What the next First Turning won't be like

[David Horn]

(01-11-2021, 07:37 PM)mamabug Wrote:

(01-11-2021, 01:37 PM)User3451 Wrote:

(01-11-2021, 11:45 AM)David Horn Wrote:

(01-10-2021, 12:54 PM)mamabug Wrote: Honestly, at this point, it is entirely with the Left's control just how bad the 4T gets (in terms of, you know, outright killing or gulag-style imprisonment of American citizens).  From my perspective, the key is to stop demonizing and scapegoating every Republican, conservative, and/or person who voted for Trump.  They need to push the bounds of who is in the in-group out far enough to allow people like rural gun-owners, conservative Christians and Jews, and civil libertarians back in (preferably without a struggle session).  Unfortunately, I really don't see that happening.  Instead, I see the farthest Left wing of the Democratic party tightening the 'in-group' even further which will open the door for increasing violence on both sides.

I think you live in a dream world.  These folks are where they are because they've been living in the environment you suggest for decades -- centuries, for some.  If everything you "know" is factually wrong, does that make it less potent?  Of course not; in fact, quite the opposite.  I won't claim to have the magic potion that get's us where we need to be, but lowering inequality is a mandatory minimum, and within the scope of government. Start there.  This is the work of decades, and none of us is young enough to see the end ... with the possible exception of Camz.

 
Addressing economic inequality needs to be done first. All other forms of inequality rest on material conditions. 

It's pretty simple.

 
I would like to say that the lack of out-group empathy I am seeing on a board dedicated to analyzing a theory of history (which should be semi-objective at least) is just one more reason for my alarmism.

Every single one of the groups I've mentioned has valid concerns that are no less important or more despicable than those of urban blacks, the trans community, and environmental activists.  That each side is willing to dismiss those concerns out of hand as being 'wrong' because they come from the other side is definitely the Crisis Mindset at work.

I'm just going to sit back and wait for the Artists to come along and tell us how wrong we were for treating each other that way.

I see your point, but wonder how to do what you suggest.  Much of white evangelical identity (what you're discussing here) makes no room for the reduction in status that this group must accept for a diverse country to succeed. No one gets to be King of the Hill in a truly fair society -- certainly not by virtue of birth.  This is the third pass at fixing a vexing race problem created at the dawning of this nation.  Both prior attempts failed on this very issue.

[mamabug]

(01-13-2021, 12:52 PM)David Horn Wrote: I see your point, but wonder how to do what you suggest.  Much of white evangelical identity (what you're discussing here) makes no room for the reduction in status that this group must accept for a diverse country to succeed. No one gets to be King of the Hill in a truly fair society -- certainly not by virtue of birth.  This is the third pass at fixing a vexing race problem created at the dawning of this nation.  Both prior attempts failed on this very issue.

I think it starts by stopping assuming what they want and are concerned about and engaging with them enough to know exactly what that is.  You mentioned you grew up in the 50's and 60's, which means that the evangelicals you probably grew up with and formed an impression of are very different from the ones who actually exist now.  For the record, I'm not evangelical but I have enough relatives who are and spent enough time among that community to have a pretty good idea of what they care about and it isn't being King of the Hill or excluding black people.  They don't see themselves as in the majority (which they aren't) and they don't consider themselves 'white' first but 'Christian' first and mostly want assurances that the dominant tribe recognizes a clear boundary to how much the state can force them to violate their conscious in order to participate in the public sphere.  This is true for all conservative Judeo-Christian religious groups, not just evangelicals, BTW.

It starts by, as I think Jonathan Haidt put it, speaking to the elephant.  Stop acting as if conservatives don't share any values with liberals and recognize that they have the same values, plus *more* of them.  Acknowledge those values as important and things that most be considered when making policy and speak to those values to find common ground.  Clinton, for all his faults as a human being, was excellent at doing this.  Obama was as well, which is why he remained personally popular despite a number of people didn't like his policies. It won't work for all the groups that find themselves in the conservative camp right now, some are just too far away, but you could probably pull over the social conservatives (probably the easiest set of groups) and the laissez faire capitalists.

Just remember, the consensus that comes out of the 4T becomes the next cycle's conservatives.  At some point, Democrats will figure out how to talk to them and bring them into the fold, unless they plan to lose power to the Republicans if they keep driving their more conservative members out of the party.  Since my primary concern is with how far we go in persecuting those outside the emerging dominant tribe, I just think the sooner they manage to do this the better.

[pbrower2a]

(01-13-2021, 04:39 AM)mamabug Wrote:

(01-12-2021, 08:47 PM)Camz Wrote: Eh. I don't see Artists having any respect for conservatives until they completely disown and despise Trump and re-invent themselves keeping the decent core values they had in the first place. That's inevitable, I think. At that point conservatives will become tolerable and even accepted by the public again, they might even be more popular with Artists than progressive liberals. That won't last tho. Only for one turning.

And no, evangelical cishet white men are not oppressed and will not be anytime soon :/

You're sort of assuming there is some universal accepted standard of what 'completely disown and despise etc...' even means.  What values, exactly, would conservatives have to hold or not hold for the vast institutional authorities on the left to no longer ostracize them yet still allow them to object to aspects of the Democratic platform?  If those values are the same as similar ones on the left, what level of disagreement over interpretation and prioritization is allowable?  Would every conservative in the country have to hold/not hold these values?  Just the politicians?  Just the majority?  What if groups who hold to one of the banned values has the audacity to vote for a Republican candidate because we live in a binary political landscape, does that now make every Republican evil again?  For whatever your own answers to these questions might be, would they be the same for all of your peers or might there be a significant enough minority that answers differently and will form the nucleus of the next counter culture?  Most importantly, how well would your generation's answers line up with our judgment happy Millennials?  FYI, if you really want to get some food for thought on how liberals and conservatives can have similar yet different core values, I suggest Jonathan Haidt's The Righteous Mind.

I hope that it is possible to be righteous without being obnoxious about it. Bad behavior is not good for survival or even economic success. I can imagine the born-again leaders concurring with people of different faith and heritage that a culture that abuses children with distressing language and images is in need of a "clean-up, Aisle SOUL". The Golden Age of Cinema showed that we can have excellent movies without overt sexuality, without racism and religious bigotry, without lionizing bad people, and without mocking people for their religious heritage. Maybe Gone with the Wind has not aged well because of the ethnic stereotypes and the praise of the Confederate heritage... but other than that one can make excellent movies that appeal to all age groups, to all social classes, to people of every level of intellectual sophistication, and to every heritage. Self-destructive and anti-social behavior must be shown for what it is and what the consequences are.  We see tendencies in that direction. 

