# American Exceptionalism **URL:** \ **Category:** Great Debates\ **Created:** [July 1, 2016, 5:56am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/american-exceptionalism/758853 "2016-07-01T05:56:05Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 9
**Author:** ![Kimstu](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/k/ecd19e/32.png) [@Kimstu](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Kimstu)\ **Post date:** [July 3, 2016, 3:07am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/american-exceptionalism/758853/161 "2016-07-03T03:07:26Z")
> [@Martin\_Hyde](#): > > We don’t have a system like Britain or Australia where a brief surge in panic means the government can ban shit Of course we do. Many consumer products are abruptly banned in the US following high-profile accidents and a consequent “brief surge in panic”. (E.g., lawn darts, non-“flame retardant” fabrics for certain uses, high-powered magnets, etc.) The only particular “shit” that the government **can’t** ban when public opinion turns against it is guns. But that’s because of one specific historical artifact of the US Constitution, not because we’ve got any kind of “exceptional” ban-proofing or panic-deflecting “system” different from those of similar countries. We’ve got basically the **same** system as Britain or Australia when it comes to consumer product bans, **except** in the case of guns. ---
**Author:** ![Martin\_Hyde](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/47e85d/32.png) [@Martin\_Hyde](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Martin_Hyde)\ **Post date:** [July 3, 2016, 3:47am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/american-exceptionalism/758853/162 "2016-07-03T03:47:56Z")
Actually you’re mistaken–you’ve cited things that fall under the purview of the Consumer Products Safety Commission–which regulates the sale and manufacture of certain consumer products. But it doesn’t do so in response to “public panics” (it’s quasi-independent, and is based off of a 40 year old statute, and has a lengthy review process) and it cannot “ban” anything. When Australia’s gun bans went into effect already owned guns became illegal, and it was a crime to continue possessing them. Lawn darts cannot be legally manufactured and sold in the United States but you’re still allowed to possess any you already owned, and are allowed to make your own for private use as well. That’s very different from a ban. One is a regulation on businesses selling things to consumers, the other is a state imposition on individual citizens. The CPSC can’t regulate lots of things: information services, software, planes, alcohol, tobacco, firearms, drugs, food, cosmetics, pesticides–there’s a long list of things outside their bailiwick, not just guns. We couldn’t ban alcohol with a simple legislative act (it took a constitutional amendment), so the claim you’ve just made is not supported by the law. ---
**Author:** ![wolfpup](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/wolfpup/32/10618_2.png) [@wolfpup](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/wolfpup)\ **Post date:** [July 3, 2016, 4:03am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/american-exceptionalism/758853/163 "2016-07-03T04:03:21Z")
> [@Martin\_Hyde](#): > > Americans have chosen to have guns. That’s actually called a feature of democracy. Let me just focus on that one point, because it illuminates so much of all the other things that I and others here have been saying. The same argument is used, not just about guns, but about lots of other issues on which Americans seem to inexplicably vote against their own best interests, like denying themselves affordable health care or voting for tax breaks for the top 1%. Why do they do this? Because democracy isn’t defined as “a bunch of people being allowed to vote”. It’s defined as a form of self-governance, which implies that you have an informed populace, knowledgeable on the issues, who vote for representatives based on well-considered reasons for supporting their particular policies. Is this what you have in the US? Take health care for an example. What most Americans think they “know” about how health care works in other countries is determined by overt and covert propagandizing by a trillion-dollar industry whose very existence is at stake. [Here’s a book you should read.](https://www.amazon.com/Deadly-Spin-Insurance-Corporate-Deceiving/dp/B00A16M7HC) How accurate do you think most Americans’ perceptions are of health care systems around the world? Most are absolutely clueless. And on economic policy and tax policy? [Read this one.](https://www.amazon.com/Dark-Money-History-Billionaires-Radical/dp/0385535597/) There are dozens of others and thousands of corroborating studies. And the _Citizens United_ ruling has pushed things along nicely for the ruling plutocracy. It’s odd that America fought a war of independence to free itself from rule by unelected aristocracy, and now it has its own. This is why so many books have been written and studies done on the decline of democracy in America. To be fair, there are global issues at play as well that affect many other countries to some degree, but America set itself up to be the great amplifier of these phenomena and its primary examplar, and now it is. So what you have is a populace whose beliefs are driven by an unregulated chaos that allows the rich and powerful and corporations with deeply vested interests to instill