Hacker News Board Hacker News, browsed like a classic message board
Live data from Hacker News

Half of Americans anticipate a U.S. civil war soon

science.org

Post reply on HN
Print view View original

101–110 of 445 posts

Re: Half of Americans anticipate a U.S. civil war soon

#101

Post by sorry_outta_gas »

Imnimo wrote: post #30
PragmaticPulp wrote: post #6

Source is apparently a preprint (that is, not peer-reviewed) uploaded here: https://www.medrxiv.org/content/10.1101/2022.07.15.22277693v... > Participants: Cross-sectional nationwide survey conducted May 13 to June 2, 2022; participants were adult members of the Ipsos KnowledgePanel. 8,620 respondents, but I don't see how they were recruited or how potential bias was accounted for. Given how weird some of the interne…

I guess it depends on what you count as "over politics" - I think a lot of people would be willing to engage in violent resistance to something like "the president declares the constitution suspended and all elections indefinitely postponed", but not to something like "the Supreme Court overturns Obergefell vs Hodges". I find the referenced numbers perfectly plausible if they interpret the question to mean something…

After the summer of 2020 I wouldn't be shocked things sprial out of control fast

Re: Half of Americans anticipate a U.S. civil war soon

#102

Post by petilon »

If a civil war happens, the blame will be on (1) social media and (2) politicians using topics such as abortion and guns to divide people in order to get votes. But politicians leveraging divisive topics to get votes is not new. What is new is social media. In the old days news was filtered, vetted and verified by reputable news services before being distributed. Now because of social media everyone is a publisher, and lies and conspiracy theories spread before truth has a chance to get its pants on. The events of Jan 6 shows what can happen if a large percentage of the citizenry believes the lies. If this continues unchecked a civil war is not outside the realms of possibility.

Re: Half of Americans anticipate a U.S. civil war soon

#103

Post by cafard »

lordleft wrote: post #20
PragmaticPulp wrote: post #6

Source is apparently a preprint (that is, not peer-reviewed) uploaded here: https://www.medrxiv.org/content/10.1101/2022.07.15.22277693v... > Participants: Cross-sectional nationwide survey conducted May 13 to June 2, 2022; participants were adult members of the Ipsos KnowledgePanel. 8,620 respondents, but I don't see how they were recruited or how potential bias was accounted for. Given how weird some of the interne…

Sadly, even a small, concerted group of violent actors can terrorize a society. I don't think the paramilitary core of the Nazis were a particularly large part of German Society, for example. That doesn't mean that an outright civil war would break out, but it does mean that all it takes is an organized group to upset the political balance, and disturb long respected norms.

a. Germany had recently lost a long and bloody war. b. The managing classes of Germany hadn't really bought in to the republic.

Re: Half of Americans anticipate a U.S. civil war soon

#104

Post by DawnQFunk »

stale2002 wrote: post #43
ant6n wrote: post #10

Earlier quoted context omitted.

What was the last one for? “States’ rights”?

Fortunately there is no need to start a war over federal vs state power, given that the current supreme court is ruling in favor of state power, in recent court cases.

No post body was provided.

Re: Half of Americans anticipate a U.S. civil war soon

#105

Post by mschuster91 »

I'd be interested in how people of other countries see the situation in the US, particularly people living in regions that have devolved into civil war situations in the last thirty-ish years.

For what it's worth, the US have been judged as a "high risk" country for social unrest escalations even before the current mess with inflation, the bogus "stolen election" claims, the open partisanship of the Supreme Court and barely after the George Floyd murder [1]. I would not be surprised if a more recent study similarly based on quantifiable data would indicate an even greater risk factor... and depending on how the elections in November this year and especially 2024 turn out, IMHO there is a definitive and massive risk of widespread unrest.