Maybe we get the vile words (which include racial, religious, and sexual smears as well as F-bombs) out of popular music. I'm not saying that creative people can't be nasty people (think of John Lennon and Michael Jackson in music) but they knew what lines not to cross.

Quote:The 1T starts with a further codification of the social norms that come out of the previous 4T.  During that 4T, as I previously mentioned, the bounds around what ideological/racial/ethnic/gendered/etc. sub groups are or are not included within the dominant group that receives all the benefits of the new society shift and tighten, leaving many groups outside who are subject to scapegoating, marginalization, and discrimination to various extremes.   Examples from previous turnings (in the US and elsewhere) include communists, racial minorities, southerners, British loyalists, Catholics, monarchists, religious minorities, aristocrats, Orthodox Christians, and so on.  

People on the losing side might learn their lesson and repudiate what got them into the nasty situation. Most Confederates recognized that they might as well (like Rhett Butler in Gone with the Wind) accept the reality and make the best of the situation. He goes into the lumber business and makes money off the rebuilding of Atlanta. In a sequel of Hogan's Heroes, the mustered-out Commandant of "Stalag 13" (who probably went through the denazification process easily because he wasn't much of a Nazi) becomes a businessman in the quickly-rebuilt Bundesrepublik. Anyone who remains connected to the discredited cause or has committed irredeemable crimes  that lost the Crisis War is in deep trouble. If you are such a thug as Champ Ferguson (Confederate guerilla who did such crimes as killing soldiers in a hospital), Kenji Doihara (colonial administrator of Manchuria), or Ernst Kaltenbrunner you may be an example for the ages. All three were hanged as war criminals.  Then again, murder is still murder.  

Mustered-out soldiers have good reasons to turn their swords into ploughshares once peace arrives; they still need to eat. The discipline of military life is a good model for complex organizations that need more to produce an abundance than to effect subtle changes in the ways in which people think.     

Quote:During the 4T, the attitude you expressed prevails towards those not in the dominant tribe, which results in those groups being excluded from the public square and facing imprisonment, impoverishment, and/or death unless they repent of their sins and leave their group (if they can).  The assumption by the dominant tribe is that anyone who does not convert, is intrinsically evil and thus any punishment they face is just.

In a 4T one can go from being on the brink of defeat to unimaginable glory in a relatively short time. One can go from lording it over subjected people to facing the judgment of those that one brutalized while lording it over them. If one is a minority associated with a brutal colonial power, as was the case with Japanese people in the Philippines, one may be obliged to obliterate one's prior identity or flee.   

Quote:Artists, as they enter adulthood, look around them and see that the rights and benefits they are told are necessary to a good life, all of which are secured for the dominant tribe, are not available to other groups and that strikes them as unfair and unbefitting a just society.  Once you have won a war, it becomes easier to be merciful.  They will start with the people easiest to empathize with (closest in proximity to the dominant tribe) and gradually push the bounds outward until the Awakening hit where the Prophets reach out to everyone and try to pull them into a new configuration which will form the genesis of the next Crisis (and so on, and so on...). 

 

The Silent were not the ones who experienced the Bataan Death March; they are the well-behaved occupation forces in Japan who see a people stripped of arrogant militarism and the desire to lord it over some Greater East Asia Co-Prosperity Sphere". In the aftermath of the war, mustered-out soldiers get the duty to return to the rice paddies to harvest the food needed to stave off a famine or rebuild housing to fend off a harsh winter. They see a far-more benign Japan than did their older brothers. The Japanese now seem like the last people who would invade and enslave others. What a difference a few months can make! That's how Crisis Eras end. To Silent soldiers, the Japanese are people of quaint customs -- not menace. A propaganda-laden cartoon like this that may have been good for mocking the Enemy for incompetence and criminality





becomes irrelevant very fast. (Stereotypes here are uggery, if you get the point). The world changes fast from a Crisis to the post-Crisis era time. "1946" isn't "1943".
    

Quote:The act of seeing people were left out of the social compact and telling the Millenials that they should be let in is what I meant by 'artists telling us how wrong we were to treat each other that way.  Passions are running high and, right now, there is no way to know exactly which groups will be excluded and to what degree.  It is too chaotic to even try to predict what might happen.  The only thing I can guarantee is that, in about 15-20 years a new generation will arise who will start seeking social reconciliation for old enemies, justice for the groups the Millennials are oppressing, and fairness for those hurt by the new institutional norms.

As important is that Idealist judgment that brought hatred of a monstrous enemy also fades out of relevance. The people on the losing side start to imitate the winners by sharing in the repudiation of the discreditable qualities of the recent past, whether outright crime (soldiers rarely choose what sides they serve) or of inflammatory hatred that suddenly became irrelevant.

[mamabug]

pbrower2a - you make some excellent points about how the high plays out as Artists take over.  They don't have the 'in the trenches' experiences so they can be more objective and make arguments that the Japanese and the Germans should be wholly integrated into the international community even though the fundamental values of those societies didn't change.  Similarly, Northern artists didn't exclude Southerners and the children of the revolutionaries didn't seek to punish British loyalists by continuing to bar them from public office and tax them more.

The uncertain thing at this point is how thoroughly the Left feels it needs to exclude, impoverish, and or imprison those who disagree with them before it feels the 'enemy of progress and source of all that is evil in America' to be quashed to the point where no further action is necessary to ensure 'repudiation of the discreditable qualities' is either likely or irrelevant.  Just like after the surrender of Cornwallis, people gradually stopped worrying that their neighbor might be a monarchist because the serious ones could leave for Canada.  This stopping point is much harder to find if the discreditable quality is something like race, religion, or class (whether my own or my ancestors').  Right now I am not even sure what, exactly, the discreditable quality even is so how can surrender be determined?

Things change quickly once the war ends, but they can get incredibly bad before that point depending on the ruthlessness involved.  I have seen very disturbing indicators in the culture (which politics is downstream of) that suggest there mob isn't ready to claim the victory just yet and that is essential to finding where the lowest point in the pendulum swing will be.

