A Different Kind of Patriotism

Oftentimes, people who are critical of this nation and this society’s actions, including me, are told: “You don’t love this country, so get out.”  Fellow citizen, you are wrong. It is precisely because I love this country so much that I am so deeply disappointed in it.  So amply blessed, so richly advantaged, this country should be ENORMOUSLY better than what it has demonstrated.

Indiana, Mr. Jones

I was in Indianapolis over the weekend.  The city is often poorly lit, from street lights, to exit signs, to businesses.  Why?

I also saw a high number of young, seemingly able bodied (both Caucasian and African-American) panhandlers (beggars).  Was it con artistry?  Lack of economic opportunity (jobs, start-ups)?  True homelessness (and if so, what caused that—veteran maladjustment? Job disruption? Mental challenges)?

In retrospect, I should have taken time to ask.  Maybe that’s a key challenge of our times—we don’t take the time to ask. 

Ethic-less Youth or Rational Response?

It would appear our youth are in large part embroiled in illusion and delusion. 

Or is it because the system itself, both the school system and the larger society, is not doing anything relevant or real anymore, not doing anything to have faith in?  Kind of like the old joke in the Soviet Union, “the government pretends to pay us, so we pretend to work.”

The reader can decide.

US high school students are, at best, “apathetic” about ethical standards (there’s good spin).  64% of students said they cheated on a test in the past year, and 30% said they stole from a store.  Yet they also reported they were “satisfied with their personal ethics and character,” and “when it comes to doing what is right, I am better than most people I know.” From a Josephson Institute survey, 2010.

Feel The Strings In Your Back

Want an example of how corporate America runs things?  On Sirius satellite radio, supposedly one of the “few restrictions,” “say anything,” media outlets, the commercial programming is often the same.  Sure, there are fewer commercials on the Right’s channel (is that because they don’t need as much money, or get more listeners that generate more revenue?  Or do they get more subsidies or donations?  Unknown), but both it and the Left’s channel are often surprisingly the same in their commercials.  For instance, a certain anti-tax commercial promoting a tax accountant firm.  It aired frequently on BOTH right (“Patriot”) and left (“Left”) satellite radio channels.   So does one about selling  gold. While I do not believe the two sides are equally to blame for the spiral the country is in, both ARE to blame, and sometimes there isn’t enough difference.  Because in back of them, with hands on the controlling strings of money, are the plutocratic elite.

America, How Do You Like Being Played?

Chick-fil-a: Much ado about little to nothing on all "sides."  We Neros fiddle while Rome burns.  We are the perfectly diverted, our energies turned to fringes--and on each other--while our common adversaries cement their control.

Those adversaries have found in culture issues the easy emotional lever to perfectly divert, divide, and subjugate us.  And then we wonder why nothing ever gets done about corporate control, money in politics, jobs that are gone forever, the plight of the shrinking middle class, etc. etc.

A Roar A What?

The shootings have people fixated on this incident, which is tragic, but not in a major way.  Hundreds of thousands didn’t die, not even thousands or even hundreds.  More happens each day, both directly and indirectly, to affect far more people, and far more significantly.  But let’s look at this incident anyway:

1.     Who was the perpetrator?  Another loner white young male.  What does that say about our society?  That maybe we’ve lost our connection to each other and our affection for and responsibility to the greater society?  That maybe we can’t distinguish illusion and diversion from reality?  That too many feel powerless, that their lives are put upon or have no meaning?  That our very culture (and its vacuousness or exploitive nature) spurs mental illness—violent mental illness—too often?

2.     The proponents of, and those against, gun control, line up and start spouting.  What if the very premise of their argument is off?  Lots of societies (Finland, Sweden, Britain, etc.) have few to no guns, and have few problems of mass murder.  Others have a lot of guns, and also few problems.  An example of the latter is Switzerland, which is not a homogenous society, but has a “well-regulated militia.”  Switzerland’s pretty safe. 

3.     Handguns deserve separate consideration.  Since handguns have little to no function outside of offensive or defensive use against humans (and only secondarily in warfare behind assault rifles, etc.), societies with profusions of them tend to be more violent than others.

