Immunizations cause autism, Bigfoot and ghosts are worthy of multiple ‘reality’ TV shows—each, Politicians are reptile people in disguise. Gameshow competitions aimed at creating a marriage; advertising advertising advertising, “nobody” families becoming famous for no readily-apparent reason apart from their willingness to make their private and sadly dramatic lives public. Basically anything you can put into words, the more cockamamie the better, has a good chance of getting some traction and a decent-sized following these days.
But is this anything particularly new? Bigfoot, Nessie, & UFOs were big in the 70s; New Age woo was (and still is for a lot of people) a big thing in the 80s, as was ridiculous hair and formulaic rebellion (seriously, take another look at Twisted Sister—such pristine rags!).
Daily I am inclined to despair for humanity, but are we really any nuttier today, or is our baseline nuttiness simply enhanced by bigger populations and better documentation through technology?
The world circa 1968 was pretty crazy. It seemed like our leaders were getting shot every day. Add to that the general swirl of intoxicating music and related psychedelia… as far as the “nobodies” there was the Loud Family a few years later. And the sad spring of 1970 with the shootings of students…
And they’re very selective in the science they trust.
The science that makes your cellphone work? Yep, they trust that science. The science of immunology? Nope. Because BIG PHARMA. I’VE DONE MY RESEARCH! WAKE UP, SHEEPLE!!! :eek:
Politics (Trump and the Republican party) is much crazier than American politics has been for a good many decades [European politics in contrast was much crazier in the early twentieth century (communism, Nazism, fascism)].
Outside the political sphere you need to consider the media. Today you have access to any kind of crazy idea due to the internet. Pre-internet the crazy ideas were mostly limited to mimeographed newsletters sent to a few hundred subscribers or similar media as the media most people accessed (your daily newspaper, the TV networks (ABC, CBS, NBC, PBS), the Time/Life/Newsweek type magazines) mostly filtered that type material out (the National Enquirer type publications being an exception).
Yep and this is the biggest problem. In 1986 Weekly World News with its Batboy stories was considered a fun joke. Today, Fox News and Alex Jones ARE the producers of the Bat Boy stories and idiotic Trump supporters aren’t challenged at the very least to question Bat Boy: to them it’s real and if you question Bat Boy your just a no-good snowflake Socialist.
At the very least in 1968 conservative v liberal was generally along intellectual lines. Today it’s made up facts v the left desperately trying to keep our country from being taken over by a Dictatorship of the Stupid. The days of William F. Buckley are long gone.
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Age, among other things, provides perspective. So does history.
I wish I could remember who it was, but someone on an NRP show recently said that we have elected incompetent boobs (I think those were his words) before to be President, and we survived and continued. This is one example of perspective.
The dangers we face, both as individuals and as a country, do change from one era to the next. So do our defenses. I tend to be optimistic for the long term, because people can think, and the ones who do tend to do better in the world than the ones who don’t. Of course, some of the people who do think are also evil, but I believe that is a relatively small minority. Like I said, optimistic.
The ‘politicians are reptiles’ thing started in the 90’s, it’s not an especially recent bunch o’ woo.
The big difference now is just that nonsense can spread so much further, so much faster, and it’s simpler for people to not only seek out their favourite woo brand, but surround themselves in it and persuade themselves that it’s much less fringe than it really is. No waiting for the next issue of Kooks Magazine, you can dive into an ocean of lunacy, with the odd bit of reality jetsam, and completely avoid the islands of reason, all from the comfort of your own sofa, with almost no effort.
You can talk to other kooks wherever they are, you don’t have to try find them in your own neighbourhood. No risk of getting ridiculed, you can pick your audience.
Even Harding was not in the same incompetency class as the current boob. And I cannot think of anyone else who qualifies. And Harding didn’t do that much (yes there was corruption, but that is only money). Boob-in-chief is doing real damage with this insane trade war and the sudden 1984-like reversal from Europe as ally and Russia as enemy to vice versa.
Despair for democracy, maybe. But humanity? We aren’t getting worse and we aren’t getting better. I think our behavior just depends on how tight systems of control squeeze us or how glorious the standard of living is. (But Florida is another story. There’s no explanation for that place.)
And larger (or smaller, depending upon your perspective) an answer than that, people who feel insecure need to fill a void with something supernatural. Religion, conspiracies, mystical energies, etc. That’s just the result of never having room to grow into yourself, imo. Not everyone has that need for supernatural belief, but many do.
Oh gawd, yes. WFB wouldn’t have the current crop of Republicans on with a few exceptions since they are unable to talk coherently for five minutes, let alone an hour.
Obama yes. They would have disagreed, but the discussion would be at a high level.
An American Family was on a long time ago. Andy Warhol said that in the future everyone would be famous for 15 minutes - we are in his future now. And he nailed it.
Here is the difference between now and them. Back when I was a kid, the National Enquirer was a rag that everyone laughed at. Today it is significant in American politics. We’ve always had bread and circuses, but today the clown is in the White House.
There are just more people and widespread communication and platforms are easy to come by now. Anyone can upload their silly/funny/weird/boring video to YouTube and some things like watching people play video games turn out to be a hit.