[David Horn]

(01-13-2021, 05:13 PM)mamabug Wrote: pbrower2a - you make some excellent points about how the high plays out as Artists take over.  They don't have the 'in the trenches' experiences so they can be more objective and make arguments that the Japanese and the Germans should be wholly integrated into the international community even though the fundamental values of those societies didn't change.  Similarly, Northern artists didn't exclude Southerners and the children of the revolutionaries didn't seek to punish British loyalists by continuing to bar them from public office and tax them more.

The uncertain thing at this point is how thoroughly the Left feels it needs to exclude, impoverish, and or imprison those who disagree with them before it feels the 'enemy of progress and source of all that is evil in America' to be quashed to the point where no further action is necessary to ensure 'repudiation of the discreditable qualities' is either likely or irrelevant.  Just like after the surrender of Cornwallis, people gradually stopped worrying that their neighbor might be a monarchist because the serious ones could leave for Canada.  This stopping point is much harder to find if the discreditable quality is something like race, religion, or class (whether my own or my ancestors').  Right now I am not even sure what, exactly, the discreditable quality even is so how can surrender be determined?

Things change quickly once the war ends, but they can get incredibly bad before that point depending on the ruthlessness involved.  I have seen very disturbing indicators in the culture (which politics is downstream of) that suggest there mob isn't ready to claim the victory just yet and that is essential to finding where the lowest point in the pendulum swing will be.

You may be over-thinking this.  If we assume the Left wins the 4T (still arguable, but a good point of departure) then the terms of the victory will determine the extent of reconciliation. Judging by the clueless nature of many members of the Right, the extent of the damage to society may be a lot less than previous internal conflicts.  If so, the problems can be addressed more directly and resolution may be some form of mutual acceptance -- probably not including the older, more radical elements.  That's an optimistic case, but one that's feasible.  The Millennials and New Artists (can we settle on a name at some point?) are more socially open on all important levels: race, gender and class. They may differ on philosophical grounds, but I don't see them marching off to the drums of a neo-QAnon, and the old QAnon doesn't fit them very well.

[mamabug]

(01-14-2021, 10:50 AM)David Horn Wrote: You may be over-thinking this.  If we assume the Left wins the 4T (still arguable, but a good point of departure) then the terms of the victory will determine the extent of reconciliation. Judging by the clueless nature of many members of the Right, the extent of the damage to society may be a lot less than previous internal conflicts.  If so, the problems can be addressed more directly and resolution may be some form of mutual acceptance -- probably not including the older, more radical elements.  That's an optimistic case, but one that's feasible.  

I hope I'm over-thinking it, and I'm certain the Left's march through institutions (academia, media, corporations, etc.) has made it so they are the likely victor.   Don't get me wrong, I dislike most policies coming from both sides, so on some level it doesn't matter as much to me who wins but what that impact will be on individual freedom and overall economic prosperity and well-being.  The double-standard in play for how those institutions treat those on the ideological left vs. right does hit me right where my sense of justice and fairness, lives, though, which makes me a bit more sympathetic to the right in a lot of circumstances.  Over time, though, I know that will get better and if the worst that happens this cycle is some people get banned off of Twitter or have to keep their heads down and mouths shut at their jobs, I can live with that.

Quote:The Millennials and New Artists (can we settle on a name at some point?) 

I feel the New Artists will end up being called Zoomers.  Personally, I like the Masked generation because it somewhat mirrors the Silent gen and also illustrates what a good chunk of their childhood memories will be about - stuck at home taking virtual classes, unable to get within 6 feet of their friends even while wearing a mask, no sports or clubs for socialization, obeying authority out of fear that they might get sick, etc..  The social and developmental toll on this generation in order to protect Boomers and Silents is something we will be coming to terms with as a society for awhile.  Depression rates are high, academic failure is soaring (in my son's classes, at least 25% of the students in any given class are failing it), social isolation is rampant, I'm sure cyber bullying has increased, and that is just the easily apparent aspects.  And everything gets worse the further down the economic scale you go.

Quote:are more socially open on all important levels: race, gender and class.

They are, and that crosses both major party lines.  Millenials and Maskers (I like it.  I'm going with it) lean more Democrat in ideology, but around 30% of Millennials lean right, which is significant.  In a two party system, the reasons people line up under one party or the other is usually for myriad of reasons and, for many people on the Republican side, race, gender, and class are not their driving motivations for voting.  Labeling them as racist has worked very well for the left in terms of driving down support among younger generations, but not enough for the electorate to abandon them since many people (at least half of them) legitimately dislike the Democrat policies that have been presented and the more illiberal aspects of the current ideology.  

The reason for my alarmism is that, once you have labeled your opponent as evil (which is what racism is seen as in this country), how do you compromise with them?  How do you even allow them to get close to the levers of power?  Why should they even be allowed to participate in the public sphere unless they thoroughly repent and convert to our way of thinking?

Better thinkers than me (on left and right) have said this has all the markings of a holy war and we all know what happy, kumbaya sessions those are.

Quote:They may differ on philosophical grounds, but I don't see them marching off to the drums of a neo-QAnon, and the old QAnon doesn't fit them very well.

Until Jan 6th, I guarantee that the average Republican had no idea who QAnon was and many of them still don't.  They aren't marching to their beat anymore than the left wants to live under the rule of antifa.

[pbrower2a]

(01-14-2021, 04:47 PM)mamabug (blue) Wrote:

(01-14-2021, 10:50 AM)David Horn (green) Wrote: You may be over-thinking this.  If we assume the Left wins the 4T (still arguable, but a good point of departure) then the terms of the victory will determine the extent of reconciliation. Judging by the clueless nature of many members of the Right, the extent of the damage to society may be a lot less than previous internal conflicts.  If so, the problems can be addressed more directly and resolution may be some form of mutual acceptance -- probably not including the older, more radical elements.  That's an optimistic case, but one that's feasible.  

I hope I'm over-thinking it, and I'm certain the Left's march through institutions (academia, media, corporations, etc.) has made it so they are the likely victor.   Don't get me wrong, I dislike most policies coming from both sides, so on some level it doesn't matter as much to me who wins but what that impact will be on individual freedom and overall economic prosperity and well-being.  The double-standard in play for how those institutions treat those on the ideological left vs. right does hit me right where my sense of justice and fairness, lives, though, which makes me a bit more sympathetic to the right in a lot of circumstances.  Over time, though, I know that will get better and if the worst that happens this cycle is some people get banned off of Twitter or have to keep their heads down and mouths shut at their jobs, I can live with that.