their ideas and values through every available channel of communication to get people to vote for their particular policies through all possible means including absolutely blatant lies, as in the health care debates. And in the end, many do just what all the propagandizing and astroturf front groups exhort them to do, and many more are sufficiently disillusioned that they don’t vote at all – the US has one of the worst voting turnout rates among developed nations. So half the eligible voters don’t bother to vote, and much of the other half have no idea what the actual facts are about what they’re voting on. And _ **that’s** _ supposed to be a democracy? No wonder Donald J. Trump is the presumptive Republican nominee! And, just to conclude on the gun issue, yes, it’s very difficult in this particular system of democracy to enact meaningful gun legislation. But here you have the NRA in the role of AHIP and the AMA on health care policy or the Koch astroturf empire on economic policy. How much of what Americans believe about guns do you think is really true and supported by research? So much of it is counter-intuitive and so many common beliefs contradicted by mountains of evidence. Exactly like universal health care, which must “obviously” be more expensive if everyone is covered, plus the government can’t do nuthin’ right, ever. Even if it does it in every other country in the world. But not in America, because Exceptionalism! ---
**Author:** ![Kimstu](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/k/ecd19e/32.png) [@Kimstu](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Kimstu)\ **Post date:** [July 3, 2016, 4:18am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/american-exceptionalism/758853/164 "2016-07-03T04:18:06Z")
> [@Martin\_Hyde](#): > > Actually you’re mistaken–you’ve cited things that fall under the purview of the Consumer Products Safety Commission–which regulates the sale and manufacture of certain consumer products. You’re right that the CPSC cannot actually **ban** things, and it was sloppy of me to refer to the CPSC in that context, but the US government can and does ban things (e.g., illegal drugs, certain types of entertainment media, etc.). The 1996 federal ban (struck down by the Supreme Court in 2002) on “virtual” child pornography—i.e., pornographic materials showing images whose creation did not involve any actual children in any way—is one example of a draconian government ban in response to public anxiety. So I maintain that it’s not the US “system” that’s “exceptional” in this regard, it’s simply the unique constitutional status of firearms. ---
**Author:** ![octopus](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/octopus/32/3716_2.png) [@octopus](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/octopus)\ **Post date:** [July 3, 2016, 6:46am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/american-exceptionalism/758853/165 "2016-07-03T06:46:51Z")
> [@wolfpup](#): > > Let me just focus on that one point, because it illuminates so much of all the other things that I and others here have been saying. The same argument is used, not just about guns, but about lots of other issues on which Americans seem to inexplicably vote against their own best interests, like denying themselves affordable health care or voting for tax breaks for the top 1%. Why do they do this? > > Because democracy isn’t defined as “a bunch of people being allowed to vote”. It’s defined as a form of self-governance, which implies that you have an informed populace, knowledgeable on the issues, who vote for representatives based on well-considered reasons for supporting their particular policies. > > Is this what you have in the US? Take health care for an example. What most Americans think they “know” about how health care works in other countries is determined by overt and covert propagandizing by a trillion-dollar industry whose very existence is at stake. [Here’s a book you should read.](https://www.amazon.com/Deadly-Spin-Insurance-Corporate-Deceiving/dp/B00A16M7HC) How accurate do you think most Americans’ perceptions are of health care systems around the world? Most are absolutely clueless. And on economic policy and tax policy? [Read this one.](https://www.amazon.com/Dark-Money-History-Billionaires-Radical/dp/0385535597/) There are dozens of others and thousands of corroborating studies. And the _Citizens United_ ruling has pushed things along nicely for the ruling plutocracy. > > It’s odd that America fought a war of independence to free itself from rule by unelected aristocracy, and now it has its own. This is why so many books have been written and studies done on the decline of democracy in America. To be fair, there are global issues at play as well that affect many other countries to some degree, but America set itself up to be the great amplifier of these phenomena and its primary examplar, and now it is. > > So what you have is a populace whose beliefs are driven by an unregulated chaos that allows the rich and powerful and corporations with deeply vested interests to instill their ideas and values through every available channel of communication to get people to vote for their particular policies through all possible means including absolutely blatant lies, as in the health care debates. And in the end, many do just what all the propagandizing and astroturf front groups exhort them to do, and many more are sufficiently disillusioned that they don’t