggested the three ideas which I call the arrow of progress:  equality, human rights, and democracy.  In each crisis since at least one of these ideas is pushed by the progressive faction and resisted by those who wish things to remain as they are.  You see in the last three American crises kings reduced in power, America freed from colonial imperialism, slaves freed and fascists defeated.

This ls all done over the dead bodies of people who want things to stay forever the same.  Kings are appointed by God.  Every major civilization if based on the cornerstone of slavery.  Wars are started whenever a nation can afford it and sees itself at an advantage.  Always there is a master race, and others to be subjugated.  Etc…

Racism is a non trivial problem.  It is very difficult to change a culture.  Still, every once in a while the people rise against it.  The American Civil War was one example.  The Civil Rights Movement is another.  The last few weeks seems mark another such time.  It is possible to say enough once in a while.  It is on rare occasion possible to take a few steps forward.  You can’t do it every day.  You may never be able to solve the problem completely.  But you can change the culture.

In the Civil Rights Movement, MLK had to march for years to finally get Congress to consider action.  The Black Lives Matter uprising seems to have taken less time to get serious attention.  We will see how hard the conservatives try to fight the people.  Some are very used to superiority.  Trump has pretty much been in their corner as much as he can without openly proclaiming himself a racist.  But I expect he is fighting history on this one.

What exactly do you think will change regarding racism?

Blacks and Mexicans are every bit as racist as whites, and the same goes for Indians (from India) and any other racial group you want to point to.  Japanese and Koreans within their own countries are extremely racist, by U.S. standards.

If you have some method by which American whites will suddenly cease all racist thoughts and feelings, you will have to explain how to get it to work on all the other races of the world as well.  If your theories of the future rely on humanity suddenly experiencing a profound shift and entering a new utopian state where everyone views outsiders just the same as they do people like themselves, you are in for a letdown.  Because nothing I'm saying has anything to do with conservatives, it is simply human nature to see people from other groups differently than those from their own group, whatever that group might be.

[Eric the Green]

(06-08-2020, 11:38 PM)Mickey123 Wrote:

(06-08-2020, 10:06 PM)Bob Butler 54 Wrote:

(06-08-2020, 08:05 PM)Mickey123 Wrote: The police are not going to ever be any better than they are today.  Police officers are what they are, you can go anywhere across the world across time and you'll see the same thing.  They are rough, aggressive, and authoritarian, as this is the sort of person who wants to be a police officer, and they deal with criminals all day, which increases their already existing tendencies.  The way that police officers are will be accepted in the next High.

People in general will never be less racist than they are today, as the tendency to stick with one's own group and be mistrustful of outsiders is built into us.  Human beings were never designed to live in large societies of millions of people, and are doing their best to deal with it as well as they do today.

I see the opposite.

The Enlightenment might have first suggested the three ideas which I call the arrow of progress:  equality, human rights, and democracy.  In each crisis since at least one of these ideas is pushed by the progressive faction and resisted by those who wish things to remain as they are.  You see in the last three American crises kings reduced in power, America freed from colonial imperialism, slaves freed and fascists defeated.

This ls all done over the dead bodies of people who want things to stay forever the same.  Kings are appointed by God.  Every major civilization if based on the cornerstone of slavery.  Wars are started whenever a nation can afford it and sees itself at an advantage.  Always there is a master race, and others to be subjugated.  Etc…

Racism is a non trivial problem.  It is very difficult to change a culture.  Still, every once in a while the people rise against it.  The American Civil War was one example.  The Civil Rights Movement is another.  The last few weeks seems mark another such time.  It is possible to say enough once in a while.  It is on rare occasion possible to take a few steps forward.  You can’t do it every day.  You may never be able to solve the problem completely.  But you can change the culture.

In the Civil Rights Movement, MLK had to march for years to finally get Congress to consider action.  The Black Lives Matter uprising seems to have taken less time to get serious attention.  We will see how hard the conservatives try to fight the people.  Some are very used to superiority.  Trump has pretty much been in their corner as much as he can without openly proclaiming himself a racist.  But I expect he is fighting history on this one.

What exactly do you think will change regarding racism?

Blacks and Mexicans are every bit as racist as whites, and the same goes for Indians (from India) and any other racial group you want to point to.  Japanese and Koreans within their own countries are extremely racist, by U.S. standards.

If you have some method by which American whites will suddenly cease all racist thoughts and feelings, you will have to explain how to get it to work on all the other races of the world as well.  If your theories of the future rely on humanity suddenly experiencing a profound shift and entering a new utopian state where everyone views outsiders just the same as they do people like themselves, you are in for a letdown.  Because nothing I'm saying has anything to do with conservatives, it is simply human nature to see people from other groups differently than those from their own group, whatever that group might be.

We are a global society, and that fact is only going to increase. Despite the xenophobes, borders are falling. Technology, commerce and culture break down the walls. Immigration to all countries can't be stopped. Soon mixed races will be the most common race in the world. Racism is already outdated, and will die in the next 2 centuries. There will be no "other groups" because we will all be of one group. Today, it is in fact social conservatives who see other groups as different from their own. That is the exact definition of social conservatism.

Police will be reformed, just as all institutions get reformed. Progress is the norm; reactionary traditionalism is no longer the norm; not since the Bastille fell and the King was overthrown. Revolution is ongoing.

Best of luck with your exams, as the General says. Meanwhile, no doubt it will take until beyond our lifetimes for me to be proven right about this, so more groups in conflict will certainly happen in the years ahead of us.

[Warren Dew]

(06-08-2020, 08:05 PM)Mickey123 Wrote: Unless some highly authoritarian system is put into place forcing everyone to work the job that society tells them to, men will continue to make more money than women do.  This will be accepted in the next High.

For the left to win, yes, a highly authoritarian system will need to be put in place for the high.

[Isoko]

What Eric describes is basically what I consider to be a personal version of hell. I mean who would want to live in such a souless, boring world where everything is the same, everyone looks the same and everyone thinks the same? How is that progress? To me, it's basically just another version of the road to hell paved with good intentions. 

