Americans are kinda real fucked up

Danhedonia said:
The blend of ignorance and anger was certainly not circumstantial ... and it was just so ...

I dunno. I used to remember when people were ashamed to be obviously stupid. Now they're proud.
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I find that the hard right in Canada fits exactly the description in your post. They are outraged that the current government is doing X but when 'their guy' was in, he was doing 4xX and there were no complaints.
 
Peen Simmons said:
The anti-intellectual thing goes all the way back in American culture. A lot of it has to do with the particular strains of Protestant and populist thought that were present almost as soon as white folks set up shop here.

It's not surprising that we're goobers when you look back and see that our one great contribution to philosophy has been Pragmatism and our great religious innovations have been Transcendentalism and the great torrent of mystical, cultish woo unleashed by the Great Awakenings.
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I agree with your overall characterization of American culture, but the founders were a rare collection of great intellectual minds in a single place and time of history who came up with a system of government that may be flawed, but unrivaled to this day. And early American Protestantism was an intellectual version of their European precursors.

Contributions to philosophy and religion after the Enlightenment? What are you expecting? Existentialism? The great French philosophy that was relevant only during the career of Sartre (but as with many half baked ideas like deconstructionism played out the longest in pop culture and films). I would prefer to never have any further innovations to religion period - it needs to die. We created Mormonism and Scientology, isn't that enough for "God's" sake? The US has been at the forefront of art, literature, and science for at least the last century. It's a big country. We just have everything else; huge areas of rural culture, farmlands, ranches, and people whose means of making a living has gone away as technology and international trade increases. We've taken away the means for a high school educated tradesperson or factory worker to reasonably own a home and raise a family by constantly seeking out and exploiting cheaper workers, initially in this country (car manufacturing moving out of states like California to states like Oklahoma for cheaper labor) and now overseas.

Anti-intellectualism has always been here with intellectualism (is that a thing?). And our main division in communication used to be those who read and those who watch television. Now everyone, the former readers and television watchers, are looking at the internet for news blurbs and commentaries. And the internet has possibly sunk to an intellectual level lower than television. There are just as many ignorant, false news sources for the extreme left as there are for extreme right wingers. Both thrive on unverified sources for ridiculous conspiracy theories. And I hope no one is confusing the far left with intellectualism or more intelligence than average Americans. Terrorizing trophy hunters and anarchy rallies are not the intelligent response to racism and fascism. It's kind of the same thing, just not racially motivated.

I guess my point is everything you hear about now has always been here. It's just seems more prevalent with social media and news media using people's iPhone footage to capture things a news van would have never had the time to travel to and film. All or most of our major intellectual journals and publications are still in print and have an online (albeit inferior) presence also. With the exception of Bush Sr., every new US president has been the opposite party than the previous since Ford.

And as I keep bringing up with people since our current president took office, there used to be a intellectual contingent in our conservative party up until recently.
 
"There are just as many ignorant, false news sources for the extreme left as there are for extreme right wingers."

The problem with this statement is it simply isn't true.

Without getting into proportionate #'s, please tell me a 'common left-wing internet conspiracy theory.' Because I can list a ton of common right-wing internet conspiracy theories (we could start with Barack Obama's birth certificate).

I don't see an 'intellectual contingent' in the GOP since George Will was summarily shoved aside for objecting to using torture.
 
Danhedonia said:
"There are just as many ignorant, false news sources for the extreme left as there are for extreme right wingers."

The problem with this statement is it simply isn't true.

Without getting into proportionate #'s, please tell me a 'common left-wing internet conspiracy theory.' Because I can list a ton of common right-wing internet conspiracy theories (we could start with Barack Obama's birth certificate).
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Yes, not sure about the proportionate numbers either. But . . . the 9/11 conspiracy theorists are generally on the extreme left. Enough to show up in Bill Mayer's Real Time audience to heckle him for not coming all the way over to their enlightened perspective. But more recently the theories have been piling up since Trump was elected. Here's an article from The New Republic on the subject:
https://newrepublic.com/article/142...election-turns-democrats-conspiracy-theorists

Danhedonia said:
I don't see an 'intellectual contingent' in the GOP since George Will was summarily shoved aside for objecting to using torture.
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I am mainly referring to the 70s through the 90s. Recent depending on your historical perspective.
 
9/11 truth has a huge lefty component. JFK is the king hell daddy of all US conspiracy theories and belongs entirely to the left fringe. Chemtrails, antivax, the anti-GMO movement, and various other health and environiment panics have strong roots in lefty movements. The ET coverup and all the attendant disclosure/D.U.M.B./military-industrial complex worry re: UFOs has a major left-leaning element.

Not to mention "AIDS was manufactured," HEMP IS A MIRACLE PLANT, the CIA did EVERYTHING, "George Bush doesn't care about black people," the government killed John Lennon, and on and on and on.