vote at all – the US has one of the worst voting turnout rates among developed nations. So half the eligible voters don’t bother to vote, and much of the other half have no idea what the actual facts are about what they’re voting on. And _ **that’s** _ supposed to be a democracy? No wonder Donald J. Trump is the presumptive Republican nominee! > > And, just to conclude on the gun issue, yes, it’s very difficult in this particular system of democracy to enact meaningful gun legislation. But here you have the NRA in the role of AHIP and the AMA on health care policy or the Koch astroturf empire on economic policy. How much of what Americans believe about guns do you think is really true and supported by research? So much of it is counter-intuitive and so many common beliefs contradicted by mountains of evidence. Exactly like universal health care, which must “obviously” be more expensive if everyone is covered, plus the government can’t do nuthin’ right, ever. Even if it does it in every other country in the world. But not in America, because Exceptionalism! Everything in that post is a symptom of a free press and freedom of speech. You prefer the alternative? ---
**Author:** ![Kimstu](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/k/ecd19e/32.png) [@Kimstu](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Kimstu)\ **Post date:** [July 3, 2016, 6:55am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/american-exceptionalism/758853/166 "2016-07-03T06:55:43Z")
> [@octopus](#): > > Everything in that post is a symptom of a free press and freedom of speech. You prefer the alternative? :rolleyes: Way to support freedom of speech there: by insinuating that anyone who uses his freedom of speech to freely criticize social and political problems doesn’t deserve freedom of speech. Got any **substantive** responses to **wolfpup** ’s post, rather than just whining about how nobody who really values free speech would use their free speech to say anything bad about the country whose respect for free speech allows them to say bad things about it? ---
**Author:** ![octopus](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/octopus/32/3716_2.png) [@octopus](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/octopus)\ **Post date:** [July 3, 2016, 7:03am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/american-exceptionalism/758853/167 "2016-07-03T07:03:08Z")
> [@Kimstu](#): > > :rolleyes: Way to support freedom of speech there: by insinuating that anyone who uses his freedom of speech to freely criticize social and political problems doesn’t deserve freedom of speech. > > Got any **substantive** responses to **wolfpup** ’s post, rather than just whining about how nobody who really values free speech would use their free speech to say anything bad about the country whose respect for free speech allows them to say bad things about it? What? She’s the one criticizing freedom of press. She’s the one whining about the press and speech of plutocrats. She’s the one saying evil corporations are making the poor, stupid, electorate vote inexplicably against their best interests. And she has the right to say it. The right that it appears she’d want to restrict for others. And saying I’m against wolfpup’s freedom of speech is not true. Where did I say she doesn’t deserve freedom of speech? I’ve always and consistently been for free speech and press since I’ve been a member of these boards. ---
**Author:** ![septimus](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/septimus/32/410_2.png) [@septimus](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/septimus)\ **Post date:** [July 3, 2016, 7:06am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/american-exceptionalism/758853/168 "2016-07-03T07:06:40Z")
> [@wolfpup](#): > > The US ranks 20th on the [Economist Democracy Index](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Democracy_Index), below Mauritius and Uruguay, and in fact the US is in the very last place just above “flawed democracy”, which it misses by a hair. Just for fun, I compared this list with [the list on the same Wiki page 9 years earlier.](https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Democracy_Index&oldid=173255746) The U.S. ranking dropped only slightly over the last 9 years, roughly swapping positions with United Kingdom. The bigger news story is that most of the democracies dropped a little — Was this a methodology change or does it truly reflect a general change? Among democracies, Norway improved a lot (though Denmark and Sweden declined). Timor-Leste and Israel were the biggest winners (more democratic since 9 years ago). Cape Verde, Botswana and Italy were also up somewhat. Big losers were Greece, Netherlands, Hungary and, hugely, Ukraine. ---
