The GOP is exploiting the structures in our brains that are rooted deep in our DNA, the wiring that says, “I must protect 'us' from 'them,'” the wiring that kept humans tribal for 300 millennia...
Here we go again, being all optimistic and hopeful. Those tendencies are probably even more strongly entrenched in our DNA. Maybe hope and consciously making climate destabilization and political destabilization enemies or forces to be overcome will save us. It isn't as if we have choices. But it will take more than just this group or audience to get us over the hump. Cultural influences and literature are always powerful tools. Does anyone know who has the old tapes of the "Roots" mini-series or documentaries? They have never been re-aired nationally that I know of. Those relatively accurate depictions of the brutality and cruelty of slavery and discrimination were a powerful influence on a lot of people. I wonder if they can be brought back for another run?
I think this is an excellent article. Maybe because I agree with your message, but I would like to think it's because it shines a light on an important issue and offers a possible way out.
“ Fear of people and economic insecurity will leave us….” 9th step promises, AA. We all need to sober up, work together, cooperate to save the planet. As Pope Francis said, “ God forgives all the time, people forgive sometimes but Mother Nature never forgives.”
There were millions of people in Poland and Eastern Europe that had a passionate aversion to the Wehrmacht and all of their conniving participants, and many did let go of that passionate aversion, but that didn't help, the best that happened is that they worked sonderkommando's, Bergen Belson, Auschwitz, Treblinca and as prisoner kaputs but all that did was delay the inevitable and even administration in camps like Dachau. When I was a teen I read every book in the public library about German concentration camps, the one that stuck with me the most is Five Chimneys.
Russia’s invasion of Ukraine is going to see such a rush of migrants from Africa, because Ukrainian Wheat is not getting to Africa., Remember it was a bread vendor, setting fire to himself, that started the Arab Spring.
While at it the bulk of migrants to Europe are from Africa, North and Sub-Saharan, blowback from Europe’s colonization of Africa, and its subsequent cultural disruption , poverty and lack of food.
Most of those migrants are young males, job seekers,
I don’t think it is skin color that Europeans fear, I think it is the cultural invasion, Islam, which is incompatible with the secular environment of Europe, and there is a tipping point, where a minority culture reaches 17% in a democratic society, that the culture changes
Even the culture of ADOS has changed America, but for the better, it has enriched our society, but white bread, homogenized Americans are threatened, not only of ADOS, but of self validating, self defining women, LGBT, and Brown Skinned migrants from the south.
The last is a paradox, because they are very conservative Catholics, Evangelicals and Pentecostals, and are religiously motivated opponents of LGBT and Women’s rights. Natural allies of the MAGAts.And enemies of liberals and progressives.
The Declaration of Independence may say “We hold all of these truths self evident, that all men are created equal”, did not apply to women (woe men, not men) and black, brown, or red people as they were not considered human, except that slaves were counted as 3/5 of a human, but for political reasons, Congressional seats were based on the size of the population, the census from 1790-1760 did not include slaves, except as property. The 1850 and 1860 had a separate slave schedule, but in one instance only was the slave named, the other census merely list age, gender and whether they were black or mulatto, and even then in some districts, not even mulatto, just black (Fulton and Putnam country Georgia are an example.
It is a futile exercise,, America might, because of its two moats, delay the inevitable, but will wind up a pariah nation.
Fact is that we live in an interdependent global world society, and the traditional divisions that led, for instance to the Scandinavian being a white country, are evaporating because of technology and transportation.
Unless nations are willing to commit ethnic and racial genocide, it is too late.
Back in the 1980’s I read a book called Camp of the Saints, admittedly it is popular among the right.
(or those on the right that read or can read,as most seem to suffer from ADHD.
The Story was about the “brown” invasion of Europe, hunger, starvation, jobs resulted in a massive migration, like a rolling wave into Europe, particularly France. Commercial cargo vessels and barges, like Liberty ships were hauling migrants in the thousands at a time, to Europe.