However, sadly even I am forced to also agree with Eric that this is the most likely outcome. Unless another generation comes forward and says "look, we want to live in peace but we want to preserve our group/culture whatever for future generations to enjoy", then I fear his version of the future will be the case. A souless, mixed up world with no adventure, no beauty, just mediocrity and sameness throughout the planet.

You know what I say to this? I'll be glad I'm dead by then so I don't have to live in such a horrible world. God help us all when that world comes to pass.

[Bob Butler 54]

(06-08-2020, 11:38 PM)Mickey123 Wrote: What exactly do you think will change regarding racism?

Blacks and Mexicans are every bit as racist as whites, and the same goes for Indians (from India) and any other racial group you want to point to.  Japanese and Koreans within their own countries are extremely racist, by U.S. standards.

If you have some method by which American whites will suddenly cease all racist thoughts and feelings, you will have to explain how to get it to work on all the other races of the world as well.  If your theories of the future rely on humanity suddenly experiencing a profound shift and entering a new utopian state where everyone views outsiders just the same as they do people like themselves, you are in for a letdown.  Because nothing I'm saying has anything to do with conservatives, it is simply human nature to see people from other groups differently than those from their own group, whatever that group might be.

A judge recently approved a set of orders to the Milwaukee police department from the mayor and city council. It among other things banned choke holds and held all officers that observe police wrongdoing without trying to stop it and reporting it as equally responsible as the wrongdoer.

At the US House a bill has been proposed at the national scale which also bans choke holds and withholds federal funding from any organization that resists reform. It does a number of other things as well.

Now, these will not prevent racists from thinking racist thoughts. Neither did laws requiring hotels and restaurants during the Civil Rights Movement to provide minorities service, but the behavior changed. The bad cops will comply or they will become ex cops. I don’t care which.

This does not mean tribal thinking does not exist. Humans have a tendency to break people into us and them. They treat the former better than the latter. They do it a lot. It was cost effective though the Industrial Age. It is still common. The US culture contains two opposing thoughts. All men shall be equal under law. Irish (or insert your minority of choice) need not apply. In time, the first comes to force the second to retreat. The racists will resist. This does not change that they are fighting a slow but losing delaying action.

The idea that all people should be equal under law definitely exists in the US culture, but the US doesn’t have a copyright on it. It can spread abroad. The Chinese, for example, has a thing about black people. This does not always become wonderful as they are trying to expand their influence in Africa, and the virus gave people an excuse to act up. The elites and leaders don’t always appreciate the racist attitudes. If your company is trying to turn a profit, racism is often a big obstacle.

Prior to World War II it was cost effective to hate other people. The way to dominate other people was through military force and colonial imperialism. These days, it is through economic influence. It is no longer advantageous to treat other people like dirt. Thus, the idea of people being treated as equal is not so outlandish.

I have come to label the times when there is a major change to a culture as cultural reboots. It started in the Generational Dynamics thread where I used the term once and it was repeated by Xenakis. I see three occurring in the US directly linked to race relations: the American Civil War, the Civil Rights Movement, and most recently Black Lives Matter. You could add as non racist reboots most any crisis heart, or in the never again reaction just after. The culture transforms. This is a feature of turnings. It is a normal part of history and S&H turning theory.

These get ignored and demeaned as ‘magic’ or ‘hocus pocus’ by some on this site. They are not. They are an important part of S&H turning theory. They often come as ‘never again’ moments in response to a major crisis, when they are not the major crisis themselves. They don’t come often enough. In the US they might come near a Crisis Heart or slightly after, and occasionally in an awakening. On average, the reality of the slave compromises gives the conservatives enough power that most of the time the progressive changes are rare.

That doesn’t make the arrow of progress not exist, nor diminish the advance in equality, human rights and democracy. It is slow. It comes in bursts after long periods of activity. But it might be considered a normal process. People should not be surprised or in denial when it finally comes, especially as we have hit the crisis heart.

[Eric the Green]

(06-08-2020, 08:05 PM)Mickey123 Wrote: In reading through this forum, there are many people here who either believe that we are near the end of the crisis, or that whatever is left of the crisis will feature minor problems like political protests or electing different people or defeating the coronavirus.  I think this is all completely wrong, that we can't be anywhere near the end of the crisis.

A first turning is a time of conformity, a time of cultural conservatism, a time when minority groups do their best to fit in, and who if not allowed to fit in will fight to show that they should be allowed to fit in.  It's a time when the group is more important than the individual.  A time when government and societal organizations are respected.

We are so far from that that it would seem impossible to get there from here. 

If the radical right succeeds to the farthest extent, they would expel many racial and religious minority groups entirely from western nations.  The remaining people would decide that, for better or worse, it was finished and it was time to move on with the new society.  We are clearly nowhere close to that happening, although it is a possibility in upcoming years.

So what does the left winning the culture wars look like?  It means the end of feminism, the end of the civil rights movement, the end of anti-capitalist sentiment.  Having achieved their goals, all of this has to stop.  There can be no more "smashing the patriarchy", as the patriarchy must be determined to no longer exist.  There can be no "defunding the police", as the police must be seen as a positive force in society.  It also means that the alt-right and other such groups must be thoroughly destroyed and discredited, so the new High conservatives will be conserving the new values.

Assuming the left is going to win (as it's safe to say this forum doesn't want to root for the alternative), how do we possibly get there from here?

The fact is that people are not ever going to be less sexist than they are now.  Men and women are going to continue to be different (and in fact, will be seen as far more different in the high than they are today), which will result in men's and women's careers having different outcomes.  Women are going to continue to dominate careers involving caring for small children, men will dominate jobs which are stressful and physically dangerous.  Unless some highly authoritarian system is put into place forcing everyone to work the job that society tells them to, men will continue to make more money than women do.  This will be accepted in the next High.

The police are not going to ever be any better than they are today.  Police officers are what they are, you can go anywhere across the world across time and you'll see the same thing.  They are rough, aggressive, and authoritarian, as this is the sort of person who wants to be a police officer, and they deal with criminals all day, which increases their already existing tendencies.  The way that police officers are will be accepted in the next High.