4.     As we become less trusting of each other, as we know each other less, as we find less in common, we have become what Vance Packard warned us about in his 1970 book, A Nation of Strangers.   A nation whose inhabitants lock themselves behind their doors often.  More gated communities.  More worrisome overprotection, which isolates even further.  We have become hyper-individualistic and increasingly non-communal.  This is likely reflected in opinion polls about handgun control.  Around 70% favored such  measures 40 years ago.  Barely 25% do today.  Fear and distrust, that.  We are a disconnected and afraid society.

5.     Still, is it an “epidemic” of mass murder violence?  Not statistically, not by a long shot (yes, another pun), and the chance of it happening to you or yours is really, really small.  But it does contribute to more fear, more suspicion of fellow citizens.  And the more focus on it, the more it is sensationalized, the greater chance some copycat will be moved to action.  And the rule of terrorist-type impact is to try to outdo one’s predecessors.

6.     Would more armed people have prevented it?  Unlikely.  The loners are usually ready to die, for starters.  More importantly, since they get to fire the opening salvo (where most casualties usually happen), that’s not going to be prevented outright.  Especially if sophisticated tactics (like the tear gas employed) are used.   And while the shooter MIGHT have been shot down by other armed members, does that really make you all feel safer?  What if it becomes a crossfire situation?  Even if you’re armed, being in a crossfire sucks, and can be even more deadly.  And how exactly are first responders (police) going to sort out “the bad guy(s)” when they arrive?  In general, having a population armed while “in public” creates more problems than it solves.  For example, misunderstandings, misperceptions about actions or movements, etc. can trigger (pun intended again) a violent reaction to…nothing.  More people would get hurt or killed with dozens or hundreds of these “misunderstandings” in a year than in 20 years of mass murders like what occurred in Aurora.

Everyone wants a simple answer, to “fix it.”  There aren’t any for this.  We have to, in this, as for many things, come to the realization that life is better when low risk is assumed, rather than extreme efforts to mitigate that low risk.

But the bigger issue is, what kind of society do we have and are perpetuating?  Correcting that will do more to secure us than anything.  It is also the hardest road.  The result will be worth it though.  However, it does takes more courage and determination than just buying more guns.  

It Can't Last

It can’t last.  The truly aware know it, and even the vaguely aware sense it at some level.    But they don’t know how to get from here to a better world.  They’re afraid of the pain.  Too late for that, Americanos.  You f’d the relatively “painless” escape valve up a long time ago.

We are in Doom Drift on a near-endlessly wide river.  If we drift all the way to the Fall(s), we go over the edge—Civilization Doom.  A strong, wrenching, all-out exertion by us can avert that, but we have to jettison a lot to have a chance at success—and to our detriment we continue to let the selfish, shortsighted, and criminally foolish be in control, as they have been for decades.

The other likely possibility is that a violent storm blows us way off course, and we smash into uncharted territory.  Many of us may perish in that, and many more as we struggle to survive in a harsh new reality.

I think this is a reason that books like World War Z (and obsession with “zombie apocalypses” in general) are so popular.  Like the sleepwalking populations of past political-economic entities such as the Roman, Ottoman, and Austrian-Hungarian empires, we recognize the signs of decay and the lack of any real measures by “the elites” to stop it.  In fact, we recognize that those elites are prime center of the decay.  Whether war, revolution, plague, famine, or disaster of some kind, wrenching change becomes acceptable to the populace at some level, even if not desired.

[By the way, World War Z is, in addition to widely informed—and worldly in the truest sense—insightful social commentary, it offers glimpses of possibility for a better future out of catastrophe, even while it condemns our present sloth and illusion embracing.  Maybe it is a best seller for more than just zombies. :)]

If drought continues, if climate change and its resultant destruction really does proceed past the tipping point (as many in the scientific community fear), if national economic and fiscal criminality proceed, if resource consumption accelerates while environmental destruction and pollution continue, if we at the same time remain married to finite fossil fuels and the ills that flow in every direction from them, then the cascade will have begun. 

We are doing next to nothing to recognize these interlocking threats (of which I have mentioned but a few!) and change course.  Will history—and our descendants—curse us?