The Republican voter base is riled up on the "stolen election" claims - 70% of them believe Joe Biden is not the legitimate US President [2]. It is possible that the Republicans manage to gain control of the Senate this year, but (assuming the Democrats put up a halfway decent candidate, which means neither Biden, Clinton nor Harris!) they may not win the Presidential election in 2024. And at that point, the situation can get really nasty really fast. Republicans are already openly thinking of putting up laws allowing state legislative bodies to overturn electoral college votes, Trump's associates attempted to subvert the electoral college process [3], and we've seen on Jan 6th that it was not just Congress which was threatened by violent protesters but also other parliaments. Both of these scenarios are something that can serve as a trigger for massive outrage.

Add on top of that the risk of unpredictable event chains like yet another school shooting with a dozen kids ending up dead or yet another instance of a police officer getting filmed executing someone on camera... I would not want to live in the US in these times.

Please let me say one thing as a German here: Take care of your democracy and protect it. The history of my ancestors should be more than enough proof where a catastrophic loss of trust in democracy can end up.

[1] https://www.maplecroft.com/insights/analysis/us-named-as-hig...

[2] https://www.poynter.org/fact-checking/2022/70-percent-republ...

[3] https://edition.cnn.com/2022/01/27/politics/fake-electors-ex...

Re: Half of Americans anticipate a U.S. civil war soon

#106

Post by 650REDHAIR »

hunglee2 wrote: post #52

eh...America is way too big (territorially) for civil war. I mean, how would you even organise it? There's not two sides which could cohere into organised military forces. Worst scenario will be an increase in temperature to what we already have now - anti-federalists who might engage in intimidation, street fights with rival groups and perhaps acts of sabotage and terrorism. In the grand scheme of things, fairly low…

It’ll be like The Troubles and you’ll think twice every time you ride a bus or go to a large social gathering.

Re: Half of Americans anticipate a U.S. civil war soon

#107

Post by jonnycomputer »

frankbreetz wrote: post #14
jonnycomputer wrote: post #7

Civil war, for what? Every time I see this mentioned, I think, "for what?"

Revolts over wealth inequality have happened many times throughout history. Wealth inequality is currently quite high.

A revolt isn't a civil war, though. Not that I know that people are making such fine distinctions in the poll.

Re: Half of Americans anticipate a U.S. civil war soon

#108

Post by lbrito »

smm11 wrote: post #24

The great majority of that 50 percent belong to one political party, that is fond of carrying around gallows, encouraging people to be locked up after being chained, etc. They're willing things to happen, as Q predications let them down.

I think this is a worldwide phenomenon.

Usually one side of the political spectrum gets progressively reactionary (no pun intended) and extreme, while the rest of the political spectrum reacts mildly to that extremism.

The media then creates a bizarre narrative that there are in fact two warring political factions, both equally extreme, one the mirror image of the other. That is almost always a strange fantasy. There is really just one radical side in most countries right now, the rest are just trying to keep things sane.

Re: Half of Americans anticipate a U.S. civil war soon

#109

Post by leshow »

I dunno about civil war, but I'm increasingly convinced the US is a failing state. Capital owners in a variety of sectors are siphoning off public money while paying next to no taxes. The introduction of unlimited money in political campaigns, the minoritarian rule by conservatives. Increasing theocracy and dissolution of church and state separation... Just to name a few things.

As a Canadian all of these things are extremely concerning, I can't imagine how Americans are feeling.

Re: Half of Americans anticipate a U.S. civil war soon

#110

Post by lapetitejort »

Verdex wrote: post #45
rngname22 wrote: post #15

Would love to see what percentage of Americans would be willing to fight in a civil war. My guess is it's a whole lot lower. 3 way civil war between left extremists vs right extremists vs the federal government?

I would be interested in seeing of who would be willing to fight in a civil war how many of them are physically able to fight in a war. Also, how many are capable of organizing a civil war. How many are willing to take orders that would send them off to die for the cause. How many are willing to take orders at all. Final test would be how many people are willing to just sit outside in August heat for an hour with no…

Simply reframe the question so that it's more accurate to what would actually happen in a civil war: "Who wants to enlist as an E-1 and lug jerry cans around for 14 hours a day only to die from a drone strike in the middle of the night?"
Post reply on HN