People in general will never be less racist than they are today, as the tendency to stick with one's own group and be mistrustful of outsiders is built into us.  Human beings were never designed to live in large societies of millions of people, and are doing their best to deal with it as well as they do today.

On the other hand, the left's goals of decreasing wealth disparity certainly can be achieved.  When individuals and corporations are expected to serve society, instead of everyone "doing your own thing", CEO salaries will be far lower than they are, and tax rates for the wealthy will be far higher, as this will be seen by all as being good for society.  Any number of social programs to decrease wealth disparity could be put into place which would redirect the wealth of society to the many instead of the few.

So how do we get there from here?  What sort of events have to take place which result in the current political right's goals being utterly invalidated and abandoned and a new society being born where feminism and civil rights protests are seen as no longer needed?  Whatever these events are, they will have to shake the foundations of the nation, far more than anything happening today.

I agree. But if racism is going to continue, so will the civil rights movement, black lives matter movement, etc. It will just mean continual conflict over race through all turnings. I think long-term, racism is doomed, and all institutions including police and women's income will continue to be reformed and changed.

[Mickey123]

(06-09-2020, 09:25 AM)Bob Butler 54 Wrote:

(06-08-2020, 11:38 PM)Mickey123 Wrote: What exactly do you think will change regarding racism?

Blacks and Mexicans are every bit as racist as whites, and the same goes for Indians (from India) and any other racial group you want to point to.  Japanese and Koreans within their own countries are extremely racist, by U.S. standards.

If you have some method by which American whites will suddenly cease all racist thoughts and feelings, you will have to explain how to get it to work on all the other races of the world as well.  If your theories of the future rely on humanity suddenly experiencing a profound shift and entering a new utopian state where everyone views outsiders just the same as they do people like themselves, you are in for a letdown.  Because nothing I'm saying has anything to do with conservatives, it is simply human nature to see people from other groups differently than those from their own group, whatever that group might be.

A judge recently approved a set of orders to the Milwaukee police department from the mayor and city council.  It among other things banned choke holds and held all officers that observe police wrongdoing without trying to stop it and reporting it as equally responsible as the wrongdoer.

At the US House a bill has been proposed at the national scale which also bans choke holds and withholds federal funding from any organization that resists reform.  It does a number of other things as well.

Now, these will not prevent racists from thinking racist thoughts.  Neither did laws requiring hotels and restaurants during the Civil Rights Movement to provide minorities service, but the behavior changed.  The bad cops will comply or they will become ex cops.   I don’t care which.

This does not mean tribal thinking does not exist.  Humans have a tendency to break people into us and them.  They treat the former better than the latter.  They do it a lot.  It was cost effective though the Industrial Age.  It is still common.   The US culture contains two opposing thoughts.  All men shall be equal under law.  Irish (or insert your minority of choice) need not apply.  In time, the first comes to force the second to retreat.  The racists will resist.  This does not change that they are fighting a slow but losing delaying action.

The idea that all people should be equal under law definitely exists in the US culture, but the US doesn’t have a copyright on it.  It can spread abroad.  The Chinese, for example, has a thing about black people.  This does not always become wonderful as they are trying to expand their influence in Africa, and the virus gave people an excuse to act up.  The elites and leaders don’t always appreciate the racist attitudes.  If your company is trying to turn a profit, racism is often a big obstacle.  

Prior to World War II it was cost effective to hate other people.  The way to dominate other people was through military force and colonial imperialism.  These days, it is through economic influence.  It is no longer advantageous to treat other people like dirt.  Thus, the idea of people being treated as equal is not so outlandish.

I have come to label the times when there is a major change to a culture as cultural reboots.  It started in the Generational Dynamics thread where I used the term once and it was repeated by Xenakis.  I see three occurring in the US directly linked to race relations: the American Civil War, the Civil Rights Movement, and most recently Black Lives Matter.  You could add as non racist reboots most any crisis heart, or in the never again reaction just after.  The culture transforms.  This is a feature of turnings.  It is a normal part of history and S&H turning theory.

These get ignored and demeaned as ‘magic’ or ‘hocus pocus’ by some on this site.  They are not.  They are an important part of S&H turning theory.  They often come as ‘never again’ moments in response to a major crisis, when they are not the major crisis themselves.  They don’t come often enough.  In the US they might come near a Crisis Heart or slightly after, and occasionally in an awakening.  On average, the reality of the slave compromises gives the conservatives enough power that most of the time the progressive changes are rare.

That doesn’t make the arrow of progress not exist, nor diminish the advance in equality, human rights and democracy.  It is slow.  It comes in bursts after long periods of activity.  But it might be considered a normal process.  People should not be surprised or in denial when it finally comes, especially as we have hit the crisis heart.

So again, what is it that you think is going to change?

The Black Lives Matter protests are focused on the police because black Americans have so much contact with the police because they commit so many crimes.  If you look at the civil rights protests of the 50s and 60s, you will see black people asking and then demanding to be treated like everyone else, to be able to live where they want, work all jobs, and in general to be treated like first class citizens.  These movements had goals, they had lists of things they were asking for which would clearly make a radical difference in their lives.

The goal of the BLM movement is "have the police and courts be more respectful of us while they are arresting us for our crimes".  Their "defund the police" demand is a hilariously terrible idea.  Everything about this is the mindset and attitudes of criminals.  If this movement 100% succeeded, the police would simply leave them alone entirely and let them commit crimes freely, which would make black neighborhoods into unlivable war zones controlled by criminal gangs, who themselves would become judge, jury and executioner for any breaking of local rules.

In the larger sense, these protests are a community unhappy and angry with their lives and their place in the world, blindly lashing out at what's around them.  But the focus of the protests is entirely wrong, and supporting them in their goal of having the police be nicer to them and leave them alone will do nothing to improve their lives and their communities.

So once again, how does the left take us from where we are to where we want to be in a High?  I can tell you that "nicer and less funded police" is not any sort of step in that direction.

