Forgetting How To Be A Civilization

Thanks for posting. I will offer a few thoughts.

He talks about LGBTQ issues. The widespread acceptance of that is indeed relatively new (he says he generally supports tolerance but that we shouldn't have to celebrate it). I think some of the alarm about polling is misplaced. It wouldn't surprise me if some people, particularly young folks, may respond to a poll identifying as LGBTQ as an act of solidarity or to push-back against traditional gender roles, for example. But I really doubt that many people are actually having gay or lesbian sex just to be supportive. I am sure that people today are less inclined to hide that they're homosexual or bisexual. He even notes that there were quite a few gay kids in his dorm in the early 1980's and that the administration did not recognize it. As a straight guy who strongly supports the gay community, that support doesn't change the fact that I'm simply not attracted to men. No amount of tv shows is going to change that. I don't think sexual orientation is a choice or that peoples' sexual orientation is likely to be impacted by the media or cultural stigma. If that were the case, there would not have been so many gay and lesbian people during the vast majority of our history when that was a huge social taboo and being outed risked violence, job loss, being shunned by family, etc.

He also talks about heterosexual norms. I'm not sure that heterosexual Americans are currently un-mooring sex from responsibility - in a way that's new anyway. The sexual revolution was in the 1960's and people have been complaining about that ever since. Men have always been dogs as far as I can tell, and contraception, education and job opportunities have given women more control and options than they had before to act like men. Of course, as he notes, even many women think the current "hook up culture" has gone too far and is not good for women or men. On the other hand, my understanding is that teenage pregnancies are down, and I would note that many social conservatives complain that young people are not having kids like they were. But isn't this a sign of young people exhibiting responsibility by not having kids when they don't want them and not prepared to be good parents?

He says we should look at the Black community because problems they face result from the collapse of families and it's "coming for us all" next. I don't think he's trying to malicious on this point, but it annoyed me reading it. He does not seem to consider the effects that the war on drugs, mass incarceration, racial profiling, loss of manufacturing jobs, and poverty may have had on the Black community. I would also submit that Black Americans are more likely to attend church and less likely to approve of homosexual sex to the extent he is blaming those things. Also, there are happy, educated, and financially secure people/families in countries such as Iceland where marriage rates are relatively low. I'm not saying that less marriages is the answer or asserting a cause and effect, but I'm not sure what he would make of such counter-examples.

The author himself notes that he is going through a divorce. I'm not criticizing him for that, but it's interesting to me that many social conservatives (including many of whom are divorced or have had multiple marriages) often seem more concerned about marriage rates than divorce rates. Maybe it's a good thing that they gave it a shot even if it didn't ultimately work out. But binding yourself to one social/spiritual/sexual partner for one's entire life is only going to be more and more difficult as life expectancy and mobility increase.

I do agree that there are valid concerns about the reduced role of families in American life. But I tend to think he's scapegoating sex and sexuality here - partly based upon his religious lens - when issues affecting families and the role of families are complicated and multi-faceted.

 

I think the villification of nationalism is strongly to blame here. We have spent the past 30 years since the first gulf war tearing each other apart and separating .

Used to be easy, hey we are america and we will figure it out together.

Now it's if I'm not represented I hate it. Or x lives matter. Or y group appreciation month.

 

Seems like an indictment of the state, families and churches if kids think those suck compared to Tik Tok. Quite frankly, the kids probably have it right, those institutions are quite rotten and poisoned by stale ideologies. At least with Tik Tok you can see fun videos of people dancing or whatever.

 

Patriarchy, rampant sex abuse and child brides it is I guess?

 

I agree. I believe that people today look at a problem that is generally acknowledged by all to be one, and then form their own opinions on the sources of and solutions for the said problem. After they fully form their belief set on the issue, they selectively look at the data to reinforce their stated opinion, rather then comprehensively analyzing the data to get the answer.

 

IMO, any complaint about the sidelining of the family that doesnt touch on the nature of the capitalist economy is DOA intellectually and should be immediately discarded.

 

This article comes from the conservative POV which is fine but there are many more things wrong with our civilization, and by that I mean American society, than the fact that Hollywood and elite universities are stocked full of liberals.

All of that pales in comparison to the damage done by Murdoch or Murdoch-style media. What started out as an attempt to counterbalance liberal news has devolved into a full fledged political disinformation machine. For just one small example, the prior summer the Fox News audience was served up nightly stories of "American" cities on fire mostly with B-Roll of violent protests in Belarus or (pre-war) Ukraine.

The combination of the Reagan era, "Greed is good" ethos combined with globalization ripped open a wound in this country that allows for drawing a straight line right to MAGA. When young men who planned on working at the Ford plant like their Dad and their Grandpa before them suddenly found after high school no way to get a job that would let them afford a house, the anger and fear began to build.

Now we have corporate behemoths buying up every empty house putting young adults into the position of being renters forever. Their grandparents' house purchased in the 50s for $22K is now worth $1.2M though.

And now one of our major political parties is busy trying to eradicate the 21st and 20th centuries. More on that to come in a future thread.

 

Seems like a basic requirement of any civilization is accepting, tolerating, overlooking or living with the things other people might do that bother you that don't harm anyone, like whatever family or sexual arrangements adults want to have.

 

I’m curious about where the “40% of Americans are evangelical Christians” came from because I just don’t see that. Not all Christians are evangelical, I know that I’m not.

 

I am not sure all evangelicals are Christian.

 

Outstanding, well thought out post.

 

A consumer society where enough is never enough leads to a dead end. Evidence that we’ve reached it is all around us, from a general malaise to environmental destruction.

 

Just merely that jobs dont tend to stay in one place because capitalism is endless boom and bust means that people move all across the country and away from the places they are rooted to community-wise and family-wise. When capital has extracted all the labor and resources it can from an area, it abandons it.

 

The internet ruined everything.

/thread

 

This is a topic that could be debated forever, but I feel there are a few small things that would make a huge impact.

We have become a "it's all about me" society. If people thought a little more about others and a bit less about themselves, things would change drastically. Throw in some personal responsibility, empathy and kindness, and things would improve in a big way. These are things everyone can do. It does not matter what color you are, what gender you are, how much money you make, where you live, what job you have, etc. People simply need to make different choices in how they treat others. Pie in the sky? Maybe. The problem is we humans have a default setting... me first. We have to be taught/trained to consider others before ourselves. And there-in lies the problem. Most people are not being taught and/or living in an environment where they see these practices in action.

 

Christians are less real than viruses.

 

There has actually been a movement toward that, but now there is a big reaction against that in our culture, so much so that things like anti-bullying campaigns are called "woke." Parents are lashing out at kids being taught that its ok to be different or that some people might view certain language as hostile or insensitive. There is a set of people that think empathy and kindness make the country soft and weak and curtail them from expressing themselves.