**Author:** ![Starving\_Artist](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/aeb1de/32.png) [@Starving\_Artist](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Starving_Artist)\ **Post date:** [July 3, 2016, 7:57am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/american-exceptionalism/758853/169 "2016-07-03T07:57:11Z")
> [@wolfpup](#): > > It has everything to do with it. It turns out, unsurprisingly, that the very wealthy are very much in favor of the economic systems that propelled them to wealth, and sociopolitical systems where money is absolutely supreme, capable of buying anything from political power to judicial favoritism – or at least, heavily tilting the scales in favor of the moneyed interests. That doesn’t mean that their perceived systems of choice are necessarily fair, optimal, or beneficial to any but a very few. How has Musk’s relatively recent wealth caused him to believe (observe, actually) that the U.S. has been the greatest force for good in the history of the world? And that it’s been the force that has saved democracy three times in the world over the last century? Musk and I (and millions of others) believe that a large number of the world’s population are living freer and happier lives (and, for the most part, lives of plenty), thanks to the effort, sacrifice, money and protection afforded them by the United States. I’m not wealthy and I’ve recognized this for decades, and I’d imagine Musk became aware of this himself long before he became wealthy, possibly even before he left South Africa. It’s perfectly obvious and not a difficult thing to recognize, even when growing up in another country. But be that as it may, do you really believe that the only people who appreciate America’s economic system are the very wealthy? I grew up in a household that was lower middle class and attained middle class only as I approached adulthood, and most of my life and the lives of most of my friends have been spent solidly in the middle class. And we’re all delighted that we live in this marvelous country club of a country, where we have big cars and big houses and big TVs and plenty of clothes and supermarkets full of choices for the products we want to buy. And we’re proud we have a big military that can protect us from the world’s bad guys, and we’re proud that it’s kept so much of the rest of the world free and safe as well. We see even our country’s poor with luxuries and amenities and lifestyles that would be the envy of much of the rest of the world. You seem to feel that the only people qualified to make a determination as to whether the U.S. is great or exceptional are the nation’s poor, but this is wrong on two counts. One, everyone gets a say too, you know, not just a certain small group. And two, many of our nation’s poor are proud themselves of the country they live in and the advantages they enjoy as a result. If you want to tut-tut about how awful the U.S. is because of the lack of universal health care or whatever, go right ahead. But you don’t get to determine which people are qualified to speak to the issue of American exceptionalism, or to put words in their mouths or attitudes in their heads. ---
**Author:** ![Half\_Man\_Half\_Wit](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/half_man_half_wit/32/21766_2.png) [@Half\_Man\_Half\_Wit](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Half_Man_Half_Wit)\ **Post date:** [July 3, 2016, 9:26am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/american-exceptionalism/758853/170 "2016-07-03T09:26:10Z")
> [@Martin\_Hyde](#): > > Well, okay. I mean firstly one must take these indices with a grain of salt. I have no conception of how you could craft such an index in a way that is unbiased, meaningful, and accurate. Well, you probably can’t. But that doesn’t mean you can discard these indices out of hand—after all, despite being conducted by different organizations, with different methodologies, and different emphases, the picture they paint is, all in all, remarkably consistent: the US is good, but not great, and looses out to many other nations. > [@](#): > > I don’t believe America is the freest country on Earth–although I think it _could_ be. Freedom is pretty serious in America, there are very, very few things you cannot do in America that you _can_ do somewhere else, legally, at least when it comes to behavior that is not harmful to another person. There are some odd exceptions to this, though—I never understood the ban on Kinder Surprise, for instance. > [@](#): > > About the only major exceptions are a few countries allow prostitution and a few countries have legalized certain recreational drugs. But America’s free press is by far second to none. Well, it’s just another index, but according to [Reporters without Borders](https://rsf.org/en/ranking), the US ranks 41st regarding freedom of the press. > [@](#): > > But I wouldn’t make a statement about “freedom” rankings–and did not. I made the statement that **America is the freest of the large countries** and that is hard to deny. The only other country by population, in the top 10, that is really a functioning Western style democracy is Japan (at number 10.) It’s not completely clear to me why size should be the thing that matters, here—it’s true that complexity brings unique challenge with it, however, there are also several boons, such as economies of scale, and greater human resources. Plus, the greater territorial size affords access to more diverse natural resources, greater climate diversity, and so on. Wouldn’t a comparable economic situation, e.g. GDP per capita, be more appropriate? > [@](#): > > The EU is a proto-state of 500m souls and vast wealth, and yet they fund their military to almost no degree at all (and often times direct response to refugee crises do involve the military, to secure food aid, housing, safe transport etc.) Besides, if you want to consider the EU as a 500 million people entity here, then shouldn’t you also do so when you rank the largest states according to ‘freedom’? > [@](#): > > That isn’t really true, and is basically just populist bitching you’re presenting as fact. It’s better to be rich and