[David Horn]

(06-08-2020, 11:38 PM)Mickey123 Wrote: What exactly do you think will change regarding racism?

Blacks and Mexicans are every bit as racist as whites, and the same goes for Indians (from India) and any other racial group you want to point to.  Japanese and Koreans within their own countries are extremely racist, by U.S. standards.

If you have some method by which American whites will suddenly cease all racist thoughts and feelings, you will have to explain how to get it to work on all the other races of the world as well.  If your theories of the future rely on humanity suddenly experiencing a profound shift and entering a new utopian state where everyone views outsiders just the same as they do people like themselves, you are in for a letdown.  Because nothing I'm saying has anything to do with conservatives, it is simply human nature to see people from other groups differently than those from their own group, whatever that group might be.

You're right. Tribal identity is inherent at this point. It was built-in through natural selection to protect us when we needed it in the era of precivilization. So yes, it takes some effort to deprogram something that intrinsic to who we are. But then, that's what civilization is all about, isn't it? It won't be easy; It certainly hasn't been up to this point. The 'others' of past eras have been validated as part of the tribe, so it's doable.

[Bob Butler 54]

(06-09-2020, 01:29 PM)Mickey123 Wrote: The goal of the BLM movement is "have the police and courts be more respectful of us while they are arresting us for our crimes". 

Your quote is part of the problem.  You are assuming blacks commit crimes.  You are not assuming the police should be nice to the pubic.  If you continue to view blacks as criminals, if you continue to thing police should not be nice to the general law abiding community, you are missing the point entirely.

Cuomo in his daily briefing express the idea that the relationship between police and public has to be based on both sides trusting the other.  This doesn’t happen when the public view the police as oppressors and the police view the people as someone to kill.  Something has to create this trust.  The low level city and town governments are the nominated people responsible, though the House is proposing their part.  Namely, laws have to be put in place to punish the police who envision continued business as usual violence and racism against the public.  With this, perhaps the public will begin to trust the police.  Still, as with the American Civil War and Civil Rights Movement, you should not expect it to happen instantly.  It took years in those cases.  During that time either violence or protests ran rampant.  But the result was a change in the culture.  The result was that which had existed for a long time was changed.

If both what the Milwaukee city council proposed and the House proposal become reality, if the habit of militarizing the police and treating the people as the enemy is broken, the issue is apt to be put on the back burner for a time.  Racism will not be completely solved.  If the issues of militant policing are resolved, if 911 is briefed to call a reasonably funded marriage counselor or a  mental health professional instead of a man with a gun and a swagger, after a two generation or four the next set of issues of discrimination will be confronted.

But if you consider the relationship between police and community can be based on mutual distrust and racism, you are part of the problem.

The people who are renting my other property got into such a mess, though racism is not playing a big part.  A lawyer declared my tennant dead, which resulted in such things as DNA testing to establish who really got the inheritance.  The lawyer was friendly with a group which contained drug pushers, prostitutes, bad cops, and an employee of Social Security who habitually turned off health care and other services.  The bad cops faked 911 calls in order to do warrantless searches.  They got in the habit of making traffic stops, the latest of which was out of the stopping cop's jurisdiction.

So I am quite familiar with the existence of bad cops.  There are also good ones.  It is not just a matter of making the good cops have authority over the bad ones.  The blue wall of silence that makes all cops stick together is stronger than the desire of the good cops to suppress the bad.

This seems to be a significant problem in many urban areas as well.  Requiring everybody to report abuse or be targeted by a special prosecutor hunting for abuse is part of the solution.

[Mickey123]

(06-09-2020, 03:31 PM)Bob Butler 54 Wrote:

(06-09-2020, 01:29 PM)Mickey123 Wrote: The goal of the BLM movement is "have the police and courts be more respectful of us while they are arresting us for our crimes". 

Your quote is part of the problem.  You are assuming blacks commit crimes.  You are not assuming the police should be nice to the pubic.  If you continue to view blacks as criminals, if you continue to thing police should not be nice to the general law abiding community, you are missing the point entirely.

Cuomo in his daily briefing express the idea that the relationship between police and public has to be based on both sides trusting the other.  This doesn’t happen when the public view the police as oppressors and the police view the people as someone to kill.  Something has to create this trust.  The low level city and town governments are the nominated people responsible, though the House is proposing their part.  Namely, laws have to be put in place to punish the police who envision continued business as usual violence and racism against the public.  With this, perhaps the public will begin to trust the police.  Still, as with the American Civil War and Civil Rights Movement, you should not expect it to happen instantly.  It took years in those cases.  During that time either violence or protests ran rampant.  But the result was a change in the culture.  The result was that which had existed for a long time was changed.

If both what the Milwaukee city council proposed and the House proposal become reality, if the habit of militarizing the police and treating the people as the enemy is broken, the issue is apt to be put on the back burner for a time.  Racism will not be completely solved.  If the issues of militant policing are resolved, if 911 is briefed to call a reasonably funded marriage counselor or a  mental health professional instead of a man with a gun and a swagger, after a two generation or four the next set of issues of discrimination will be confronted.

But if you consider the relationship between police and community can be based on mutual distrust and racism, you are part of the problem.

The people who are renting my other property got into such a mess, though racism is not playing a big part.  A lawyer declared my tennant dead, which resulted in such things as DNA testing to establish who really got the inheritance.  The lawyer was friendly with a group which contained drug pushers, prostitutes, bad cops, and an employee of Social Security who habitually turned off health care and other services.  The bad cops faked 911 calls in order to do warrantless searches.  They got in the habit of making traffic stops, the latest of which was out of the stopping cop's jurisdiction.

So I am quite familiar with the existence of bad cops.  There are also good ones.  It is not just a matter of making the good cops have authority over the bad ones.  The blue wall of silence that makes all cops stick together is stronger than the desire of the good cops to suppress the bad.

This seems to be a significant problem in many urban areas as well.  Requiring everybody to report abuse or be targeted by a special prosecutor hunting for abuse is part of the solution.

