“Freedom’s just another word …”
We are in such a bad place in America these days.
We are overly moral about the wrong things when it comes to the behavior of those we dislike and willing to accept anything from those on our side of the equation.
And what do we get? A president who thinks he can do anything he wants without getting permission from anyone, tearing down sn entire wing of the White House, putting his mark on Washington like a dog pissing on every tree he passes. A paved-over Rose Garden to accommodate a gigantic structure for an athletic event in the most lowbrow sport there is.
Really, Mike? What about cockfighting?
All right, second-most lowbrow.
Eating contests?
Debatable.
A bad place? Definitely, but why and how did we get here?
I have written numerous times about various things that have hurt our country, from television to burgeoning income inequality. But I think there are more basic problems that go far deeper than concrete things. I’ll mention three here:
- Too many of us seem to have developed a feeling that people who aren’t like us can’t be real Americans. Whether it’s race, ethnicity, religion or politics, “different” is no longer good in America. Where that seems really to infuriate some people is when they hear people speaking languages other than English. The old joke about people who speak three languages being trilingual, people who speak two being bilingual and people speaking only one being American isn’t all that funny anymore.
- We have regressed strongly in the way we view differences of opinion. We used to believe that even if we disagreed with what someone said, we believed in their right to say it. We went from there to “you’re wrong,” then to “you’re stupid” and then to “you’re evil.”
- Everything has become either a win or a loss to us. Compromise has become a bad word. This goes to the previous problem as well, necause how do you compromise with what you consider evil? You don’t. So nothing good gets accomplished and few issues are permanently settled..
It’s easy to over-romanticize the past, especially if you’re a white male. Many of the people who are now angriest are ones who up till the 1960s could have a perfectly successful life with nothing more than a high-school education. Men working at skilled blue-collar jobs could own a home and a car, support a family and have reasonable job security.
Millions of those jobs no longer exist, and rather than blame the plutocrats who eliminated them to increase profits, they blame the people of other races and ethnicities with whom they have to compete for the jobs that are left.
So opportunistic politicians get ahead by appealing o the worst qualities in all of us. We went from the positivity of Barack Obama’s campaign (“Yes we can”) to the American carnage of Donald Trump in just eight years.
It seems to me there are two remedies that if not actually solutions might at least ameliorate some of our problems.
First and foremost would be choosing to operate under a principle that is part of every human religion — the Law of Reciprocity, also known as the Golden Rule.
Do unto others as you would have others do unto you.
Second is even simpler — restore a sense of shame.
If you are considering doing or not doing something, would you be ashamed to tell your mother about it?
More on this in the future.