Americans ask: what’s up with France? Why are they so angry and rioting? You could easily ask the same thing about the United States. So many things are terrible. So many of our leaders are corrupt. Why aren’t we angry? Why aren’t we rioting?
Why Are You Not Rioting?
Ted Rall
Ted Rall is a syndicated political cartoonist for Andrews McMeel Syndication, WhoWhatWhy.org and Counterpoint. He is a frequent contributor to The Wall Street Journal, a graphic novelist and author of many books of art and prose, and an occasional war correspondent. He is, recently, the author of the graphic novel "The Stringer."
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Remember the researchers in Eastern Europe who bred wild foxes into domesticated pets in six generations? The system has done something similar to us humans. It would be too long a post to enumerate all the major ways people have been rendered harmless but the overarching cause has been the conversion of political identity in this country from one of economics to one of personal identity.
@alex_the_tired, I’d like to understand your thoughts better. What I am seeing is that Democrats are going big tent; they’ll let in feminists, Black people, trans and queer people, Muslims, etc. as well as progressive white, Christian, heterosexual males. It is the opposite of personal identity politics. Sure, the Republicans argue that being so open is proof of rejection of “core Americans,” which is an example of personal identity politics, but that approach is proving to be losing strategy in recent elections.
The US is the most propagandized country on the planet. As Alex points out, above, the US resident has been “groomed” for decades to abhor any legitimate political interest and, certainly, unified activity as “too harsh” and/or “too negative” … in favor of individual, personal, “fun-filled” diversion/distraction. At best, if any mass demonstration were planned, it is transmitted, in real time, by security agency-tapped “smart” phones to make clear to the (Saint Obumma era) water cannon wielders where and how many units to activate.
I’ve attempted to sum up the situation in my email post-script:
“Democracy? … in a society that proudly & vociferously claims to be
dominated by the clearly totalitarian institutions of religion, the military and
trans-national corporations?!?”