Eventualy the French Government gave orders to sink the boats and machine gun the migrants that came ashore, but the soliders couldn’t bring themselves to obey the orders.
And disasters like this does not slow the tide,, because people need to eat, and fear for their lives from their government.
There are 64 countries that have laws that criminalize homosexuality, and nearly half of these are in Africa.. Uganda and Indonesia has laws that make LGBT a crime punishable by death
Good article. Provoked some activity amongst the little gray cells.
However, towards the end you wrote this:
“To save itself, the GOP will have to leave them behind, re-embrace the Romney/McCain wing of the party, and just go back to hating unions while arguing for tax cuts for billionaires and the end of Social Security and Medicare. We’re already seeing this with recent moves by Mitch McConnell and Chris Christie.”
Which caused me to think, “wait, what?
This, this is what a better, normal GOP would look like”?
Ick.
These are not good.
This is not a group I would want to be aligned with.
Which just goes to show that the GOP has gone so far off the cliff that a return to hating and taking from the poor to give to the rich seems like a good thing.
So I am rooting for gravity. Go GOP, go. Continue off the cliff and into the pit of oblivion.
It is worth a try! I really wish we could come together on climate change and fascism and defeat them both. I’m sure that point will come and the way things are going.
What is absolutely scary and disheartening is there doesn’t seem to be any true action on climate change. It’s an emergency now. This weekend I was researching stocks and mutual funds. If you look up what are the best stocks to invest in, you’ll get back articles that list the top 10 and it’s always oil companies and tobacco again and again. For me this really illuminates how greed and lack of values are destroying life on this planet as we know it. I have divested my retirement from any oil, tobacco, guns, deforestation and private prisons.
Our tribalism is inherent, but how many people recognize or accept this? How can we disseminate this knowledge to all? Some of our behaviors are programmed. Recognizing this fact becomes central to controlling one's own behavior. It also means understanding that our conceptions of God are not reality for everyone.
That last part is where some people are deficient, willingly or not. It explains the polarization that has continued unabated since the 1964-70 period that is described. This is the centerpiece of our arguments with one another - whether our beliefs are true. It is not the “respect” for beliefs that some have us think. There will always be people who choose to completely surrender their agency and autonomy. As there are people who know that those beliefs run up against the ideals and principles of the Enlightenment, as well as the founding of our country.
Viewed from a smaller scale, for the purposes of illustration only, America is like a gated community where, the democrats would propose that everyone inside the walls should be treated equally, while others inside those walls would say differently. Yes, there are "immigrants" allowed into the gated community, but it's all controlled and is in the best interests of everyone inside the walls. What would happen if America (or any other nation for that matter) were to demolish the walls (the borders)? Would those who are democrats still say that everyone is created equal? Biden didn't spell that out in his speech. Right now, America takes care of those who are inside the walls, and the rest of the world's population should behave themselves, according to Biden. Even their helping Ukraine is done with their own security in mind, as was the takeover of Afghanistan, Iraq, etc.
Call me narrow minded, but all of the Republican representatives seem too immature to understand that race is not hair, eye or skin color, and colors is not race. Race is not eye shape, and eye shape is not race. Race is not nose shape, and nose shape is not race. Race is not detached earlobes or not, and earlobe attachment is not race. Race is not teeth color, and teeth color is not race. Race is not length of second toe compared to first toe, and length of second toe compared to first toe is not race. Race is not athleticism, or intellect, and intellect and athleticism is not race. Race is not imperviousness to disease or vaccines, and vaccines and disease imperviousness is not race. Race is not liking sex more, and liking sex more is not race. Immature people do not seem to get these nuances, and by that I would call them ignorant. So, we have a bunch of people who are grouping people by vague and not so vague physical characteristics and these characteristics are not race, but the diversity within our race, that makes us interesting visually, and to some that variation is threatening. However, I suggest that in that us and them mentality, these people are damaged, and/or immature. The Republican party seems to suffer from this a lot. Therefore I am going to posit that when Republicans are running things it is as if their frontal cortexes have not fully developed and so they are missing the critical thinking necessary to understand that we are all in this together. The adult mature understanding. We share the planet, even the fascist billionaires who are now sending their personal rocket ships into space thinking that it is frontier which will save them, share this planet that they are helping to destroy with their personal excesses. Well, our human bodies age rapidly in space, with variation, and that may be because we are not meant to be there. So, it might be plan B to save Earth instead of just counting on new technologies to be developed that can save those in the 1% who have money. Also, if they have no one else to help realize their dreams, those dreams may die. They will then be dreams deferred. I assume if you understand what I am talking about, you are not a Republican.
