06-09-2022, 11:48 PM
(This post was last modified: 06-09-2022, 11:48 PM by Eric the Green.)
(06-06-2022, 07:00 PM)Eric the Green Wrote:(06-06-2022, 04:33 PM)pbrower2a Wrote: This Crisis Era can end without a shooting war. It can end with some radically-new arrangement that is likely to be either center-left or Hard Right. Whoever wins, there will be rearguard violence. This one will decide among other things whether property determines power or one-man, one-vote does. One side has reason and science on its side, but is unable so far to enforce its vision; it expects the culture to drive the reality. The other has a firm set of values that it has determined is the ultimate reality., and that brute force in the service of those values will establish what is right.
If the Hard Right prevails, then we will have a hierarchical, anti-egalitarian, and repressive society in which any individual thought, let alone any show of dissent, becomes a grave peril. That sort of America will have a brain drain much as have many societies similarly hierarchical, anti-egalitarian, and repressive. It could also have torture chambers and shooting pits. There might be small rewards for compliance -- maybe occasional trips to an amusement park or a cruise on a riverboat casino -- in the equivalent of the Nazi Kraft durch Freude. Religion will play a role in offering a wondrous Afterlife in return for acquiescence with the hell that America will have become.
It still needs to be remembered that not only is all that true, but our very existence as a civilization is at stake. The climate crisis won't wait. Tipping points are starting now, and more will tip. Without a change of course this decade, we will not be able to reverse the crisis. It is not only the USA but all nations must act. No more should it ever be said that the next 4T will see the climate crisis come upon us. It is upon us now. Never should it be omitted from the list of events and trends within our failed society, such as the above list.
If this 4T fails and the hard right wins, fear will be a constant and ever-increasing pall. No street, no type of facility will be safe from guns. Violence will be oft-erupting, and epic disasters of every kind routine. Ignorance and superstition will rule the day, and that means fear over nothing multiplies as well. We will be in a new dark age that will never lift. Every group will be suspicious and afraid of every other; every group will try to rule over every other. And only some, the most privileged, will win. Exactly how long it will be until our republic and our civilization ends entirely is not clear, but certainly this will happen in no fewer than 2 centuries.
Today, people often still talk as if we have a future. They talk about what we leave for our children. People don't realize that we may have no future. The future is on the ballot, and it is partisan, and we don't realize that.
No MORE than 2 centuries I meant. Or FEWER than 2 centuries. Probably one.