Well, I'd say that the mirror-image Marxists who dominate Corporate America aren't on the Left. Academia and media tend Left by default because people to the Left of Ronald Reagan aren't going to go very far in such businesses. Corporate America fills with unimaginative, money-driven people at least among middle management and higher ranks. Academia and media have far more room for smart people who have the proclivity to think outside the box. 

Quote:

Quote:The Millennials and New Artists (can we settle on a name at some point?) 

I feel the New Artists will end up being called Zoomers.  Personally, I like the Masked generation because it somewhat mirrors the Silent gen and also illustrates what a good chunk of their childhood memories will be about - stuck at home taking virtual classes, unable to get within 6 feet of their friends even while wearing a mask, no sports or clubs for socialization, obeying authority out of fear that they might get sick, etc..  The social and developmental toll on this generation in order to protect Boomers and Silents is something we will be coming to terms with as a society for awhile.  Depression rates are high, academic failure is soaring (in my son's classes, at least 25% of the students in any given class are failing it), social isolation is rampant, I'm sure cyber bullying has increased, and that is just the easily apparent aspects.  And everything gets worse the further down the economic scale you go.

I will be satisfied to let them establish their own name as a moniker. The most important attribute that I associate with them is "interrupted childhood" due to COVID-19.

Quote:

Quote:are more socially open on all important levels: race, gender and class.

They are, and that crosses both major party lines.  Millenials and Maskers (I like it.  I'm going with it) lean more Democrat in ideology, but around 30% of Millennials lean right, which is significant.  In a two party system, the reasons people line up under one party or the other is usually for myriad of reasons and, for many people on the Republican side, race, gender, and class are not their driving motivations for voting.  Labeling them as racist has worked very well for the left in terms of driving down support among younger generations, but not enough for the electorate to abandon them since many people (at least half of them) legitimately dislike the Democrat policies that have been presented and the more illiberal aspects of the current ideology.  

The reason for my alarmism is that, once you have labeled your opponent as evil (which is what racism is seen as in this country), how do you compromise with them?  How do you even allow them to get close to the levers of power?  Why should they even be allowed to participate in the public sphere unless they thoroughly repent and convert to our way of thinking?

Better thinkers than me (on left and right) have said this has all the markings of a holy war and we all know what happy, kumbaya sessions those are.

A 70-30 split among the Millennial generation between non-right and right is about like the split of the popular vote between the GOP and everyone else in Oklahoma. If you want a career in Oklahoma politics beyond very local politics, forget being a Democrat. So far the ideological Right has little to offer the Millennial generation except more of the same of something nobody asked them whether they wanted. Low pay, high personal debt, inadequate public services, high rent, rejection of the usual Reason* that Civic generations want? 

The Millennial Generation is at its oldest, approaching 40, and it has had little opportunity with which to reshape the world at all to its own desires. Until recently one could say that the only reason that a prole could have for existence is to make someone already filthy rich even more filthy rich.   

Quote:

Quote:They may differ on philosophical grounds, but I don't see them marching off to the drums of a neo-QAnon, and the old QAnon doesn't fit them very well.

Until Jan 6th, I guarantee that the average Republican had no idea who QAnon was and many of them still don't.  They aren't marching to their beat anymore than the left wants to live under the rule of antifa.

The Qu Qlux Qlan, as I call it, was just too qrazy for most people to take seriously. But enough people do that it poses a qlear and present danger because it qan use violence for its ends. Antifa is more a phantom than a menace.

We now see the consequences of craziness meeting violence. The insurrection of January 6 demonstrates that some people would be perfectly satisfied with dictatorship so long as that dictaroship can foce its way upon the rest of America. [/quote]

*Reason isn't enough. The Reign of Terror following the French Revolution exemplifies the consequence of cold reasoning devoid of charity, compassion, and conscience.

[beechnut79]

(01-14-2021, 09:24 PM)pbrower2a Wrote:

(01-14-2021, 04:47 PM)mamabug (blue) Wrote:

(01-14-2021, 10:50 AM)David Horn (green) Wrote: You may be over-thinking this.  If we assume the Left wins the 4T (still arguable, but a good point of departure) then the terms of the victory will determine the extent of reconciliation. Judging by the clueless nature of many members of the Right, the extent of the damage to society may be a lot less than previous internal conflicts.  If so, the problems can be addressed more directly and resolution may be some form of mutual acceptance -- probably not including the older, more radical elements.  That's an optimistic case, but one that's feasible.  

I hope I'm over-thinking it, and I'm certain the Left's march through institutions (academia, media, corporations, etc.) has made it so they are the likely victor.   Don't get me wrong, I dislike most policies coming from both sides, so on some level it doesn't matter as much to me who wins but what that impact will be on individual freedom and overall economic prosperity and well-being.  The double-standard in play for how those institutions treat those on the ideological left vs. right does hit me right where my sense of justice and fairness, lives, though, which makes me a bit more sympathetic to the right in a lot of circumstances.  Over time, though, I know that will get better and if the worst that happens this cycle is some people get banned off of Twitter or have to keep their heads down and mouths shut at their jobs, I can live with that.

Well, I'd say that the mirror-image Marxists who dominate Corporate America aren't on the Left. Academia and media tend Left by default because people to the Left of Ronald Reagan aren't going to go very far in such businesses. Corporate America fills with unimaginative, money-driven people at least among middle management and higher ranks. Academia and media have far more room for smart people who have the proclivity to think outside the box. 

Quote:

Quote:The Millennials and New Artists (can we settle on a name at some point?) 

I feel the New Artists will end up being called Zoomers.  Personally, I like the Masked generation because it somewhat mirrors the Silent gen and also illustrates what a good chunk of their childhood memories will be about - stuck at home taking virtual classes, unable to get within 6 feet of their friends even while wearing a mask, no sports or clubs for socialization, obeying authority out of fear that they might get sick, etc..  The social and developmental toll on this generation in order to protect Boomers and Silents is something we will be coming to terms with as a society for awhile.  Depression rates are high, academic failure is soaring (in my son's classes, at least 25% of the students in any given class are failing it), social isolation is rampant, I'm sure cyber bullying has increased, and that is just the easily apparent aspects.  And everything gets worse the further down the economic scale you go.

I will be satisfied to let them establish their own name as a moniker. The most important attribute that I associate with them is "interrupted childhood" due to COVID-19.

