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Think America’s divided now? Try the 1970s

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Re: Think America’s divided now? Try the 1970s

#11

Post by beervirus »

matwood wrote: post #5

I maybe wrong in thinking about this way, but in the 1970s people were debating over topics that were debatable. Vietnam for example, an argument can be made it was the right move to get involved. And, an argument can be made it was a mistake. Same with socialism vs. capitalism and a myriad of other large, complex topics. Now the divide is around the basics of the scientific method. People think that vaccines have ki…

> Now the divide is around the basics of the scientific method. People think that vaccines have killed more people than they help. They think that hydrochloroquine is a wunderdrug and Bill Gates is suppressing its use so he can make more money. I see disagreements that are not arguable on any merit.

The number of people who believe stuff like this is vanishingly small. They're just vocal in their ignorance.

Re: Think America’s divided now? Try the 1970s

#12

Post by rootsudo »

zepto wrote: post #6
matwood wrote: post #5

I maybe wrong in thinking about this way, but in the 1970s people were debating over topics that were debatable. Vietnam for example, an argument can be made it was the right move to get involved. And, an argument can be made it was a mistake. Same with socialism vs. capitalism and a myriad of other large, complex topics. Now the divide is around the basics of the scientific method. People think that vaccines have ki…

Don’t we just hear about that now because of the internet? In the 1970’s we just didn’t know what people were thinking.

Doesn't make it different, so now we have feedback and people who aren't experts having a voice where fifty years ago people were vetted, from personal networks before they went live on TV and say anything.

Less filters, and no governance.

Re: Think America’s divided now? Try the 1970s

#14

Post by jdkee »

Gloria: Do you know that 60 percent of all deaths in America are caused by guns?

Archie Bunker: Would it make you feel any better if dey was pushed out of windows?

~

Archie Bunker: Well, I'll tell you one thing about President Nixon. He keeps Pat home. Which was where Roosevelt should have kept Eleanor. Instead he let her run around loose until one day she discovered the colored. We never knew they were there. She told them they were gettin' the short end of the stick and we been having trouble ever since.

Mike: Let me tell you something Mr. Bunker...

Archie Bunker: No, let me tell you something, Mr. Stivic. You are a meathead! A meathead, dead from head up! A meathead!

~

Archie Bunker: When your mother-in-law and me was goin' around together, it was two years — we never — I never — I mean absolutely nothin', not 'til the wedding night.

Edith Bunker: Yeah, and even then...

Gloria: I'm sorry, Mr. Davis, sometimes my father says the wrong things.

Sammy Davis Jr.: Yeah, I've noticed that.

Lionel Jefferson: But he's not a bad guy, Mr. Davis. I mean, like, he'd never burn a cross on your lawn.

Sammy Davis Jr.: No, but if he saw one burning, he's liable to toast a marshmallow on it.

~

Archie Bunker: Now, no prejudice intended, but I always check with the Bible on these here things. I think that, I mean if God had meant for us to be together he'd a put us together. But look what he done. He put you over in Africa, and put the rest of us in all the white countries.

Sammy Davis Jr.: Well, he must've told 'em where we were because somebody came and got us.

Re: Think America’s divided now? Try the 1970s

#15

Post by claudeganon »

Violent, fringe, left-wing movements are of little importance because they have no corollary representation in electoral politics and are largely defunct. They’re likewise so far outside the neoliberal consensus of the Democratic Party that they have little hope of finding their way in.

The same, unfortunately, cannot be said for the right, which has a great deal of transit between milita groups, white supremacists, and the Republican political establishment. This is clear in Trump’s pardon of Amon Bundy, the dismantling of counterintelligence monitoring these groups’ activities, and in the rhetoric of politicians like Iowa representative Steve King.

Re: Think America’s divided now? Try the 1970s

#16

Post by daenz »

tensor wrote: post #4

This article really misses the point. Sure, there may be times in the long past where there was a lot of divide. America once had legal slavery too. But it would still be absolutely appalling if slavery were to come back today. The article almost gives off the impression that "oh it happened before so it's ok and normal". No, it's not ok and normal. It wasn't ok back then and it's not ok now.