If we waved a magic wand and made all of the police officers in the U.S. into nice people who were utterly free of prejudice and who never treated anyone disrespectfully, this would get us approximately .01% of the way we need to go to reach the High.

The difference wouldn't even be noticeable, except by people who were suspected of crimes or who were being arrested.  We would still be a million miles away from the High with no clear path to get there.

As I'm repeatedly asking this question and getting no answers, I'm suspecting that liberals (who make up much of this forum) haven't the slightest plan or idea how to move forwards towards concluding the Crisis and moving to the High.

That leaves either the radical right's plan to ship all the minorities off to other countries, or the far left's inevitable plan for a socialist revolution.  In a crisis turning, people will eventually turn to the biggest and most extreme plans.  Nobody has any real practical plan to "smash the patriarchy", or to make everyone stop being racist.  But the anti-capitalists, they will indeed have a plan, the plan they always come back to.  Socialist revolution!

So the far left wants a socialist revolution, the new far right wants ethnic cleansing, and there's always the possibility of looking without instead of within and having a big old war, where we could join with western europe and try to free the downtrodden people of China, Russia, and North Korea and abolish dictatorships worldwide.

Which of these alternatives should a liberal root for?

[Warren Dew]

A liberal, or a leftist? An actual liberal would hope for the foreign war to avoid dictatorship on either end.

[Bob Butler 54]

(06-09-2020, 05:34 PM)Mickey123 Wrote: If we waved a magic wand and made all of the police officers in the U.S. into nice people who were utterly free of prejudice and who never treated anyone disrespectfully, this would get us approximately .01% of the way we need to go to reach the High.

The difference wouldn't even be noticeable, except by people who were suspected of crimes or who were being arrested.  We would still be a million miles away from the High with no clear path to get there.

As I'm repeatedly asking this question and getting no answers, I'm suspecting that liberals (who make up much of this forum) haven't the slightest plan or idea how to move forwards towards concluding the Crisis and moving to the High.

That leaves either the radical right's plan to ship all the minorities off to other countries, or the far left's inevitable plan for a socialist revolution.  In a crisis turning, people will eventually turn to the biggest and most extreme plans.  Nobody has any real practical plan to "smash the patriarchy", or to make everyone stop being racist.  But the anti-capitalists, they will indeed have a plan, the plan they always come back to.  Socialist revolution!

So the far left wants a socialist revolution, the new far right wants ethnic cleansing, and there's always the possibility of looking without instead of within and having a big old war, where we could join with western europe and try to free the downtrodden people of China, Russia, and North Korea and abolish dictatorships worldwide.

Which of these alternatives should a liberal root for?

I don’t think the problem is that you are getting no answers, but you have made up your mind what the answer should be and you have not been getting it from anybody.  No matter how I or others word their answers, it is not your answer, therefore you ignore it.

What are the problems we are facing this crisis?  One political cartoon had a granddaughter listing them off.  Combine the pandemic of 1917, the protests of the 1960s, the Civil War and the Great Depression, all together, all at once, and there you are.

What are the greatest problems facing the society?  What are the problems the society absolutely must fix?  I’m sorry, but saving the planet doesn’t make the cut.  The right’s ability to ignore problems, to block spending to solve them while disregarding the science, doesn’t make it so far either, but it is a significant subtext.

But, no.  This isn’t crisis enough for you.  There was always a crisis war in the Industrial Age.  Therefore, we have to have a crisis war.  

You are not alone in being obsessed with war.  Several posters are making the same mistake, assuming that patterns observed in the Industrial Age will hold in the Information Age.  Different ages.   Different patterns.  Any pattern observed in the earlier age should not be assumed to hold over in the next, especially if the signature technologies of the new age are involved: computers, nukes or renewable energy.  

Check reality.  Verify the pattern before going wild predicting it will continue.

Sorry.  Wrong age.  Major powers don’t do crisis wars anymore.  Even if nukes don’t make the big powers nervous, insurgency blocks the ability to do colonial imperialism.  Playing defense in an insurgent conflict makes everyone reluctant to put boots on the ground.  Starting something is just a bad idea these days.

The crisis ends and the country moves into a high when the major problems facing the country are solved.  If we focus on racial inequality by the police, the virus, and fixing the economy from problems primarily caused by the virus, that seems to be the crisis so far.  Everything else is lower tier.  Some lower tier problems may be addressed assuming the Democrats get into power, which seems likely just now.  But it is up to the next administration and congress to determine which if any problems to bring onto the front burner.  As Biden doesn’t look like the most dynamic guy, I am not looking for many issues to move onto center stage.  We will see about the VP choice and if the Democrats get firm control of both houses of Congress.

Exporting minorities?  A socialist revolution?  Ethnic cleansing?  Aggression in the name of democracy as the superior culture?  These supposed agendas of various groups seem to be figments of your imagination.  If there is supposed to be a war, someone must be planning these things?  

Does anyone advocate any of these things?

[Bob Butler 54]

(06-09-2020, 06:53 PM)Warren Dew Wrote: A liberal, or a leftist?  An actual liberal would hope for the foreign war to avoid dictatorship on either end.

As usual, wrong.  I know of no liberals who favor a foreign war.  Anyone?  That seems a more conservative daydream.  Well, Mickey seems a hawk and fairly liberal.  He might count, but not all liberals generally.  They generally favor 'cut and run' as opposed the conservative 'stay the course' in the great debate of the Bush 43 years.

You make it a habit of misstating the motives of liberals in a forum full of liberals.  You either badly misunderstand your opponent, or are playing some sort of game lying.  I haven't figured out which.  You seem vaguely intelligent, but highly ideological.  You could actually believe your bogus methodology to the extent of not listening to what liberals say about liberals.  Sill, trolling seems the more likely explanation.

[Mickey123]

(06-09-2020, 07:30 PM)Bob Butler 54 Wrote:

(06-09-2020, 05:34 PM)Mickey123 Wrote: If we waved a magic wand and made all of the police officers in the U.S. into nice people who were utterly free of prejudice and who never treated anyone disrespectfully, this would get us approximately .01% of the way we need to go to reach the High.

