05-13-2017, 08:22 AM
(05-13-2017, 12:54 AM)Emman85 Wrote:(05-12-2017, 03:14 PM)Mikebert Wrote: This social moment is not mapping into a 4T. If this is actually the case we would have a situation in which (in S&H terminology) we would have another skipped Civic generation or anomaly. But I do not buy the Civil War anomaly. I think there was a Civil War gen born over ca. 1840-1858 (T Roosevelt, Wilson and Debs as were in this gen) which oversaw a 2T in elderhood as did the GIs. I will note that the Revolutionary generation did *not* oversee a 2T--they were mostly dead by the 1830's core years of the 2T. I believe that the Millies, like the Revolutionary gen, will oversee a social moment that over ca. 2047-2066 that is *not* a 2T. In fact it will be a 4T.
Oh come on, just dump the theory then, so we're a 2T now even though the generations don't match at all.
We(in the late 2010s) are NOT in a spiritual awakening of any kind.
To me it looks like a pre regeneracy 4T, if we don't have a civic regeneracy by 2025 then I will just dump the whole theory in the waste pin.
This is definitely not a 2T. There is no semblance of an Awakening. The Millennial Generation shows little evidence of anything other than conventional and conformist religiosity.The Millennial Generation seems (so far) to seek to work within the system, much like GIs did. But this is important -- the current Boomer leadership has so far shown a "My Way or the Highway" approach to politics even in inter-factional struggles (which, should they become genuine strife, will give America as nasty a Crisis as is possible.
We had signs of a Crisis from 2000 (disputed election. 9/11, Enron/Tech bust) that went nowhere in reshaping basic attitudes -- except to go back to 3T behavior. As Dubya said, "Go shopping", which is about as 3T (Unraveling/Degeneracy) behavior as there could be.
I look at the Great Depression as largely a time of calming, with people getting the general idea that it was best to not break too far from accepted norms in behavior. Obama's two terms look in many respects similar to the first two terms of FDR, if less successful politically and more successfully economically.
America has typically been fortunate to have good leaders during Crisis Eras. We had really good ones, the sorts that people would deify in antiquity, in the American Revolution. We had Lincoln and FDR. Obama, all things taken into account, was as good as anyone could be; his problem is that he is more like the sort of leader who emerges after the Crisis is over. Donald Trump is simply an execrable leader. He is not unifying people except into hostile camps who think him the greatest thing to have ever happened to America and into people who think him the worst.
We did not solve our class resentments -- especially the divide between the middle class and working class* (at least within the white majority). Donald Trump exploited those resentments on behalf of his class -- that all will be destitute except his Master Class. It is hard to see how his weird combination of vulgarity and economic elitism will play out. In countries with weaker institutions, revolution has been a commonplace occurrence.
I can't see President Trump leading us into a High. He is simply too divisive and vindictive. An American leader might lead America into a traditionalist, inequitable, repressive, and authoritarian High much as was Spain from the 1940s to the 1970s (Franco suppressed much of Spain's Awakening) -- but America would need a military caudillo. America is still divided too sharply along regional, ethnic, and religious lines for such a dubious High. I can imagine him botching things so badly that we would have mass graves and refugee problems.
*link forthcoming for a connection to a discussion in another thread.
The ideal subject of totalitarian rule is not the convinced Nazi or the dedicated Communist but instead the people for whom the distinction between fact and fiction, true and false, no longer exists -- Hannah Arendt.