Quote:

Quote:are more socially open on all important levels: race, gender and class.

They are, and that crosses both major party lines.  Millenials and Maskers (I like it.  I'm going with it) lean more Democrat in ideology, but around 30% of Millennials lean right, which is significant.  In a two party system, the reasons people line up under one party or the other is usually for myriad of reasons and, for many people on the Republican side, race, gender, and class are not their driving motivations for voting.  Labeling them as racist has worked very well for the left in terms of driving down support among younger generations, but not enough for the electorate to abandon them since many people (at least half of them) legitimately dislike the Democrat policies that have been presented and the more illiberal aspects of the current ideology.  

The reason for my alarmism is that, once you have labeled your opponent as evil (which is what racism is seen as in this country), how do you compromise with them?  How do you even allow them to get close to the levers of power?  Why should they even be allowed to participate in the public sphere unless they thoroughly repent and convert to our way of thinking?

Better thinkers than me (on left and right) have said this has all the markings of a holy war and we all know what happy, kumbaya sessions those are.

A 70-30 split among the Millennial generation between non-right and right is about like the split of the popular vote between the GOP and everyone else in Oklahoma. If you want a career in Oklahoma politics beyond very local politics, forget being a Democrat. So far the ideological Right has little to offer the Millennial generation except more of the same of something nobody asked them whether they wanted. Low pay, high personal debt, inadequate public services, high rent, rejection of the usual Reason* that Civic generations want? 

The Millennial Generation is at its oldest, approaching 40, and it has had little opportunity with which to reshape the world at all to its own desires. Until recently one could say that the only reason that a prole could have for existence is to make someone already filthy rich even more filthy rich.   

Quote:

Quote:They may differ on philosophical grounds, but I don't see them marching off to the drums of a neo-QAnon, and the old QAnon doesn't fit them very well.

Until Jan 6th, I guarantee that the average Republican had no idea who QAnon was and many of them still don't.  They aren't marching to their beat anymore than the left wants to live under the rule of antifa.

The Qu Qlux Qlan, as I call it, was just too qrazy for most people to take seriously. But enough people do that it poses a qlear and present danger because it qan use violence for its ends. Antifa is more a phantom than a menace.

We now see the consequences of craziness meeting violence. The insurrection of January 6 demonstrates that some people would be perfectly satisfied with dictatorship so long as that dictaroship can foce its way upon the rest of America. 

*Reason isn't enough. The Reign of Terror following the French Revolution exemplifies the consequence of cold reasoning devoid of charity, compassion, and conscience.
[/quote]

So, do you all consider the storming of the Capitol to be this era’s Bastille?  I would have thought that it would be Wall Street or some large mega-corporation that deprived so many people of their livelihoods.    Could we still be feeling the reverberations of this event for many years to come, much like 911, JFK murder and Pearl Harbor?

[pbrower2a]

(01-14-2021, 10:50 AM)David Horn Wrote:

(01-13-2021, 05:13 PM)mamabug Wrote: pbrower2a - you make some excellent points about how the high plays out as Artists take over.  They don't have the 'in the trenches' experiences so they can be more objective and make arguments that the Japanese and the Germans should be wholly integrated into the international community even though the fundamental values of those societies didn't change.  Similarly, Northern artists didn't exclude Southerners and the children of the revolutionaries didn't seek to punish British loyalists by continuing to bar them from public office and tax them more.

The uncertain thing at this point is how thoroughly the Left feels it needs to exclude, impoverish, and or imprison those who disagree with them before it feels the 'enemy of progress and source of all that is evil in America' to be quashed to the point where no further action is necessary to ensure 'repudiation of the discreditable qualities' is either likely or irrelevant.  Just like after the surrender of Cornwallis, people gradually stopped worrying that their neighbor might be a monarchist because the serious ones could leave for Canada.  This stopping point is much harder to find if the discreditable quality is something like race, religion, or class (whether my own or my ancestors').  Right now I am not even sure what, exactly, the discreditable quality even is so how can surrender be determined?

Things change quickly once the war ends, but they can get incredibly bad before that point depending on the ruthlessness involved.  I have seen very disturbing indicators in the culture (which politics is downstream of) that suggest there mob isn't ready to claim the victory just yet and that is essential to finding where the lowest point in the pendulum swing will be.

You may be over-thinking this.  If we assume the Left wins the 4T (still arguable, but a good point of departure) then the terms of the victory will determine the extent of reconciliation. Judging by the clueless nature of many members of the Right, the extent of the damage to society may be a lot less than previous internal conflicts.  If so, the problems can be addressed more directly and resolution may be some form of mutual acceptance -- probably not including the older, more radical elements.  That's an optimistic case, but one that's feasible.  The Millennials and New Artists (can we settle on a name at some point?) are more socially open on all important levels: race, gender and class. They may differ on philosophical grounds, but I don't see them marching off to the drums of a neo-QAnon, and the old QAnon doesn't fit them very well.

Should the Hard Right of the Reagan-Trump era prevail, then this Crisis essentially consolidates the agenda and the social conditions that the Hard Right has cherished. That means basically an economic order that offers people nothing more than the duty to endure poverty and harsh management in return for promises of pie-in-the-sky-when-you-die for dedicated, undemanding service to the economic elites who offer the common man nothing more than bare survival. Such is the dark side of the Protestant Reformation, the Calvinist position in which those who fare best have the Blessing of the Almighty and those who suffer poverty have been chosen for an earthly Hell for reasons that nobody dares try understand. To know and contemplate the consequences of the underlying assumptions is to understand everything.

Another interpretation is of course that we have a fake respite that culminates in some final wave of Crisis that sweeps aside the vile order. That could be a war for profit that in the end ruins the profiteers and forces the end of a system that went very bad very fast and had no chance of returning to its old virtues. 

Fourth Turnings are the means of obliterating the social rot that must vanish if people are to enjoy progress, whether moral, economic, or technological. Decadence is always a risk in history, and it becomes especially tempting in the languid environment of an anything-goes Third Turning. A Third Turning is a great time for introducing fads of transitory popularity and profitability, but almost never any lasting traditions. There can be great works of artistic merit, and in music alone I can cite The Art of Fugue (J S Bach) and the ballet score of The Rite of Spring (Igor Stravinsky)... and how different could one get in less than 170 years?

