That, and even more than that. As Heather Cox Richardson is so adept at pointing out, it’s not just about keeping the populace dumb but also racism. The defunding of education has direct roots in the reaction to school desegregation. That continues today, with the ultimate expression of that racist movement being the school voucher system.
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There’s a great line in Stargate SG-1 about this trope in TV shows. A character suggests a really stupid and dangerous plan. Everyone is resistant. The character says, “well, do you have a better idea?!”. The standard reaction would be “no” and then everyone goes along with the plan. Instead there’s a perfect long beat of everyone looking at them. Finally someone says, “Not having a better idea is a not a reason to do something stupid”. They then do nothing and move on to other tasks.
I just rewatched that whole run and was reminded how good the writing in that show really is.
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Maybe because my parents were side-products of the 60s I was just mentally in a different era? And true that there were some dangers lurking, but every era had devious shit going on (including the nuke threat of the 60s, and war…).
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Samantha Carter is also a kick-ass role model.
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Pick a time, any time - at least a generation before that.
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Could be? Also could be that your parents shielded you from the darker part of the 70s? And of course, no one was as hyper-connected as we are today, so it was easier to tune out such events, especially if you were young at the time.
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I would respectfully disagree and say that Americans have always distrusted most institutions, especially governmental ones but in no small degree educational, religious and societal ones as well. heck, the country was born out of a war based on the deep mistrust in the extant government of the time and our current constitutional regime only arose because our distrust in federal power led to a government that was so bad the early leaders decided they had to allow at least a little federal authority. This nation may be uniquely prone/vulnerable to mistrust of institutions due to our origins.
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I disagree. The mid-20th century might have been an aberration, but there is little doubt that there was more general trust in our institutions… especially compared to today. There were exceptions of course, but the liberal consensus was a thing that happened. I know people hate to be told that things “liberal” were once embraced, but it’s true.
I disagree, as plenty of countries were borne out of violence rebellion against institutions. We’re not particular unique in that in the age of the nation-state, even if the US was somewhat ahead of the curve.
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Was it ever. I hate how much attention that movie gets. It was classist bullshit and terribly written. I like Mike Judge in general, but that thing was awful.
Everyone needs to let go of the idea that there was some point 15, 20, 30, whatever years ago when everyone was smarter and more rational. That has never been true. People haven’t changed much in the last 10,000 years. We have the same cognitive shortcuts, biases, and lazy thinking we’ve always had. It’s how we’re wired. Yet every new crop of cranky old men is convinced everyone is stupider than they used to be and when they were young it was a Vulcan paradise. 
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I’d argue America hit Peak Stupid with the pointless and criminal invasion of Iraq in 2003. It’s still bad but it’s been getting better. Sometimes the media even correct people when they lie now.
Regarding this article, I’m not sure I’d look to the CIA to tell me when the good old days were, what’s gone wrong since then, or whose fault it was.
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The subtext to that argument, whether people realize it or not, is that when cisgendered, straight, white men ran things, things were better.
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Can’t we have just a little white supremacy? /s
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I look at what kids are capable of these days, and it’s amazing. It makes me wonder what they would be capable of if we actually invested in them.
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They are amazing, this generation, for sure.
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( BTW that’s one guy, who’s not notable for anything else, trying to sell a book and make some speaking fees. The talk pages for the WP article are endless skirmishes between Pontell’s hydra-like sockpuppets and everybody else. )
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I think if the average person has any memory of OWS at all, it was how the corporate media emphasized things like…nearby homeless people pooping on cop cars - and pinning that on the movement. It was so ridiculous…but it worked.
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Hm, Jonathan Haidt. I think I’ll skip it. He seems to come from the same bothsiderist BS mold that David Brooks comes from.
Hunter S. Thompson said something like: “If you squint, you can see where that wave of optimism crested, on the Santa Monica hills and then fell back to the sea leaving behind a scum of self interest and nihilism.”
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I have a hard time trying to decide which is worse - the extremist and radicalized right wing with absolutely abhorrent ideas and plans for a lot of Americans they hate, or the bothsiderist “moderates” that keep normalizing this behavior, often pretending it’s somehow fringe (or does not exist/is not the very core of the right wing) but in any case, no matter what the right wing does, “the left extremes are just as bad”. This is a position that is so morally bankrupt - and it comes from people that definitely should know better. They’ve been pretending - for decades - as if Fox News, Rush Limbaugh and Alex Jones don’t even exist, when that is what the right wing revolves around.
This is something I hear driftglass of The Professional Left rail on all the time, and I think I’m starting to agree with him: the “moderates” are probably worse for this. They make the very worst aspects of the rising fascism of the extreme right seem “respectable” to the low info voter - or at least, no worse than AOC and Bernie and “the squad” or whatever the boogeyman du jour is. Because, you know, “both sides”.
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Hmmmm… my Unitarian-Universalist congregation recently made a decision to change our system of governance from a corporate Minister-as-CEO model to a collaborative model where all stakeholders have immediate input in church governance. We are in the initial phase of this transition and how this actually works and affects ministry has yet to be fleshed out. We are doing it though. It is exciting and I hope our work can be taken up by other churches. Embrace change!
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