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A really interesting look at the partisan divide, especially the role played by the draft during the Vietnam War, Feminiism, and the Civil Rights Movement
The Roots of Our Partisan Divide
Posted from imprimis.hillsdale.edu
Vietnam War
Democrats
Republicans
Feminism
Discrimination
Edited 5 y ago
Posted 5 y ago
Responses: 14
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I read this article and while I don't entirely agree with it, I do think that Vietnam helped to separate the country into camps of those who served and those who didn't. And women used to be a fairly united group whether married or single; that is clearly no longer the case.
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Sgt Stephen Brown
Yes in a way the beginning of the participation trophy. Too the average person who never served who sees someone with a hat , or whatever, that distinguishes them as a Veteran they thank them for their service not having any idea where they served. It’s apparently only important to those who think their assigned job was more important.
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Interesting read. I think the author skipped over two parts that were pretty significant:
- First why the civil rights act eventually caused problems. Sure there is a thought that the corrective actions made impacted (in particular) poor white America. But more importantly the effect of the caste system that things like Jim Crow laws caused was that poor white America (the majority) felt better about their position because systematically there were always people below them. They were less likely to be unhappy with the system as a whole because they had a position of power over another segment of the population that was in turn being repressed from exercising any real political or economic power themselves.
- The first certainly did cause some social upheaval but what has brought it to it's head has been the destruction of the middle class, removal of much upward mobility and the concentration of wealth among a few people. This was all done without the "advantage" of the caste system provided to social stability. The growing white poor are angry because they don't have opportunity and they no longer can have the satisfaction of thinking, we'll at least I'm not them. The minority poor are similarly unhappy because they don't have opportunity either and now they have power to do something about it.
All of us outside the top 1% are unhappy with each other when the real problem is the concentration of money and opportunity with a very few Americans.
- First why the civil rights act eventually caused problems. Sure there is a thought that the corrective actions made impacted (in particular) poor white America. But more importantly the effect of the caste system that things like Jim Crow laws caused was that poor white America (the majority) felt better about their position because systematically there were always people below them. They were less likely to be unhappy with the system as a whole because they had a position of power over another segment of the population that was in turn being repressed from exercising any real political or economic power themselves.
- The first certainly did cause some social upheaval but what has brought it to it's head has been the destruction of the middle class, removal of much upward mobility and the concentration of wealth among a few people. This was all done without the "advantage" of the caste system provided to social stability. The growing white poor are angry because they don't have opportunity and they no longer can have the satisfaction of thinking, we'll at least I'm not them. The minority poor are similarly unhappy because they don't have opportunity either and now they have power to do something about it.
All of us outside the top 1% are unhappy with each other when the real problem is the concentration of money and opportunity with a very few Americans.
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CPT Jack Durish
The fact that you believe upward mobility has been destroyed isn't as surprising as the fact that you have found at least six people on RP who agree with you. Now it may beggar your imagination, but the fact is that there is no "pie". The one percent don't have an unfair slice of "pie". If you want a bigger slice of "pie", try baking you own. Anyone willing to put in the effort to bake their own pie can join the one percent.
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SPC Kevin Ford
CPT Jack Durish Impossible. You only think that because you believe the pie is made of money, it's not. Money is a proxy for a person's ability to access the finite resources currently in the system.
Because those resources are finite everyone cannot have unlimited access to them. We have set up a system where a few people have unlimited access to them and everyone else gets what's left
Sure you can make an argument that we can handle a few more with near unlimited access but given the finite nature of the underlying resources the more people you make like that, the less there is to supply what mathematically has to be the majority of the population.
Unless you have some way to make the resources themselves unlimited (i.e. Star Trek style replicators) what you argue for can structurally only work for a small percentage of the population. The math behind that is inescapable.
Because those resources are finite everyone cannot have unlimited access to them. We have set up a system where a few people have unlimited access to them and everyone else gets what's left
Sure you can make an argument that we can handle a few more with near unlimited access but given the finite nature of the underlying resources the more people you make like that, the less there is to supply what mathematically has to be the majority of the population.
Unless you have some way to make the resources themselves unlimited (i.e. Star Trek style replicators) what you argue for can structurally only work for a small percentage of the population. The math behind that is inescapable.
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The reasoned part of the argument work if you assume the problem have been areday fixed with racism and the treatment of women, That is an assumption he makes that not all or most could agree with. Fixing problems centuries in the making takes time and will cause anger among those that benefited from the problematic Status Quo. But he does make rational arguable points
On LGBTQ issues is he seems to be operating on the knee jerk level though and is using the same language that was used against interracial marriage.
On LGBTQ issues is he seems to be operating on the knee jerk level though and is using the same language that was used against interracial marriage.
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Maj Marty Hogan
1stSgt Nelson Kerr while we are usually at opposite sides of ideas- you nailed this one. On the LGBTQ issue- the knee jerk reaction will be a long one to solve- many of us were raised to think opposite so tolerance and ignoring will happen until we are gone. Reality- sitting down and talking will help- but culture is hard to remove from a generation and when several of those still exist- it just takes time.
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1stSgt Nelson Kerr
Maj Marty Hogan - I can understand those that find the idea that human being should all be treated equally because of their upbringing unpalatable without thinking that doing so is in any way excusable or acceptable, , We are human being we all have the capacity to learn, if anyone need death to stop being a fool then a fool is all you ever were.
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