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Why the past 10 years of American life have been uniquely stupid

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Re: Why the past 10 years of American life have been uniquely stupid

#211

Post by redisman »

Mountain_Skies wrote: post #171
grapeskin wrote: post #162

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> The level of political polarization now, while high, is less than the late 1850's. I know this is in the context of the build up to the civil war, but how much were neighbors at each other’s necks? I don’t know much about that period aside from the obvious events that followed (slavery being the huge and obvious motivator for the war), so I’m not sure how divided everybody was. But it seems like in the US today, th…

That Trump's pleas for his supporters to take the vaccine fell on deaf ears appears to indicate things aren't quite that clear cut. Perhaps some groups are more inclined to force compliance with all of their views than other groups.

I think this just shows that politics is largely not a generative project. Trump tapped into a current of grievance and honed his message on that and almost never went against whatever got the biggest cheers at his rallies. He wasn’t the mastermind who came up with these ideas. They were already there.

Re: Why the past 10 years of American life have been uniquely stupid

#213

Post by nradov »

grapeskin wrote: post #202
nradov wrote: post #177

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You would only believe that if you don't actually talk to your neighbors. In the real world (i.e. not the corporate media) most people have more moderate and nuanced viewpoints. Demonizing and alienating those people is not a winning political strategy. This is, by the way, one reason why the Joe Rogan Experience podcast has been so amazingly popular. The host comes across as a moderate leftist, but he has guests fro…

Not trying to fit into your red vs blue grouping, but I don’t think anyone considers Joe Rogan to be left at all. He’s generally seen at Dr Oz for 30 year old dudes. I’ve listened to some after hearing him hyped up and generally fitting into the target demographic. Didn’t find much nuance.

Rogan claims to have voted for Barack Obama twice. That's pretty typical for a moderate leftist. He gives his guests a chance to express a lot more nuance than you see in mainstream media channels. Most of the criticism comes from people who haven't actually listened to many episodes all the way through, and just rely on biased takes from critics or short quotes taken out of context. I also used to have a negative opinion until I played some whole episodes with interviews of really interesting people.

Re: Why the past 10 years of American life have been uniquely stupid

#214

Post by freeone3000 »

NoImmatureAdHom wrote: post #190
oh_sigh wrote: post #59

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Are you intimately familiar with modern life in the US and (Germany/Canada)? Because divisions you see from the inside might not be obvious from the outside.

Tbh I think that's an indication that they're less intense

It's more an indication of the US-centricism of US media.

Re: Why the past 10 years of American life have been uniquely stupid

#215

Post by jgod »

rootsudo wrote: post #41
mathlover2 wrote: post #15

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It isn't immune, but it certainly hasn't gotten to the point it has in the US. We had a failed insurrection two years ago that killed 5 people. The truck convoy was a bunch of morons thinking they could get their way by going to Ottawa and being absolutely obnoxious --- and ultimately failing because no one wanted to put up with their shit. Social media is a factor. It's not the main factor, and Haidt's weird focus o…

I wonder what you think about other riots and events. You do know the history of the United States is one that supports insurrection (from the English Monarchy) and those rights are protected by the bill of rights? "Social media is a factor. It's not the main factor, and Haidt's weird focus on it rather than deeply entrenched and growing economic disparities, lack of education in the US, the rise of the religious rig…

Doesn't it make you wonder what they would say about the Founding Fathers had they lost?

Re: Why the past 10 years of American life have been uniquely stupid

#216

Post by topkai22 »

PaulDavisThe1st wrote: post #65
rayiner wrote: post #11

Haidt makes an excellent observation about the mid-20th century unity being an aberration due to the technology of the time: > Gurri is no fan of elites or of centralized authority, but he notes a constructive feature of the pre-digital era: a single “mass audience,” all consuming the same content, as if they were all looking into the same gigantic mirror at the reflection of their own society. Something I think we o…

> What I see missing from Haidt's analysis is increased federalism and localism as a solution. I'm theoretically in favor of this, but ... one of the reasons we need a bigger, more powerful federal government is to have a governmental entity that can take on the massively more powerful private entities (corporations) that exist. No state government can take on Walmart or Amazon. The federal government can (or could,…

You need to change the incentives of the federal government (specifically the congress) to be in more in favor of localism. In 1900, senators were (at least partially) still appointed by state legislators and the local political parties held far greater control over their nomination process. Those mechanisms had their own issues with corruption and were replaced by more democratic processes, but they made members of congress far more beholden to local interests (particularly state and local elites.) In turn, you saw a lot more distrust of large national institutions and legislation to limit them. Almost all banks used to be local, for example, because of legislation strictly limiting branching.