Liberals (post-Clinton) have really put a lock on the "we're reasonable and normal" act. But there's plenty of lefty woo out there.
 
rickenvox said:
I agree with your overall characterization of American culture, but the founders were a rare collection of great intellectual minds in a single place and time of history who came up with a system of government that may be flawed, but unrivaled to this day.
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LOL. Talk about a great myth.
 
I certainly see fake news from both sides on my facebook feed. I have one friend that is on the left, not a nut case or anything, super nice guy (and a very good drummer) but almost every post he does is fake news. All it takes is a little bit of web search to look it up, and yep, fake story. Or sometimes, yes, that DID happen, but here is the real reason it happened, that the big headlines don't tell you about/misleading.

But I probably see more fake news from my far right facebook friends, tbh.
 
Jbird said:
I certainly see fake news from both sides on my facebook feed. I have one friend that is on the left, not a nut case or anything, super nice guy (and a very good drummer) but almost every post he does is fake news. All it takes is a little bit of web search to look it up, and yep, fake story. Or sometimes, yes, that DID happen, but here is the real reason it happened, that the big headlines don't tell you about/misleading.

But I probably see more fake news from my far right facebook friends, tbh.
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Your post speaks to the bigger reality. There is likely fake news and CTs that are left-based, but the once right-fringe has become more the norm or "mainstream", with "real" media and even Fox News wasting air time exposing the outlandish stuff for the trash it is. On the other side, the left fringe is still the fringe even (if not ESPECIALLY) among the left.

That said, if you really look at the "spectrum" of political ideology, it's actually more of a circle. And on the at circle the fringe right and left are very close/right next to each other (the 180 of the moderates the fall between the left and right)...a place where everyone's out to get them/us/everyone and we're all too blind or indoctrinated to see it!!! But, again, our current reality has endlessly more of the fringe stuff coming from the right AND way too many people within the GOP not immediately and emphatically disputing/denying the information and its purveyors for the deplorable asshats that they are.
 
Mark Wein said:
Whats funny is that around here those three conspiracies have the most traction with the far right. The others not so much. Especialy chemtrails and antivax.
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Well, that's because much of the thinking we consider "far right" is mostly just contercultural hokum in patriot drag. I suspect that this is the result of the default position of hegemonic US corporate culture adopting a kind of vaguely neoliberal PC sheen. EVERYONE EVERYWHERE knows we're supposed to be tolerant and cosmopolitan and concerned about the most recent tragedy and dedicated to reasonable progress according to the sensibilities of lawfulness and fair play.

So if you have a bone to pick with this kind of dominant paradigm status quo Pollyanna beige crapola, its real real easy to get into shock jock territory and tear off down a lot of rabbit holes that lead to border science and weird shit.

Strange bedfellows, basically.

Follow the logic...

I believe the government is trying to control me.

The government is in cahoots with rich and powerful media and business interests (i.e., international Zionist bankers)

Corporations keep yapping about science and green initiatives.

Science and environmentalism are part of the plot.

The fucking scientists are trying to poison me with UNNATURAL CHEMICALS because this dubiously sourced Mother Earth News article from the '70s.

There's so much overlap between the granola types and the prepper/sustainability weirdos.
 
It's not logically sound to write stuff, then say "other people said this!" You're supposed to cite what they actually say.

I agree with Rickenvox about the temporal nature of paranoia -- currently, it tilts very, very heavily to one side. I'll go a step further and say that when you look at topics like "teaching evolution," and Obama's birth, the notion that you can have "alternative facts" does not jibe with older conspiracy-theory adherents, who all sought "hidden truth" no matter how sadly off base they may be. No, it is the 2010's "conservative" movement that says "who cares about truth? We just want what we want, and that's our version of 'true.'" Screw that.
 
Danhedonia said:
It's not logically sound to write stuff, then say "other people said this!" You're supposed to cite what they actually say.

I agree with Rickenvox about the temporal nature of paranoia -- currently, it tilts very, very heavily to one side. I'll go a step further and say that when you look at topics like "teaching evolution," and Obama's birth, the notion that you can have "alternative facts" does not jibe with older conspiracy-theory adherents, who all sought "hidden truth" no matter how sadly off base they may be. No, it is the 2010's "conservative" movement that says "who cares about truth? We just want what we want, and that's our version of 'true.'" Screw that.
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Even dummies have a right to postmodernism.
 
Before this goes political and gets closed, I have to admit I go on Reddit just to troll. It's easy and passes the time since I've watched everything on Netflix, Hulu, Amazon, etc.
Just saying, trolling is a popular hobby for many. Don't take it to heart.
Right or wrong doesn't matter. Facts don't matter. We troll just yo get people frothy.

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As you all know though, I respect this forum and don't do it here. Reddit though, fair game.

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