white in American than it is to be poor. But the claim that there is “no justice” to poor and minorities is absurd, and frankly–untrue. I also think there are very few countries on the grab-bag of indexes you just linked to where being a member of the majority ethnic group and being born wealthy wouldn’t afford you a much better quality of life, and even better outcomes in the legal system, than being born a poor minority. Perhaps, but I’d be surprised it it were the case in many of these states that if you’re a member of an ethnic minority, your chance of being incarcerated is around [one in three](http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2013/10/04/racial-disparities-criminal-justice_n_4045144.html), as compared to one in 17 for the white majority. And to a degree, this is self-perpetuating: several states still practice felony disenfranchisement, denying the right to vote to incarcerated felons, sometimes even after their release. So those people hurt by the system, are unable to change it. In any case, even if things were exactly the same across those other countries, then that wouldn’t mean it’s not a flaw of America—merely that other countries share the same flaw, and need to work on bettering themselves (which most citizens of those countries will probably readily admit). > [@](#): > > I see no way in which that makes us less free–you obviously disagree with the decision, but part of a **true** democracy is the people get to make decisions, even ones that may be bad (and I personally don’t think gun ownership in general is a bad decision, but it could do with some more regulation.) Well, it’s questionable whether it’s really the population’s interests, rather than the interests of an economical elite, that drives voting patterns in the US; see the [study](http://www.bbc.com/news/blogs-echochambers-27074746) already pointed to by **wolfpup**. > [@](#): > > Sure, every country can improve. But I find that on the Internet and in the court of world opinion America is held to a standard no other country on Earth is subject to. Because in the theatre of world politics, America claims for itself a position it would let no other country on Earth assume. ---
**Author:** ![MrDibble](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/mrdibble/32/114_2.png) [@MrDibble](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/MrDibble)\ **Post date:** [July 3, 2016, 9:44am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/american-exceptionalism/758853/171 "2016-07-03T09:44:28Z")
> [@Ambivalid](#): > > I’m just curious, nothing more, but prior to The Holocaust was the word “holocaust” used to describe similar atrocities? Unquestionably [yes](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Names_of_the_Holocaust#The_Holocaust). ---
**Author:** ![up\_the\_junction](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/u/f1d935/32.png) [@up\_the\_junction](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/up_the_junction)\ **Post date:** [July 3, 2016, 12:58pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/american-exceptionalism/758853/172 "2016-07-03T12:58:17Z")
> [@septimus](#): > > The bigger news story is that most of the democracies dropped a little — Was this a methodology change or does it truly reflect a general change? In the period 9/11 to Snowden? Dunno, what do you think? ---
**Author:** ![Kobal2](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/kobal2/32/20_2.png) [@Kobal2](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Kobal2)\ **Post date:** [July 3, 2016, 2:00pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/american-exceptionalism/758853/173 "2016-07-03T14:00:29Z")
> [@octopus](#): > > Speaking of Rome, how’d they go into decline? Over-reliance on slave labour leading to economic disparities and social upheaval, military over-extension but also failure to maintain an economic system that was built on permanent conquest & tribute, political system going to the dogs and Christians throwing the values that made the Empire sort of work into the fire. Also the great migrations. But then again, some would say it didn’t so much decline as morph into something else, or survived well into the 15th century to fall at the hands of the Seljuk Turks. What’s your actual point ? ---
**Author:** ![QuickSilver](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/quicksilver/32/7832_2.png) [@QuickSilver](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/QuickSilver)\ **Post date:** [July 3, 2016, 5:03pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/american-exceptionalism/758853/174 "2016-07-03T17:03:30Z")
> [@Human\_Action](#): > > If one grants your premise, what follows? Does it mean the US should be the model for the world? Should ignore international law and norms? Should forcibly Americanize the planet? > > Or does it just mean “America is awesome!”, and nothing more? It’s been mentioned here before, but it bears repeating: [America, fuck yeah!](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=r1RbBHMeX80) ---