>But it would still be absolutely appalling if slavery were to come back today.

I've got news for you: undocumented labor makes up 9% of California's labor force [0]. Undocumented workers don't have the same exact conditions as slaves, but I'll leave the research to you as to why their position is one of extraordinary vulnerability and abuse at the hands of employers. People proudly tout California as the USA's largest agricultural exporter, but they don't acknowledge why it's possible.

0. https://www.epi.org/publication/california-immigrant-labor-l...

Re: Think America’s divided now? Try the 1970s

#17

Post by ojnabieoot »

This is an extremely dumb article.

a) Today intense partisan divisiveness and animosity is felt by the overwhelming majority of the US electorate, not just among extremist groups with no formal political representation. Even taking the author's premise that the 70s had more bloodshed for granted, left-right animosity was comparatively low in conventional politics. A crucial factor of this was that the "realignment of the parties" had just begun with the Nixon administration, so there were still a great deal of centrist liberal Republicans and deeply conservative Democrats.

b) Unlike the 70s, extremist politics are represented at the highest levels of government. This is only true of the right, which is highly relevant!

c) Unlike the 70s, political extremism in the US is almost exclusively a right-wing phenomenon, both in government and in the general population. The few radical communists that actually exist in the US have little impact even on socialist discourse. The fact that Democrats have been moving left since 2005 is not at all symmetrical with the Republican plunge into proto-fascism starting in 2009. The lone gunman who attempted to kill Steve Scalise is not at all symmetrical with the masses who swarmed Charlottesville with anti-Semitic chants.

Of course given the source none of this is a surprise. The author rather gives the game away by focusing exclusively on socialist/marxist terrorism. Arsonists don't generally like taking credit for their work.

Re: Think America’s divided now? Try the 1970s

#18

Post by hedora »

tensor wrote: post #4

This article really misses the point. Sure, there may be times in the long past where there was a lot of divide. America once had legal slavery too. But it would still be absolutely appalling if slavery were to come back today. The article almost gives off the impression that "oh it happened before so it's ok and normal". No, it's not ok and normal. It wasn't ok back then and it's not ok now.

Slavery is still legal in the US (it was never completely banned).

> The Thirteenth Amendment forbade slavery and involuntary servitude, “except as punishment for crime whereof the party shall have been duly convicted.“

There are about 2.1 million people in the prison system. They’re forced to work, disproportionately african american, or other minorities. Many were wrongfully convicted. Their work props up a multi-billion dollar industry.

This doesn’t count refugees, who are also forced to work in US immigration camps.

But, yeah, to agree with your point, many people apparently think this is totally OK.

https://www.theatlantic.com/business/archive/2015/09/prison-...

https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Incarceration_in_the_United_...

https://www.newyorker.com/business/currency/making-profits-o...

https://www.cnn.com/2018/04/17/us/immigrant-detention-forced...

Re: Think America’s divided now? Try the 1970s

#19

Post by matz1 »

matwood wrote: post #5

I maybe wrong in thinking about this way, but in the 1970s people were debating over topics that were debatable. Vietnam for example, an argument can be made it was the right move to get involved. And, an argument can be made it was a mistake. Same with socialism vs. capitalism and a myriad of other large, complex topics. Now the divide is around the basics of the scientific method. People think that vaccines have ki…

Every topics is debatable, on the basis that no everyone think the same way, even scientific method. You would think mathematical statement such as 1+1=2 is obviously true, the absolute truth ? No, its still very much debatable, people can argue how to define '1','2','+', what axiom to use, etc.

Re: Think America’s divided now? Try the 1970s

#20

Post by sandworm101 »

astine wrote: post #3

There may have been more violence among various radical and extremist factions in American politics in the 70s but that doesn't mean that America was more divided politically over all. There wasn't nearly as much partisanship in the upper-echelons of power in 70s and I suspect that there was more consensus among people in more moderate circles. There also wasn't this huge epistemological divide running right through…

The political class may have been unified, but perhaps because so many people didn't participate in politics. Many religious people stayed away or at least did not vote along religious lines, and other large segments were disenfranchised altogether. So the separations may have existed but simply did not play out in the political arena because politics was in the hands of a homogeneous group.
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