So to answer the question of "who deals with the titans" the answer is "the federal government, but they do so because they are beholden to state and local governments/institutions/elites."

I'm not sure I see a path from where we are to making federal representatives more responsible to state institutions (my repeal the 17th amendment campaign never having gained much traction), but it doesn't mean it doesn't exist.

Re: Why the past 10 years of American life have been uniquely stupid

#217

Post by freeone3000 »

NoImmatureAdHom wrote: post #194
VictorPath wrote: post #107

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Also with productivity gains, the average inflation-adjusted hourly wage of half a century ago is the same as it was in 2018, and it has popped slightly up and down since the . All gains have been sucked up by the heirs, the aristocracy.

The way this stuff is measured is broken. The baskets of goods aren't comparable. Given the choice between a $1000 (real) basket of goods from 1956 and a $1000 (real) basket of goods from 2022, which would you pick? To me the answer is obvious, 2022. Everything you get will be better. Better textiles, better food, cheap electronics...

From 1956? I'll take the automobile, please.

Re: Why the past 10 years of American life have been uniquely stupid

#218

Post by whatshisface »

tharne wrote: post #50

I'd say the first 10 years of the 21st century were a hell of a lot stupider. We blew a budget surplus on tax cuts for the wealthy. We started two wars that lasted the better part of 20 years, one of which was waged against a country that had nothing whatsoever to do with 9/11. Oh, and we didn't win either of them. We completely ignored the rise of China and any threat it posed, assuming all the while they'd become g…

Many of the things you list were not fully and uncontroversially understood to be bad decisions until the end of the 2010s, so by analogy let's wait and see what we're saying in 2030 before we declare the 2010s to be an improvement over the 2000s.

Re: Why the past 10 years of American life have been uniquely stupid

#219

Post by TimTheTinker »

PaulDavisThe1st wrote: post #65
rayiner wrote: post #11

Haidt makes an excellent observation about the mid-20th century unity being an aberration due to the technology of the time: > Gurri is no fan of elites or of centralized authority, but he notes a constructive feature of the pre-digital era: a single “mass audience,” all consuming the same content, as if they were all looking into the same gigantic mirror at the reflection of their own society. Something I think we o…

> What I see missing from Haidt's analysis is increased federalism and localism as a solution. I'm theoretically in favor of this, but ... one of the reasons we need a bigger, more powerful federal government is to have a governmental entity that can take on the massively more powerful private entities (corporations) that exist. No state government can take on Walmart or Amazon. The federal government can (or could,…

> one of the reasons we need a bigger, more powerful federal government is to have a governmental entity that can take on the massively more powerful private entities (corporations) that exist.

Is bigger government more able to do this? It already has the power it needs -- the legislature can outlaw undesirable corporate behaviors, the justice department can pursue litigation (including antitrust litigation), and federal courts can rule against unlawful behavior by these companies. I don't see how bigger further enables any of these goals.

The problem I see is that lobbying and corporate hobnobbing with government elites in Washington creates a friendship and unity between corporate elites and government that ought not to exist. (Exhibit A: Ajit Pai)

A merely bigger government concentrates unjust power at the top: power to dictate more of our lives and increase bureaucracy, not power to enact justice and protect liberty.

We need a better government, not a bigger one -- a government that enforces justice without corporate favoritism, enacts the will of the people through representation, and upholds and protects the US constitution.

Re: Why the past 10 years of American life have been uniquely stupid

#220

Post by weatherlite »

mathlover2 wrote: post #5

This is the dumbest thing I have seen come from Jonathan Haidt. If social media is this powerful a destabilizer of societies, I wonder how Haidt explains first world countries like Germany, Canada, and most of the rest of the planet that have social media but haven't fallen into the same sort of divisiveness the US has.

Netherlands was barely able to form a government, took around 6 months I think and it seems shaky. Belgium, well ...has its own issues. UK - pretty polarized (Brexit was around 50% split), France - rise of the far right, Israel - election every 6 months, and so on and so on.
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