If a 4T fails to do the job of clearing out the rot, most of it recent (especially of the preceding 3T), then the end of the Crisis results in the institutionalization of the rot. If anything must die it is 

(1) anti-rational, anti-scientific bunk
(2) mirror-image Marxism
(3) corrupt institutions

If all goes well, then a rediscovery of the power of reason and science will destroy the first; political change will make the second irrelevant, and bankruptcy will destroy the latter.

[David Horn]

(01-14-2021, 04:47 PM)mamabug Wrote:

(01-14-2021, 10:50 AM)David Horn Wrote: You may be over-thinking this.  If we assume the Left wins the 4T (still arguable, but a good point of departure) then the terms of the victory will determine the extent of reconciliation. Judging by the clueless nature of many members of the Right, the extent of the damage to society may be a lot less than previous internal conflicts.  If so, the problems can be addressed more directly and resolution may be some form of mutual acceptance -- probably not including the older, more radical elements.  That's an optimistic case, but one that's feasible.  

I hope I'm over-thinking it, and I'm certain the Left's march through institutions (academia, media, corporations, etc.) has made it so they are the likely victor.   Don't get me wrong, I dislike most policies coming from both sides, so on some level it doesn't matter as much to me who wins but what that impact will be on individual freedom and overall economic prosperity and well-being.  The double-standard in play for how those institutions treat those on the ideological left vs. right does hit me right where my sense of justice and fairness, lives, though, which makes me a bit more sympathetic to the right in a lot of circumstances.  Over time, though, I know that will get better and if the worst that happens this cycle is some people get banned off of Twitter or have to keep their heads down and mouths shut at their jobs, I can live with that.

The Right has run a decades long disinformation campaign that's now captured the minds of ~40% of the population.  They lie and they cheat.  The Left's biggest fault is hyper sensitivity to every wrong.  Neither is pretty, but lying and cheating go to the heart of how we govern ourselves.

mamabug Wrote:

David Horn Wrote:The Millennials and New Artists (can we settle on a name at some point?) 

I feel the New Artists will end up being called Zoomers.  Personally, I like the Masked generation because it somewhat mirrors the Silent gen and also illustrates what a good chunk of their childhood memories will be about - stuck at home taking virtual classes, unable to get within 6 feet of their friends even while wearing a mask, no sports or clubs for socialization, obeying authority out of fear that they might get sick, etc..  The social and developmental toll on this generation in order to protect Boomers and Silents is something we will be coming to terms with as a society for awhile.  Depression rates are high, academic failure is soaring (in my son's classes, at least 25% of the students in any given class are failing it), social isolation is rampant, I'm sure cyber bullying has increased, and that is just the easily apparent aspects.  And everything gets worse the further down the economic scale you go.

Welcome to roughly 50 years of intentional socio-economic repression.  It may be time for everyone to read Kurt Anderson's newest book:Evil Geniuses: The Unmaking of America. And I still favor Homelanders.

mamabug Wrote:

David Horn Wrote:... are more socially open on all important levels: race, gender and class.

They are, and that crosses both major party lines.  Millenials and Maskers (I like it.  I'm going with it) lean more Democrat in ideology, but around 30% of Millennials lean right, which is significant.  In a two party system, the reasons people line up under one party or the other is usually for myriad of reasons and, for many people on the Republican side, race, gender, and class are not their driving motivations for voting.  Labeling them as racist has worked very well for the left in terms of driving down support among younger generations, but not enough for the electorate to abandon them since many people (at least half of them) legitimately dislike the Democrat policies that have been presented and the more illiberal aspects of the current ideology.  

The reason for my alarmism is that, once you have labeled your opponent as evil (which is what racism is seen as in this country), how do you compromise with them?  How do you even allow them to get close to the levers of power?  Why should they even be allowed to participate in the public sphere unless they thoroughly repent and convert to our way of thinking?

Better thinkers than me (on left and right) have said this has all the markings of a holy war and we all know what happy, kumbaya sessions those are.

In case you missed it, the neo-Right has shown its full colors already, and it's not pretty. I find the Dems insipid and ineffectual, but I find the Reps outwardly dangerous to democracy.  I can't tolerate the neoliberals either, which is the other wing of the GOP and the "Dem centrists'.  

mamabug Wrote:

David Horn Wrote:They may differ on philosophical grounds, but I don't see them marching off to the drums of a neo-QAnon, and the old QAnon doesn't fit them very well.

Until Jan 6th, I guarantee that the average Republican had no idea who QAnon was and many of them still don't.  They aren't marching to their beat anymore than the left wants to live under the rule of antifa.

My own experience here, deep in the heart of Red Country, tends to disprove your point.  Are they QAnon?  Maybe not, but the same QAnon nonsense  comes out of their mouths: anti-vax, Trump won, and Trump did nothing wrong.  Sorry, there is no moral or ethical equivalent to that, to say nothing of basic rationality.

[mamabug]

(01-14-2021, 09:24 PM)pbrower2a Wrote: Well, I'd say that the mirror-image Marxists who dominate Corporate America aren't on the Left. Academia and media tend Left by default because people to the Left of Ronald Reagan aren't going to go very far in such businesses. Corporate America fills with unimaginative, money-driven people at least among middle management and higher ranks. Academia and media have far more room for smart people who have the proclivity to think outside the box. 

And maybe the *real* battle of the Crisis will be when the populist left and populist right finally realize they have more in common than they think and rise up against the pro-statist, pro-globalist, pro-corporatist elite.

When I see politicians ignoring the very rules they've imposed on others that are causing businesses to shut down, I'm one step away from raising a fist in the air and shouting 'Workers of the world unite!"

Preferably in a non-Marxist and anti-authoritarian way, of course. 

As many have pointed out, the left-right dichotomy is insufficient - which is why the political compass was developed.  I can easily join hands with anyone on the anti-authoritarian spectrum, left or right, can work with anyone in the center, and would fight like hell anyone who wants to use the authority of the state to force obedience to their ideology and drive up dependence on government largesse.

[mamabug]

(01-15-2021, 12:01 PM)David Horn Wrote: My own experience here, deep in the heart of Red Country, tends to disprove your point.  Are they QAnon?  Maybe not, but the same QAnon nonsense  comes out of their mouths: anti-vax, Trump won, and Trump did nothing wrong.  Sorry, there is no moral or ethical equivalent to that, to say nothing of basic rationality.

I'm smack dab in the heart of Blue Country, which may be why we have such different views on left v. right.  The democrats could nominate an actual donkey for president (or state senator) and we would vote for it.