The difference wouldn't even be noticeable, except by people who were suspected of crimes or who were being arrested.  We would still be a million miles away from the High with no clear path to get there.

As I'm repeatedly asking this question and getting no answers, I'm suspecting that liberals (who make up much of this forum) haven't the slightest plan or idea how to move forwards towards concluding the Crisis and moving to the High.

That leaves either the radical right's plan to ship all the minorities off to other countries, or the far left's inevitable plan for a socialist revolution.  In a crisis turning, people will eventually turn to the biggest and most extreme plans.  Nobody has any real practical plan to "smash the patriarchy", or to make everyone stop being racist.  But the anti-capitalists, they will indeed have a plan, the plan they always come back to.  Socialist revolution!

So the far left wants a socialist revolution, the new far right wants ethnic cleansing, and there's always the possibility of looking without instead of within and having a big old war, where we could join with western europe and try to free the downtrodden people of China, Russia, and North Korea and abolish dictatorships worldwide.

Which of these alternatives should a liberal root for?

I don’t think the problem is that you are getting no answers, but you have made up your mind what the answer should be and you have not been getting it from anybody.  No matter how I or others word their answers, it is not your answer, therefore you ignore it.

What are the problems we are facing this crisis?  One political cartoon had a granddaughter listing them off.  Combine the pandemic of 1917, the protests of the 1960s, the Civil War and the Great Depression, all together, all at once, and there you are.

What are the greatest problems facing the society?  What are the problems the society absolutely must fix?  I’m sorry, but saving the planet doesn’t make the cut.  The right’s ability to ignore problems, to block spending to solve them while disregarding the science, doesn’t make it so far either, but it is a significant subtext.

But, no.  This isn’t crisis enough for you.  There was always a crisis war in the Industrial Age.  Therefore, we have to have a crisis war.  

You are not alone in being obsessed with war.  Several posters are making the same mistake, assuming that patterns observed in the Industrial Age will hold in the Information Age.  Different ages.   Different patterns.  Any pattern observed in the earlier age should not be assumed to hold over in the next, especially if the signature technologies of the new age are involved: computers, nukes or renewable energy.  

Check reality.  Verify the pattern before going wild predicting it will continue.

Sorry.  Wrong age.  Major powers don’t do crisis wars anymore.  Even if nukes don’t make the big powers nervous, insurgency blocks the ability to do colonial imperialism.  Playing defense in an insurgent conflict makes everyone reluctant to put boots on the ground.  Starting something is just a bad idea these days.

The crisis ends and the country moves into a high when the major problems facing the country are solved.  If we focus on racial inequality by the police, the virus, and fixing the economy from problems primarily caused by the virus, that seems to be the crisis so far.  Everything else is lower tier.  Some lower tier problems may be addressed assuming the Democrats get into power, which seems likely just now.  But it is up to the next administration and congress to determine which if any problems to bring onto the front burner.  As Biden doesn’t look like the most dynamic guy, I am not looking for many issues to move onto center stage.  We will see about the VP choice and if the Democrats get firm control of both houses of Congress.

Exporting minorities?  A socialist revolution?  Ethnic cleansing?  Aggression in the name of democracy as the superior culture?  These supposed agendas of various groups seem to be figments of your imagination.  If there is supposed to be a war, someone must be planning these things?  

Does anyone advocate any of these things?

The thing is, you've given up on the actual Strauss-Howe theory and replaced it with your own ideas.  The Crisis, according to the theory, is a time when society is threatened to its core, shaken to its foundations, and out of the ashes of this a new society is born.  According to the theory, the climax of a crisis is unforseeable until you get close to it, total war is likely, and things that were unimaginable a few years before become possible.

But you don't believe any of this.  You've replaced the theory with your own personal preference, which is a very mild crisis that doesn't threaten society in any way.  These Black Lives Matter protests do not threaten anything, they are minor protests of a sort seen repeatedly throughout the last 55 years.  The coronavirus pandemic is similar to the Hong Kong flu of the 60s and the Asian Flu of the 50s, each of which killed 1-4 million people.  A disease which kills mostly old people, in addition to 0.1% of people under the age of 65, doesn't threaten the existence of society.

The economic fallout of our response to the coronavirus is still unknown.  We have high unemployment currently, but where this takes us economically in the upcoming years, no one knows yet.  It may be that we're at the beginning of the 2nd Great Depression, and if so, that would qualify as a Crisis event, but not likely the climax unless it becomes far worse than the first Great Depression, which still required World War II to let the Crisis be completed.

As to what I said about ethnic cleansing/forcibly removing minorities, that is indeed the goal of the alt-right.  Read their forums some time and look at what they're discussing.  They want to remove all Muslims from Western Europe and remove blacks and Mexicans and Muslims and Jews from the U.S.

As to socialist revolution, this is always the far left's goal. 

Obviously these things aren't possible today.  They only become possible at the end, when the culture wars reach their conclusion.

You want to throw out the Crisis part of the Strauss-Howe theory and still have it work, but it can't work without a crisis.  You can do without a war, but this requires society to be shaken to its foundation in some other fashion.

[Tim Randal Walker]

Seasonal metaphor.....

Don't recall, off the top of my head, exactly how S & H worded it. Was it that winter may be brief, and perhaps mild?

Or was it that winter may be mild, and perhaps brief?

It may well be that this time, America's 4T may be milder compared to the previous 4Ts. I think the country had reached the point where something like Covid 19 was just strong enough to push us into an actual Crisis mood.

I am going to use my own weather metaphor-snow flurries instead of a full blown blizzard.

[Bob Butler 54]

(06-09-2020, 08:32 PM)Mickey123 Wrote: The thing is, you've given up on the actual Strauss-Howe theory and replaced it with your own ideas.  The Crisis, according to the theory, is a time when society is threatened to its core, shaken to its foundations, and out of the ashes of this a new society is born.  According to the theory, the climax of a crisis is unforseeable until you get close to it, total war is likely, and things that were unimaginable a few years before become possible.

