Culture Wars Era - is it moving into its final phase?

[David Horn]

(03-17-2019, 02:01 PM)pbrower2a Wrote: Any comments on the admissions scandal at some highly-renowned universities?

A culture of corruption often breaks down in a 4T because it can no longer sustain itself. Legacy admissions were bad enough, capable of pushing someone of at-best middling talent (Dubya, Trump) ahead of people of genuine merit. Meanwhile the winners of the system find ways to shut out the less-favored once the 'legacy' graduates get control of access (or keep control of access) to the levers of economic and bureaucratic power. As vertically-integrated monopolies supplant a competitive economy, alternatives disappear.

The rest of us are expected to expect no more than the elites offer in their concept of generosity -- as little as possible -- in return for toil extracted under fear. The tax system is reshaped to favor those who have already Made It at the expense of people who might start new businesses.

We end up with the bureaucratic bloat of Soviet-style communism, the sense of entitlement of elites under feudalism, and the insatiable greed of elites that one saw among the Gilded-Age plutocrats.

I don't know if we need a revolution, let alone what sort. One thing is certain: we need to redo what has gone very wrong. We have institutions built for small shopkeepers and yeoman farmers. The plutocrats and bureaucrats rule, as is the norm in every society that has ever soured.

I doubt this is a unique case.  Our hyper-competitive culture encourages everyone to cheat, if they can.  Elites have an easier time of it.  Helicopter parenting was bad enough.  Snowplow parenting is not just worse, but socially destructive.  To those of you in the game: sorry, but your highly protected children are not going to be the new overlords, because they are and will continue to be totally unequipped to suffer any the slings and arrows life dishes out.  That will lead to something unpleasant, but it's hard to know who gains from it.  We know your precious coddled many are not likely to be among them, unless you, mommy and daddy, have resources to burn and connections to keep it quiet.  Of course, mommy and daddy will eventually leave the scene, and Buffy and Junior will be clueless what to do then.

This could be a changing of the guard … if we're lucky.