Here, most people who lean right are those that feel left out of the economic prosperity enjoyed by the urban elites - the guy who came to fix my dishwasher was an ardent Trump fan.  My husband drives for Uber and he has picked up a lot of people who favored Trump in the last election.  Most of them are working class and small business owners who can't work remotely and are losing money under our 'one-size-fits-all' lockdown approach.  The vast majority of counties have had less than 60 deaths and are well under hospital capacity limits, yet they are subject to the exact same restrictions as our five high population areas.

The other 'Trump' supporters in the state are rural communities whose livelihoods are repeatedly threatened by urban voters that impose environmental restrictions that are either impractical or expensive to implement without thought for balancing competing needs or reimbursing those impacted.  

Most of the actual anti-vaxxers in my part of the world are leftover from the hippie communalists that distrusted government and fought the man.

[David Horn]

(01-15-2021, 03:19 PM)mamabug Wrote:

(01-15-2021, 12:01 PM)David Horn Wrote: My own experience here, deep in the heart of Red Country, tends to disprove your point.  Are they QAnon?  Maybe not, but the same QAnon nonsense  comes out of their mouths: anti-vax, Trump won, and Trump did nothing wrong.  Sorry, there is no moral or ethical equivalent to that, to say nothing of basic rationality.

I'm smack dab in the heart of Blue Country, which may be why we have such different views on left v. right.  The democrats could nominate an actual donkey for president (or state senator) and we would vote for it.

Here, most people who lean right are those that feel left out of the economic prosperity enjoyed by the urban elites - the guy who came to fix my dishwasher was an ardent Trump fan.  My husband drives for Uber and he has picked up a lot of people who favored Trump in the last election.  Most of them are working class and small business owners who can't work remotely and are losing money under our 'one-size-fits-all' lockdown approach.  The vast majority of counties have had less than 60 deaths and are well under hospital capacity limits, yet they are subject to the exact same restrictions as our five high population areas.

The other 'Trump' supporters in the state are rural communities whose livelihoods are repeatedly threatened by urban voters that impose environmental restrictions that are either impractical or expensive to implement without thought for balancing competing needs or reimbursing those impacted.  

Most of the actual anti-vaxxers in my part of the world are leftover from the hippie communalists that distrusted government and fought the man.

The motivations seem similar in both your area and mine.  There's no question that many educated people struggled to get where they are, and have zero sympathy for those who refused to do likewise, assuming they did it and so can others.  The blow back from that is justified.  I worked with many highly educated people who couldn't tie their own shoes (literally, in some cases).  Being competent and underpaid is infuriating, especially when you are covering the asses of people paid much more.  I get the feeling.  But I live in an are where being educated is actually looked down on.  If you listen to country music, a lot of it is about that very thing.

It doesn't change the facts on the ground, though.  Global Warming is real, and the cost to fix it will be borne by those people who benefitted from creating the problem.  If you're a coal miner, you're not going to be doing that much longer.  But massive inequality is different.  That was caused intentionally by the greed heads who have run the show for decades.  They are powerful, in control of the "center" of both major parties, and see no reason to change the rules now -- even with evidence that they are destroying the very thing they wish to own outright. The non-elite Red and Blue are both affected, so the sooner they get it through their thick skulls that they have a common and very powerful enemy, the sooner we get on with it.

[mamabug]

(01-16-2021, 09:54 AM)David Horn Wrote: It doesn't change the facts on the ground, though.  Global Warming is real, and the cost to fix it will be borne by those people who benefitted from creating the problem.  If you're a coal miner, you're not going to be doing that much longer.  

But did the coal miner, who worked for long, back breaking hours at minimal pay and suffer long term health consequences because of it *really* benefit from creating the problem of global warming?  The coal mine owner isn't going to pay for global warming, he's going to pocket any compensation for closing the mine and go invest it in mining for components for solar panels.  

As I see it, the solutions for solving Global Warming remind me a lot of the solutions for solving COVID - they are based on models often using unvalidated assumptions and speculative data that, magically, results in recommendations that require centralizing government power and enriching corporations.  It's not that I disagree AGW is real or that it is an issue, it's that the more I'm told by the people who will benefit that the *only* solution is to give them what they want, the more I think they are using fear to gain power not to actually solve the problem.

I do blame Republicans in a lot of this because they often spend too much time denying the problem rather than saying, yes this is a problem but your 'solutions' will just make everything worse.  Possibly, this is because almost all national level politicians are part of the elite that will benefit from the solution so their objections are weak.  

Ah, well, such is the way of the world.  Politicians are corrupt and self serving and big business uses that to their advantage.  The best most of us can hope for is they'll manage to give us the bread and circuses we need to stay happy.

[David Horn]

(01-16-2021, 04:26 PM)mamabug Wrote:

(01-16-2021, 09:54 AM)David Horn Wrote: It doesn't change the facts on the ground, though.  Global Warming is real, and the cost to fix it will be borne by those people who benefitted from creating the problem.  If you're a coal miner, you're not going to be doing that much longer.  

But did the coal miner, who worked for long, back breaking hours at minimal pay and suffer long term health consequences because of it *really* benefit from creating the problem of global warming?  The coal mine owner isn't going to pay for global warming, he's going to pocket any compensation for closing the mine and go invest it in mining for components for solar panels.  

No, it wasn't the coalminer who created the problem, anymore than the tobacco farmer created smoking. Yet both are and have been the focus of the GOP, because that delivers votes in regions focused on those industries. The faux-sensitivity to their suffering has always been a smokescreen for their baking of the industries that are responsible, none moreso than the oil industry. The money uses the poor and directly affected as shields to slow-walk changes that benefit them. It's cynical but typical. Capital always wants it all.

mamabug Wrote:As I see it, the solutions for solving Global Warming remind me a lot of the solutions for solving COVID - they are based on models often using unvalidated assumptions and speculative data that, magically, results in recommendations that require centralizing government power and enriching corporations.  It's not that I disagree AGW is real or that it is an issue, it's that the more I'm told by the people who will benefit that the *only* solution is to give them what they want, the more I think they are using fear to gain power not to actually solve the problem. 