I do include other perspectives in my approach, in particular ages and civilizations.  S&H produced a decent product, but they are not the only ones to do so.  I am accustomed on T4T sites to people who have learned S&H reasonably well, but are not familiar with other systems or their implications.  Some get militant about it.

I spent much time last year wondering about whether a crisis configuration - prophet, nomad, civic - going by without a trigger.  There had been no trigger, no regeneracy, no crisis heart.  None claimed one.  Clearly a crisis without a trigger or regeneracy would not be classic S&H.  However, along came COVUS and much of the theory could be run along the S&H pattern.  I abandoned my conjecture, though I note that the presence of a sufficient trigger in the Information Age is not guaranteed.

I still see nukes and insurgency making a crisis war rare in the Information Age with the trigger, regeneracy and crisis war by major powers accordingly much more rare.  So far, none such have occurred.  When such a war occurs, if it occurs, I will adjust.  In the meanwhile I won’t hold my breath.  The major mistake of modern hawks is assuming the current age will be an echo of the last.  This has not been the case in past ages.  I do not expect it now.

(06-09-2020, 08:32 PM)Mickey123 Wrote: But you don't believe any of this.  You've replaced the theory with your own personal preference, which is a very mild crisis that doesn't threaten society in any way.  These Black Lives Matter protests do not threaten anything, they are minor protests of a sort seen repeatedly throughout the last 55 years.  The coronavirus pandemic is similar to the Hong Kong flu of the 60s and the Asian Flu of the 50s, each of which killed 1-4 million people.  A disease which kills mostly old people, in addition to 0.1% of people under the age of 65, doesn't threaten the existence of society.

The new and old values are well noted, debated and compromised over the length of the unraveling.  The most severe problems that actually confront the culture are addressed.  The culture does not confront problems that have not existed, which have generated no triggers.  How could they?

Once the primary problems of a crisis are solved, once the new values are proven by the trial and error crisis heart, you hold some never again conferences then slide into the high mentality.  I do not see people waiting around for another trigger.  Always in the past they have moved on to the high.  With the boomers fading from the leadership role, I anticipate the pattern holding.

This is pretty pure S&H.

(06-09-2020, 08:32 PM)Mickey123 Wrote: Obviously these things aren't possible today.  They only become possible at the end, when the culture wars reach their conclusion.

You want to throw out the Crisis part of the Strauss-Howe theory and still have it work, but it can't work without a crisis.  You can do without a war, but this requires society to be shaken to its foundation in some other fashion.

These things are impossible period.  I can acknowledge there are Internet forums where all sorts of strange ideas are debated.  The internet is great for that.  I don’t see that as meaning a lot.  I anticipate the new values will settle the culture wars.  I anticipate the crisis will be centered on the greatest problems of today, not the greatest problems of years gone by.  I realize this isn’t crisis enough for you.  I suspect it is crisis enough for most to want to move on to the high rather than wait for a trigger that will never come and with the new values already in place.

[Eric the Green]

(06-09-2020, 08:32 PM)Mickey123 Wrote:

(06-09-2020, 07:30 PM)Bob Butler 54 Wrote:

(06-09-2020, 05:34 PM)Mickey123 Wrote: If we waved a magic wand and made all of the police officers in the U.S. into nice people who were utterly free of prejudice and who never treated anyone disrespectfully, this would get us approximately .01% of the way we need to go to reach the High.

The difference wouldn't even be noticeable, except by people who were suspected of crimes or who were being arrested.  We would still be a million miles away from the High with no clear path to get there.

As I'm repeatedly asking this question and getting no answers, I'm suspecting that liberals (who make up much of this forum) haven't the slightest plan or idea how to move forwards towards concluding the Crisis and moving to the High.

That leaves either the radical right's plan to ship all the minorities off to other countries, or the far left's inevitable plan for a socialist revolution.  In a crisis turning, people will eventually turn to the biggest and most extreme plans.  Nobody has any real practical plan to "smash the patriarchy", or to make everyone stop being racist.  But the anti-capitalists, they will indeed have a plan, the plan they always come back to.  Socialist revolution!

So the far left wants a socialist revolution, the new far right wants ethnic cleansing, and there's always the possibility of looking without instead of within and having a big old war, where we could join with western europe and try to free the downtrodden people of China, Russia, and North Korea and abolish dictatorships worldwide.

Which of these alternatives should a liberal root for?

I don’t think the problem is that you are getting no answers, but you have made up your mind what the answer should be and you have not been getting it from anybody.  No matter how I or others word their answers, it is not your answer, therefore you ignore it.

What are the problems we are facing this crisis?  One political cartoon had a granddaughter listing them off.  Combine the pandemic of 1917, the protests of the 1960s, the Civil War and the Great Depression, all together, all at once, and there you are.

What are the greatest problems facing the society?  What are the problems the society absolutely must fix?  I’m sorry, but saving the planet doesn’t make the cut.  The right’s ability to ignore problems, to block spending to solve them while disregarding the science, doesn’t make it so far either, but it is a significant subtext.

But, no.  This isn’t crisis enough for you.  There was always a crisis war in the Industrial Age.  Therefore, we have to have a crisis war.  

You are not alone in being obsessed with war.  Several posters are making the same mistake, assuming that patterns observed in the Industrial Age will hold in the Information Age.  Different ages.   Different patterns.  Any pattern observed in the earlier age should not be assumed to hold over in the next, especially if the signature technologies of the new age are involved: computers, nukes or renewable energy.  

Check reality.  Verify the pattern before going wild predicting it will continue.

Sorry.  Wrong age.  Major powers don’t do crisis wars anymore.  Even if nukes don’t make the big powers nervous, insurgency blocks the ability to do colonial imperialism.  Playing defense in an insurgent conflict makes everyone reluctant to put boots on the ground.  Starting something is just a bad idea these days.