Maybe we should reframe this as: the enemy (not my tribe) of my enemy (climate change) is my friend. So, if climate change doesn’t kill us, it might make us stronger.
Your immigration policy also says we need immigrants. I wish the USA policy were openly thus. The EU needs to embrace that too. We are aging nations made young by the influx of new people willing to work to support our systems that take care of us in our retirement and old age. However, I have had friends tell me of racism in Canada, and we read about the abominable treatment of indigenous people in Canada. Your prime minister is supporting the destruction of the Great Lakes by backing Enbridge a Canadian company, and even if the board has people of many backgrounds, there is no Native American on the board, and if there were, they probably would not stop the company from continuing with an outdated, unsafe pipeline in Lake Michigan.
Here we go again, being all optimistic and hopeful. Those tendencies are probably even more strongly entrenched in our DNA. Maybe hope and consciously making climate destabilization and political destabilization enemies or forces to be overcome will save us. It isn't as if we have choices. But it will take more than just this group or audience to get us over the hump. Cultural influences and literature are always powerful tools. Does anyone know who has the old tapes of the "Roots" mini-series or documentaries? They have never been re-aired nationally that I know of. Those relatively accurate depictions of the brutality and cruelty of slavery and discrimination were a powerful influence on a lot of people. I wonder if they can be brought back for another run?
I think this is an excellent article. Maybe because I agree with your message, but I would like to think it's because it shines a light on an important issue and offers a possible way out.
“ Fear of people and economic insecurity will leave us….” 9th step promises, AA. We all need to sober up, work together, cooperate to save the planet. As Pope Francis said, “ God forgives all the time, people forgive sometimes but Mother Nature never forgives.”
Its a fascinating concept . Kind of like the Golden Rule on steroids.
Ive often felt that if i could let go of my passionate aversion to MAGA and all of their conniving participants, it would ...“ help”??
It is a situation where I’d like to see some of the prominent leaders of the Right fall to their knees and admit their hypocrisy and treachery.
Fantasy was always an issue for me.
On the one hand we say
fight like hell for democracy , VS. annihilate the “Woke”, on the other side.
I will admit I’ve come to be
quite proud of my “ Woke” yoke.
But I am not unaware of the possibility that better behavior can in fact elicit better behavior .
It is a question , for sure.
I will think about it , but my defensive shield or my reality sensor may trip it up. Just saying.
There were millions of people in Poland and Eastern Europe that had a passionate aversion to the Wehrmacht and all of their conniving participants, and many did let go of that passionate aversion, but that didn't help, the best that happened is that they worked sonderkommando's, Bergen Belson, Auschwitz, Treblinca and as prisoner kaputs but all that did was delay the inevitable and even administration in camps like Dachau. When I was a teen I read every book in the public library about German concentration camps, the one that stuck with me the most is Five Chimneys.
Russia’s invasion of Ukraine is going to see such a rush of migrants from Africa, because Ukrainian Wheat is not getting to Africa., Remember it was a bread vendor, setting fire to himself, that started the Arab Spring.
While at it the bulk of migrants to Europe are from Africa, North and Sub-Saharan, blowback from Europe’s colonization of Africa, and its subsequent cultural disruption , poverty and lack of food.