Sorry, but we've tried the decentralized market-driven responses, and gotten almost nowhere. Note: even the most market-=centric option (carbon credits) got shot down by the PTB in the industries that simply didn't want to have to pay anything ever. So yes, a powerful public response is the only option left, as Winston Churchill noted on other matters of similar import.

mamabug Wrote:I do blame Republicans in a lot of this because they often spend too much time denying the problem rather than saying, yes this is a problem but your 'solutions' will just make everything worse.  Possibly, this is because almost all national level politicians are part of the elite that will benefit from the solution so their objections are weak.   

Deny and delay are not solutions. They are the problem. The GOP is and has always been the party of big business. Why be surprised?

mamabug Wrote:Ah, well, such is the way of the world.  Politicians are corrupt and self serving and big business uses that to their advantage.  The best most of us can hope for is they'll manage to give us the bread and circuses we need to stay happy.

Political corruption tends to be a two sided issue, one that is much less prevalent in other advanced countries. Why is that the case, do yo think? Even our close neighbor to the north is vastly better at this than we are. Maybe we need to do less of what we do and more of what they do.

[pbrower2a]

It will not be as inequitable. A new consensus will be that if the economic order and political stability are to be maintained, then people other than owners and executives must have a stake in the system.

[David Horn]

(01-17-2021, 08:40 PM)pbrower2a Wrote: It will not be as inequitable. A new consensus will be that if the economic order and political stability are to be maintained, then people other than owners and executives must have a stake in the system.

The last 1T equalized the economic lives of white Americans, and did next to nothing for anyone not in that class.  This time it has to be broad-based, or our grandchildren and their children will be back staring at this same state of affairs.  If this 1T fails in that regard, the next 2T will be explosive.

[beechnut79]

(01-18-2021, 11:31 AM)David Horn Wrote:

(01-17-2021, 08:40 PM)pbrower2a Wrote: It will not be as inequitable. A new consensus will be that if the economic order and political stability are to be maintained, then people other than owners and executives must have a stake in the system.

The last 1T equalized the economic lives of white Americans, and did next to nothing for anyone not in that class.  This time it has to be broad-based, or our grandchildren and their children will be back staring at this same state of affairs.  If this 1T fails in that regard, the next 2T will be explosive.

Even more so than the 1960s? That was certainly an explosive time to say the l ast.

[Eric the Green]

(01-16-2021, 04:26 PM)mamabug Wrote:

(01-16-2021, 09:54 AM)David Horn Wrote: It doesn't change the facts on the ground, though.  Global Warming is real, and the cost to fix it will be borne by those people who benefited from creating the problem.  If you're a coal miner, you're not going to be doing that much longer.  

But did the coal miner, who worked for long, back breaking hours at minimal pay and suffer long term health consequences because of it *really* benefit from creating the problem of global warming?  The coal mine owner isn't going to pay for global warming, he's going to pocket any compensation for closing the mine and go invest it in mining for components for solar panels.  

As I see it, the solutions for solving Global Warming remind me a lot of the solutions for solving COVID - they are based on models often using unvalidated assumptions and speculative data that, magically, results in recommendations that require centralizing government power and enriching corporations.  It's not that I disagree AGW is real or that it is an issue, it's that the more I'm told by the people who will benefit that the *only* solution is to give them what they want, the more I think they are using fear to gain power not to actually solve the problem.

I do blame Republicans in a lot of this because they often spend too much time denying the problem rather than saying, yes this is a problem but your 'solutions' will just make everything worse.  Possibly, this is because almost all national level politicians are part of the elite that will benefit from the solution so their objections are weak.  

Ah, well, such is the way of the world.  Politicians are corrupt and self serving and big business uses that to their advantage.  The best most of us can hope for is they'll manage to give us the bread and circuses we need to stay happy.

The coal minors owe their poor health, drug use and unhappy life to the fact that they are, or were, coal minors, and voted for their job instead of their health.

The solutions for solving Covid and solving global warming are both correct. The problem is that they have not been implemented fully enough. Put trickle-downers in charge, and they leave everything to the states and localities on the philosophy that this is less tyrannical. All that does is subject us to the tyranny of more covid and more fires, droughts, floods and global warming. Both problems originate in our encroachment on Nature. Give it space, and learn the lesson of the failure of Trump and the Republicans to deal with problems. Restore the government to appropriate solutions to help the people and keep business greed in check. Don't think that it enriches corporations to implement solutions. And be glad that some people invest in these solutions. The government needs to invest more in them. And enact national production acts. 

What enriches corporations is trickle-down Reaganomics. It gives them all the tax and regulation breaks it wants, and plenty of subsidies too. That is how the wealthy few got to have all the marbles in the USA, while most people have to work paycheck to paycheck or go homeless.

[pbrower2a]

(01-18-2021, 11:31 AM)David Horn Wrote:

(01-17-2021, 08:40 PM)pbrower2a Wrote: It will not be as inequitable. A new consensus will be that if the economic order and political stability are to be maintained, then people other than owners and executives must have a stake in the system.

The last 1T equalized the economic lives of white Americans, and did next to nothing for anyone not in that class.  This time it has to be broad-based, or our grandchildren and their children will be back staring at this same state of affairs.  If this 1T fails in that regard, the next 2T will be explosive.

But that is significant. One of the big social divides in economic results was between Protestants and Catholics. Polish-Americans, Italian-Americans, and most Irish-Americans (of the latter, the ones not connected to corrupt urban machines) were poor before World War II. Let's put it this way: when little Stanley (short for Stanislaw) Kowalczyk was bagging groceries, he heard plenty of Polish jokes. Once a Colonel in the US Army, he didn't. There were successful American Jews before World War II, but far more after the war. 

Let's not forget that blacks of the GI Generation had their role in the Civil Rights struggle. Blacks who fought an enemy with much the same bigotry and viciousness of the KKK came back often with the discipline necessary for resisting the KKK. GI Blacks knew enough to play by the rules, but they won enough times and their wins stuck. 

Had this 4T consolidated a Trump-like agenda, then we would have a 1T that few people (aside from the Mater Class and some hangers-on) would have liked. The following 2T would have a repudiation of its inequity,  oppression, and regimentation as its focus. Economic elites are rarely gentle in responding to criticism elsewhere, and they would take delight in shedding the blood of any moral or political challengers. If such bloody repression of dissent prevailed, then the following 3T would be more depraved than any 3T in prior American history, and the best thing that could happen to America in the 4T would be its defeat. Think of Germany, Italy, and Japan in the last 4T. "Evil Empires" do great harm to Humanity as a whole -- including to their subjects who are supposedly privileged to live under their rule.