**Author:** ![octopus](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/octopus/32/3716_2.png) [@octopus](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/octopus)\ **Post date:** [July 3, 2016, 5:21pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/american-exceptionalism/758853/175 "2016-07-03T17:21:22Z")
> [@Kobal2](#): > > Over-reliance on slave labour leading to economic disparities and social upheaval, military over-extension but also failure to maintain an economic system that was built on permanent conquest & tribute, political system going to the dogs and Christians throwing the values that made the Empire sort of work into the fire. Also the great migrations. But then again, some would say it didn’t so much decline as morph into something else, or survived well into the 15th century to fall at the hands of the Seljuk Turks. > > What’s your actual point ? It was a question not a point. ---
**Author:** ![dropzone](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/dropzone/32/7515_2.png) [@dropzone](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/dropzone)\ **Post date:** [July 3, 2016, 5:24pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/american-exceptionalism/758853/176 "2016-07-03T17:24:27Z")
> [@DerekMichaels00](#): > > American Exceptionalism And we are exceptionally good at it. :rolleyes: ---
**Author:** ![Martin\_Hyde](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/47e85d/32.png) [@Martin\_Hyde](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Martin_Hyde)\ **Post date:** [July 3, 2016, 7:03pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/american-exceptionalism/758853/177 "2016-07-03T19:03:47Z")
> [@wolfpup](#): > > Let me just focus on that one point, because it illuminates so much of all the other things that I and others here have been saying. The same argument is used, not just about guns, but about lots of other issues on which Americans seem to inexplicably vote against their own best interests, like denying themselves affordable health care or voting for tax breaks for the top 1%. Why do they do this? People don’t always behave rationally, I am in full agreement that America is guilty of irrational voting behavior on many important issues. But I don’t think that’s exceptional to America. Have you been following the news in Britain recently? ---
**Author:** ![Martin\_Hyde](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/47e85d/32.png) [@Martin\_Hyde](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Martin_Hyde)\ **Post date:** [July 3, 2016, 7:24pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/american-exceptionalism/758853/178 "2016-07-03T19:24:17Z")
> [@wolfpup](#): > > Because democracy isn’t defined as “a bunch of people being allowed to vote”. It’s defined as a form of self-governance, which implies that you have an informed populace, knowledgeable on the issues, who vote for representatives based on well-considered reasons for supporting their particular policies. I simply disagree that America has a “particularly uninformed” electorate. I think there’s good evidence people in every democratic country don’t necessarily vote based on cold logic. There’s emotion, familial identity to party, personal attraction to candidates, belief in certain world views (that are not objective facts, just opinions) and etc. > [@](#): > > Is this what you have in the US? Take health care for an example. What most Americans think they “know” about how health care works in other countries is determined by overt and covert propagandizing by a trillion-dollar industry whose very existence is at stake. [Here’s a book you should read.](https://www.amazon.com/Deadly-Spin-Insurance-Corporate-Deceiving/dp/B00A16M7HC) How accurate do you think most Americans’ perceptions are of health care systems around the world? Most are absolutely clueless. And on economic policy and tax policy? [Read this one.](https://www.amazon.com/Dark-Money-History-Billionaires-Radical/dp/0385535597/) There are dozens of others and thousands of corroborating studies. And the _Citizens United_ ruling has pushed things along nicely for the ruling plutocracy. Well I mean what’s interesting is you’re obviously presenting yourself as deeply knowledgeable and the holder of the “real truth.” But you’re not well acquainted with the facts. Health insurance companies are a very small part of the costs of health care, like less than 10%. I actually provided a breakdown in another thread, and basically 70% of costs are due to healthcare providers (i.e. people like doctors and nurses) and hospitals. Around 15% is due to pharmaceuticals and medical devices. Something like 10% is due to home health aides and nursing homes, and the last 5% is “other.” Inside that 5% are the costs of health insurance companies in the form of the profits they extract from the system. It’s no doubt that health insurance companies will fight for their survival politically, but you’re buying into a false narrative if you think they’re why we have expensive healthcare in the United States. I understand on economic policy and tax policy it’s “fun” to believe that most people are real stupid, you’re real smart, and the only people who disagree with you are stupid people who have been confused by eeevil billionaires. This sort of Sanders-style populit leftism resonates with a lot of people–in the same way nativist populism from Donald Trump resonates with people. The truth is not nearly so clear. There’s good evidence that taxes that are too high cause economic harm, that too much government involvement leads to poor results. Something American leftists, in their dream to create “European utopias” here have ignored is the actual history of leftism in Europe. The leftists in Europe largely won by the 60s and early 70s. They got their high tax, massive State societies. What has happened since then is almost all