Most of those migrants are young males, job seekers,
I don’t think it is skin color that Europeans fear, I think it is the cultural invasion, Islam, which is incompatible with the secular environment of Europe, and there is a tipping point, where a minority culture reaches 17% in a democratic society, that the culture changes
Even the culture of ADOS has changed America, but for the better, it has enriched our society, but white bread, homogenized Americans are threatened, not only of ADOS, but of self validating, self defining women, LGBT, and Brown Skinned migrants from the south.
The last is a paradox, because they are very conservative Catholics, Evangelicals and Pentecostals, and are religiously motivated opponents of LGBT and Women’s rights. Natural allies of the MAGAts.And enemies of liberals and progressives.
The Declaration of Independence may say “We hold all of these truths self evident, that all men are created equal”, did not apply to women (woe men, not men) and black, brown, or red people as they were not considered human, except that slaves were counted as 3/5 of a human, but for political reasons, Congressional seats were based on the size of the population, the census from 1790-1760 did not include slaves, except as property. The 1850 and 1860 had a separate slave schedule, but in one instance only was the slave named, the other census merely list age, gender and whether they were black or mulatto, and even then in some districts, not even mulatto, just black (Fulton and Putnam country Georgia are an example.
It is a futile exercise,, America might, because of its two moats, delay the inevitable, but will wind up a pariah nation.
Fact is that we live in an interdependent global world society, and the traditional divisions that led, for instance to the Scandinavian being a white country, are evaporating because of technology and transportation.
Unless nations are willing to commit ethnic and racial genocide, it is too late.
Back in the 1980’s I read a book called Camp of the Saints, admittedly it is popular among the right.
(or those on the right that read or can read,as most seem to suffer from ADHD.
The Story was about the “brown” invasion of Europe, hunger, starvation, jobs resulted in a massive migration, like a rolling wave into Europe, particularly France. Commercial cargo vessels and barges, like Liberty ships were hauling migrants in the thousands at a time, to Europe.
Eventualy the French Government gave orders to sink the boats and machine gun the migrants that came ashore, but the soliders couldn’t bring themselves to obey the orders.
Here is an example, estimated 600 hundred drowned
https://www.cnn.com/2023/06/17/world/greece-boat-worst-ever-tragedy-mediterranean-sea-intl-hnk/index.html#:~:text=Greek%20migrant%20boat%20wreck%20may,tragedy'%20with%20hundreds%20still%20missing&text=The%20sinking%20of%20a%20packed,for%20Home%20Affairs%20Ylva%20Johansson.
And disasters like this does not slow the tide,, because people need to eat, and fear for their lives from their government.
There are 64 countries that have laws that criminalize homosexuality, and nearly half of these are in Africa.. Uganda and Indonesia has laws that make LGBT a crime punishable by death
Good article. Provoked some activity amongst the little gray cells.
However, towards the end you wrote this:
“To save itself, the GOP will have to leave them behind, re-embrace the Romney/McCain wing of the party, and just go back to hating unions while arguing for tax cuts for billionaires and the end of Social Security and Medicare. We’re already seeing this with recent moves by Mitch McConnell and Chris Christie.”
Which caused me to think, “wait, what?
This, this is what a better, normal GOP would look like”?
Ick.
These are not good.
This is not a group I would want to be aligned with.
Which just goes to show that the GOP has gone so far off the cliff that a return to hating and taking from the poor to give to the rich seems like a good thing.
So I am rooting for gravity. Go GOP, go. Continue off the cliff and into the pit of oblivion.
Good riddance.
It is worth a try! I really wish we could come together on climate change and fascism and defeat them both. I’m sure that point will come and the way things are going.
What is absolutely scary and disheartening is there doesn’t seem to be any true action on climate change. It’s an emergency now. This weekend I was researching stocks and mutual funds. If you look up what are the best stocks to invest in, you’ll get back articles that list the top 10 and it’s always oil companies and tobacco again and again. For me this really illuminates how greed and lack of values are destroying life on this planet as we know it. I have divested my retirement from any oil, tobacco, guns, deforestation and private prisons.