The crisis ends and the country moves into a high when the major problems facing the country are solved.  If we focus on racial inequality by the police, the virus, and fixing the economy from problems primarily caused by the virus, that seems to be the crisis so far.  Everything else is lower tier.  Some lower tier problems may be addressed assuming the Democrats get into power, which seems likely just now.  But it is up to the next administration and congress to determine which if any problems to bring onto the front burner.  As Biden doesn’t look like the most dynamic guy, I am not looking for many issues to move onto center stage.  We will see about the VP choice and if the Democrats get firm control of both houses of Congress.

Exporting minorities?  A socialist revolution?  Ethnic cleansing?  Aggression in the name of democracy as the superior culture?  These supposed agendas of various groups seem to be figments of your imagination.  If there is supposed to be a war, someone must be planning these things?  

Does anyone advocate any of these things?

The thing is, you've given up on the actual Strauss-Howe theory and replaced it with your own ideas.  The Crisis, according to the theory, is a time when society is threatened to its core, shaken to its foundations, and out of the ashes of this a new society is born.  According to the theory, the climax of a crisis is unforseeable until you get close to it, total war is likely, and things that were unimaginable a few years before become possible.

But you don't believe any of this.  You've replaced the theory with your own personal preference, which is a very mild crisis that doesn't threaten society in any way.  These Black Lives Matter protests do not threaten anything, they are minor protests of a sort seen repeatedly throughout the last 55 years.  The coronavirus pandemic is similar to the Hong Kong flu of the 60s and the Asian Flu of the 50s, each of which killed 1-4 million people.  A disease which kills mostly old people, in addition to 0.1% of people under the age of 65, doesn't threaten the existence of society.

The economic fallout of our response to the coronavirus is still unknown.  We have high unemployment currently, but where this takes us economically in the upcoming years, no one knows yet.  It may be that we're at the beginning of the 2nd Great Depression, and if so, that would qualify as a Crisis event, but not likely the climax unless it becomes far worse than the first Great Depression, which still required World War II to let the Crisis be completed.

As to what I said about ethnic cleansing/forcibly removing minorities, that is indeed the goal of the alt-right.  Read their forums some time and look at what they're discussing.  They want to remove all Muslims from Western Europe and remove blacks and Mexicans and Muslims and Jews from the U.S.

As to socialist revolution, this is always the far left's goal. 

Obviously these things aren't possible today.  They only become possible at the end, when the culture wars reach their conclusion.

You want to throw out the Crisis part of the Strauss-Howe theory and still have it work, but it can't work without a crisis.  You can do without a war, but this requires society to be shaken to its foundation in some other fashion.

I don't know if you are reading my replies, but I have thoughts on this topic and the posts here.

I do think saving the planet (at least meaning reversing climate change) is indeed topic A during this fourth turning. It is a literal winter season this time. I said that it would be all during the 23 years I have been posting here. If we don't take charge of this crisis in the next 10 years, we won't be able to ever again. It's now or never; now meaning the 2020s, which will be entirely within the remaining years of this fourth turning.

I think you are speaking correctly Mickey when you say "You can do without a war, but this requires society to be shaken to its foundation in some other fashion." We have become less prone to total war in the information age when wars between great powers are not possible. But we have not evolved anywhere near to the point where we can evade the problems that beset us, and they must be dealt with in a 4T because they will confront us. So we win, or we lose, the crisis. If we win, the progressive side triumphs and becomes the foundation for greater consensus in a more conservative and stable era called a first turning or recovery era. If we lose for the first time in the anglo-american saeculum, then the USA enters a long and steep decline.

Although major changes must be made, and the far left and far right will be in contention, that does not mean that some of Mickey's predictions will come true. Most progressives don't want socialism as traditionally defined, as state takeover of the economy. They want a mixed economy, a more democratic state, and one which unlike in the 3T and the early 4T under Trump, recognizes that neo-liberal Reaganomics which scapegoats welfare has failed, and that we need restored regulation on business, higher taxes on the wealthy and refunding of government social programs, including for poor communities, and investments in future technology, education, health care for all, income boosts for the poor and middle classes, etc. This may take a revolution, or suppression of a far-right resistance, because the far right is racist and/or fanatically dedicated to Reaganomics and blind to the crisis.

The prediction of suppression and export of ethnic groups assumes a Trump victory in 2020 which unleashes the farthest right wing control of the country. It is possible in a 4T, but I think the more progressive forces are the majority, and that enough sense still exists to prevent this outcome. But, it's a possibility.

The current Black Lives Matter movement is more sustained and widespread than recent protest movements, and we probably have to go back to the Awakening era social moment to find an equivalent, unless I'm missing something. I think this and the covid crisis/depression are indeed at-least borderline threats to the existence of society, although not the most major ones, and that they are giving a push to the progressive trend that I predict for the 2020s. The planetary trends indicate that this current situation is just a testing of the waters, and that a further push will soon come after the election, perhaps regardless of who wins it; but I think of course progress has a better chance if the Democrats win, whereas if Trump and the Republicans win there will be chaos and destruction, which could lead to drastic revolution or civil war in the following years or else severe repression and decline.

Also, if an innocent verdict happens in the Derrick Chauvin case, god only knows how much rioting and destruction will ensue that will hurt the black community even more than others, and convince some that revolution is the only answer, especially if Trump wins. The three leading threats to the USA in this 4T will likely be the threat of Trump and the right-wing takeover or rebellion, the climate crisis, and the possibility of a large foreign war which the USA is almost certain to get involved in in 2024-26 at the same time as domestic upheaval threatens. This is complicated by the ongoing racism crisis, and the pandemic, which if Trump wins will continue indefinitely and keep threatening many lives including those of younger people and keep our society in a deepening depression. Covid is much worse than the flu.

[Bob Butler 54]

(06-09-2020, 09:05 PM)Tim Randal Walker Wrote: I am going to use my own weather metaphor-snow flurries instead of a full blown blizzard.

I would recognize it as an ordinary winter storm, but not a blizzard, but you have the right idea.  The 1861 - 1917 - 1929 - 1968 combination rates a full blown storm at least.