leftist parties have moved to the center, scaled back the massive state involvement in the economy, and often times lowered tax rates. This is because they were having undesirable and negative results. My personal belief is America’s tax rates are a tad too low, we spend a lot of money on benefit programs that are structured inefficiently (many times direct pay outs are more efficient, but “violate the American way”) and I’d like a more robust social safety net in several areas. But I also think that you’re painting a very false picture that somehow America is the only place in the world where there is any debate on economic theory. Look at Germany, it’s a rich and prosperous country, but their almost obsessive avoidance of personal debt and belief in both personal and government austerity as prescriptions for economic growth literally have no support among any mainstream economists, either from the left or the right. It’s a school of thought that only has adherents within the boundaries of Germany proper. There are many “classical liberal” parties throughout Europe. There are far right nationalist parties. There are far left green parties, socialist parties etc. You’re presenting a false narrative in which the United States is the only place where everyone doesn’t agree on the “one truth” about things, and that the only reason we don’t is because we’re being duped by eeevil billionaires. > [@](#): > > It’s odd that America fought a war of independence to free itself from rule by unelected aristocracy, and now it has its own. This is why so many books have been written and studies done on the decline of democracy in America. To be fair, there are global issues at play as well that affect many other countries to some degree, but America set itself up to be the great amplifier of these phenomena and its primary examplar, and now it is. That’s not an accurate history of our revolution or of American history. Our _elites_ fought a war of independence to get economic independence from Britain, because it benefited their business interests. There was a strain of true, radical democratic revolutionaries in that era, Thomas Jefferson being the most notable, but that “wing” of the revolution lost. The constitution and the first 12 years of government were more about establishing an orderly system of government that kept the people from being too involved, that entrenched the wealthy, and that protected the interests of the upper class Americans who were the intellectual and political leadership of the revolution. Note–I love the Founding Fathers, and they made some very important statements on human liberty, justice etc. They also did believe in plural government, it’s just their conception of who should be part of that government should be seen as very alien to our modern time–borderline oligarchical. Most of the FFs feared the people and feared mob rule, and made great pains to establish a system by elites and for elites. The Founding Fathers weren’t yeoman farmers or laborers rebelling against a powerful aristocracy, they were the leading men of business, law, industry in the colonies. Jefferson often maintained the radical banner during his time in the opposition, but by the time he actually became President he had mellowed out a lot. Jefferson has always been a mercurial, contradictory figure. He wrote many, many times about the evils of slavery but practiced it himself and made no serious move to emancipation his belief was emancipation had to be gradual or the blacks and whites would fight in a destructive race war, and that slave owners shouldn’t engage in spontaneous emancipation until some process was created to deal with in an orderly fashion. And yet he was also a major advocate for more direct democracy and was very anti-elite, and yet by any measure he himself was a member of the American aristocracy (he put himself in pretzels on that though, in his mind the elite were merchants and bankers, he was just a big landowner, and in his mind that was somehow different.) He wrote extensively that our Presidency was far too powerful “a king in all but name”, and even against the very concept of politicians of one area being able to “bind the future” to their will with things like a restrictive constitution that is difficult to change. Yet in his Presidency he really made no efforts to roll back on any of the things the Federalists had entrenched about our way of government. But ultimately the idea that we’re seeing the “death of American democracy” is one of the most fundamentally unsound I have ever heard. I think it paints a dramatically incorrect picture of how “democratic” America was historically. It’s not even been 100 years since women got the right to vote. It’s just been 50 years since blacks _genuinely_ got the right to vote–obviously many blacks did vote during reconstruction, and sometimes continued to do so outside the South afterward, but genuine full political participation by blacks was largely blocked until the 1960s. The idea that we’re now less democratic than we were a few generations ago, when many Americans couldn’t vote at all based on the color of their skin, is absurdly incorrect. > [@](#): > > So what you have is a populace whose beliefs are driven by an unregulated chaos that allows the rich and powerful and corporations with deeply vested interests to instill their ideas and values through every available channel of communication to get people to vote for their particular