Our tribalism is inherent, but how many people recognize or accept this? How can we disseminate this knowledge to all? Some of our behaviors are programmed. Recognizing this fact becomes central to controlling one's own behavior. It also means understanding that our conceptions of God are not reality for everyone.
That last part is where some people are deficient, willingly or not. It explains the polarization that has continued unabated since the 1964-70 period that is described. This is the centerpiece of our arguments with one another - whether our beliefs are true. It is not the “respect” for beliefs that some have us think. There will always be people who choose to completely surrender their agency and autonomy. As there are people who know that those beliefs run up against the ideals and principles of the Enlightenment, as well as the founding of our country.
Viewed from a smaller scale, for the purposes of illustration only, America is like a gated community where, the democrats would propose that everyone inside the walls should be treated equally, while others inside those walls would say differently. Yes, there are "immigrants" allowed into the gated community, but it's all controlled and is in the best interests of everyone inside the walls. What would happen if America (or any other nation for that matter) were to demolish the walls (the borders)? Would those who are democrats still say that everyone is created equal? Biden didn't spell that out in his speech. Right now, America takes care of those who are inside the walls, and the rest of the world's population should behave themselves, according to Biden. Even their helping Ukraine is done with their own security in mind, as was the takeover of Afghanistan, Iraq, etc.
Call me narrow minded, but all of the Republican representatives seem too immature to understand that race is not hair, eye or skin color, and colors is not race. Race is not eye shape, and eye shape is not race. Race is not nose shape, and nose shape is not race. Race is not detached earlobes or not, and earlobe attachment is not race. Race is not teeth color, and teeth color is not race. Race is not length of second toe compared to first toe, and length of second toe compared to first toe is not race. Race is not athleticism, or intellect, and intellect and athleticism is not race. Race is not imperviousness to disease or vaccines, and vaccines and disease imperviousness is not race. Race is not liking sex more, and liking sex more is not race. Immature people do not seem to get these nuances, and by that I would call them ignorant. So, we have a bunch of people who are grouping people by vague and not so vague physical characteristics and these characteristics are not race, but the diversity within our race, that makes us interesting visually, and to some that variation is threatening. However, I suggest that in that us and them mentality, these people are damaged, and/or immature. The Republican party seems to suffer from this a lot. Therefore I am going to posit that when Republicans are running things it is as if their frontal cortexes have not fully developed and so they are missing the critical thinking necessary to understand that we are all in this together. The adult mature understanding. We share the planet, even the fascist billionaires who are now sending their personal rocket ships into space thinking that it is frontier which will save them, share this planet that they are helping to destroy with their personal excesses. Well, our human bodies age rapidly in space, with variation, and that may be because we are not meant to be there. So, it might be plan B to save Earth instead of just counting on new technologies to be developed that can save those in the 1% who have money. Also, if they have no one else to help realize their dreams, those dreams may die. They will then be dreams deferred. I assume if you understand what I am talking about, you are not a Republican.
It’s so deeply disturbing and frightening.
Maybe we should reframe this as: the enemy (not my tribe) of my enemy (climate change) is my friend. So, if climate change doesn’t kill us, it might make us stronger.
Your immigration policy also says we need immigrants. I wish the USA policy were openly thus. The EU needs to embrace that too. We are aging nations made young by the influx of new people willing to work to support our systems that take care of us in our retirement and old age. However, I have had friends tell me of racism in Canada, and we read about the abominable treatment of indigenous people in Canada. Your prime minister is supporting the destruction of the Great Lakes by backing Enbridge a Canadian company, and even if the board has people of many backgrounds, there is no Native American on the board, and if there were, they probably would not stop the company from continuing with an outdated, unsafe pipeline in Lake Michigan.