policies through all possible means including absolutely blatant lies, as in the health care debates. And in the end, many do just what all the propagandizing and astroturf front groups exhort them to do, and many more are sufficiently disillusioned that they don’t vote at all – the US has one of the worst voting turnout rates among developed nations. So half the eligible voters don’t bother to vote, and much of the other half have no idea what the actual facts are about what they’re voting on. And _ **that’s** _ supposed to be a democracy? No wonder Donald J. Trump is the presumptive Republican nominee! I’ve yet to find a democratic country where being born rich and powerful doesn’t give you greater access to political power than being poor. The nativist populism embodied by Donald Trump is driven by “globalization’s losers” and we’re seeing it on both sides of the Atlantic. The reason is simply–many people are being told by elites (both political and business) that free trade is good for them. The ones who are seeing a decline in their way of life in spite of that, are finding it a hard pill to swallow and are rebelling against the very concept of elites. But the fact that they have elites to rebel against, all over the OECD, suggests that America isn’t some unique dystopian hell hole where the rich have lots of power. > [@](#): > > And, just to conclude on the gun issue, yes, it’s very difficult in this particular system of democracy to enact meaningful gun legislation. But here you have the NRA in the role of AHIP and the AMA on health care policy or the Koch astroturf empire on economic policy. How much of what Americans believe about guns do you think is really true and supported by research? So much of it is counter-intuitive and so many common beliefs contradicted by mountains of evidence. Exactly like universal health care, which must “obviously” be more expensive if everyone is covered, plus the government can’t do nuthin’ right, ever. Even if it does it in every other country in the world. But not in America, because Exceptionalism! I don’t have any real idea what Americans believe about guns. I do think a lot of Americans are willing to trade a relatively small number of dead people for their right to own firearms though. ---
**Author:** ![octopus](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/octopus/32/3716_2.png) [@octopus](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/octopus)\ **Post date:** [July 3, 2016, 7:25pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/american-exceptionalism/758853/179 "2016-07-03T19:25:39Z")
> [@Martin\_Hyde](#): > > People don’t always behave rationally, I am in full agreement that America is guilty of irrational voting behavior on many important issues. But I don’t think that’s exceptional to America. Have you been following the news in Britain recently? Rational based on what? Not everybody values the same things or values them to the same extent. ---
**Author:** ![Martin\_Hyde](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/47e85d/32.png) [@Martin\_Hyde](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Martin_Hyde)\ **Post date:** [July 3, 2016, 7:29pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/american-exceptionalism/758853/180 "2016-07-03T19:29:22Z")
> [@Kimstu](#): > > You’re right that the CPSC cannot actually **ban** things, and it was sloppy of me to refer to the CPSC in that context, but the US government can and does ban things (e.g., illegal drugs, certain types of entertainment media, etc.). > > The 1996 federal ban (struck down by the Supreme Court in 2002) on “virtual” child pornography—i.e., pornographic materials showing images whose creation did not involve any actual children in any way—is one example of a draconian government ban in response to public anxiety. > > So I maintain that it’s not the US “system” that’s “exceptional” in this regard, it’s simply the unique constitutional status of firearms. I disagree–the first time that we’ve ever had the Supreme Court strike down a gun law was in the 2000s. And the gun “problem” is far older than that, and we’ve had tons of gun laws written at the state and national level in the 20th century that were never declared unconstitutional. Many Americans just aren’t interested in banning guns, and don’t respond to mass shootings that are on the news the way the political left “wants them to.” I actually find this to be a pretty logical behavior. Mass shootings are a boogeyman. In 2013 we had 6500 gun homicides in which we knew the type of gun used in the FBI’s reporting. Of those, 5782 were committed with hand guns, 308 with shotguns and 123 with “other guns.” The “scary evil rifles” liberals say we should “obviously” be banning because some Muslim shot up a gay club accounted for 285 homicides–or ~4% of the homicides in which we know the type of gun used (there were 8400 total homicides, and about 2000 where the FBI doesn’t know the type of gun used.) Responding to spectacular events that are like 1% of gun deaths a year, in a country with 6-7000 people dying every year from handguns, with something like an assault weapons ban is to me a perfect example of an uninformed overreaction and I frankly view it as a credit to America we aren’t buying into it. [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/american-exceptionalism/758853.md?page=8) [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/american-exceptionalism/758853.md?page=10)