When America used to be great

[DrPepper]

What was it that made America great back in that period that the MAGA crowd thinks was so perfect? Also, what time period would you assign that?

[dolomite]

What was it that made America great back in that period that the MAGA crowd thinks was so perfect? Also, what time period would you assign that?

Any time before social media and furor over msm.

[MICHHAWK]

I am 52 years old. As far back as I can remember America has always been great. I don't ever remember a time when it was not great. I suspect there is no time when America was not great.

[DrPepper]

What was it that made America great back in that period that the MAGA crowd thinks was so perfect? Also, what time period would you assign that?

Any time before social media and furor over msm.

Are you or the current administration doing anything to curb social media?

[dolomite]

What was it that made America great back in that period that the MAGA crowd thinks was so perfect? Also, what time period would you assign that?

Any time before social media and furor over msm.

Are you or the current administration doing anything to curb social media?

I don't tweet or use facebook.

[DrPepper]

You non twitter usage is not going to counter Trumps.

[DrPepper]

I think there is a large group of Americans that have gotten really lazy. They don’t want to go make something for themselves. They sit by without learning to code, thinking they can always have a job with the union. They don’t stress education to their kids. They don’t try to represent the moral high ground. They don’t put serious effort into parenting, finding it easier to let the cell phones, you tube, and the neighbor kids to parent their own.
Remember how Joel Embiid scoffed at how easy classes at KU were to him? He was used to hours of homework everyday and his parents making sure he did it.
Grown men escape to video games. Grown women escape to hours of Facebook. Antidepressants are common.

[ousdahl]

This is so nuanced.

I think much of the idea of “used to be” is tied to bigotry. The MAGA crowd is overwhelmingly white Christian men who believe America was/is/should be a white Christian nation. They are upset about their perception of Mexicans taking jobs they feel entitled to, blacks kneeling about police brutality, Muslims trying to not be typecast as terrorists, and women wanting to pursue professions and positions of power with equal pay to boot.

The larger push for social justice has been countered with their own claims of oppression of the white Christian man by the libtards.

Another angle is the economic one: many blue collar whites frame their manufacturing and coal jobs as some traditional way of life, and think they’re entitled to maintain it. When the free market phases those jobs out*, instead of picking themselves up and pursuing some other living, they sit around feeling sorry for themselves and blaming Obama.

Even if it’s not framed as bigotry, they perceive some rosy Norman Rockwell painting of a past that they think has been tainted by modern influences. Political correctness is vilified, as is any sense of progress that might come to their “way of life.”

A big problem is media, with 24-hour “news” cycles competing for ratings by seeing which pundit can get the most OuTrAgEd! in prime time. What used to be a vanilla reporting of the evening news is a blood-boiling moral mandate against the other side.

*I hesitate to accept Trump or the MAGAs as an actual populist movement, as I think populism should appeal to he popular masses, not just one butthurt demographic. If we DO ever see a populist movement, I think it’ll be overwhelmingly economic, and average joes from all demographics agree upon economic equality.

Shoot, sorry. Long exhausting day at work. I shoulda just ranted in the tourist thread.

[Mjl]

I think there is a large group of Americans that have gotten really lazy. They don’t want to go make something for themselves. They sit by without learning to code, thinking they can always have a job with the union.

This makes a lot of sense. The MAGA message seemed to really hit home with those in manufacturing. Problem is if we play to that crowd, we're going to be left behind. Going backwards is not a good thing.

MAGA is a bad message. Should be Make America Greater.

[dolomite]

Maybe some people (not all e.g. Seahawk) from their tiny viewpoint thought America was great at a time when they were ignorant of what was really going on in places other than where they lived. Like only getting the Topeka Daily Capital newspaper on Sundays and the CBS evening vanilla news in black and white. We live in a time when something happens on the other side of the world it's immediately pretty much known unless you're living in the Amazon jungle,(and I imagine some of those tribes from their perspective think life is pretty great since that is all they know).

[MICHHAWK]

I think much of the idea of “used to be” is tied to bigotry. The MAGA crowd is overwhelmingly white Christian men who believe America was/is/should be a white Christian nation. They are upset about their perception of Mexicans taking jobs they feel entitled to, blacks kneeling about police brutality, Muslims trying to not be typecast as terrorists, and women wanting to pursue professions and positions of power with equal pay to boot.

The larger push for social justice has been countered with their own claims of oppression of the white Christian man by the libtards.

Another angle is the economic one: many blue collar whites frame their manufacturing and coal jobs as some traditional way of life, and think they’re entitled to maintain it. When the free market phases those jobs out*, instead of picking themselves up and pursuing some other living, they sit around feeling sorry for themselves and blaming Obama.

Even if it’s not framed as bigotry, they perceive some rosy Norman Rockwell painting of a past that they think has been tainted by modern influences. Political correctness is vilified, as is any sense of progress that might come to their “way of life.”

A big problem is media, with 24-hour “news” cycles competing for ratings by seeing which pundit can get the most OuTrAgEd! in prime time. What used to be a vanilla reporting of the evening news is a blood-boiling moral mandate against the other side.

*I hesitate to accept Trump or the MAGAs as an actual populist movement, as I think populism should appeal to he popular masses, not just one butthurt demographic. If we DO ever see a populist movement, I think it’ll be overwhelmingly economic, and average joes from all demographics agree upon economic equality.

This is a classic dude. Would you consider it to be part of the solution, or part of the problem?

[DrPepper]

OuTrAgEd! ‘media’ is clearly a problem. Michael Jackson’s life became ‘news’ and the real news got less following. People began to care more about who got voted off the island than government. Tv Nelson ratings became the driving force rather than actual journalism awards. This easily led to clickbait when an online world became possible.
Jerry Springer type shows, which played to our moral weaknesses) became hugely popular. Cable tv came along and we could have smut and filth on 24/7 (something the old networks did not do). Those old networks learned they could get good ratings with cheap reality shows. The scummier the better. So there was Big Brother, Jerry Springer, and Entertainment Tonight rather than The Walton’s and Little House on the Prairie (for one generation), Dr Quinn and the Cosby show for another generation.

My objective is to get my news from the center and top of the Media Bias Chart (link below) and to PAY to support real journalism. Real journalism costs money, so I pay subscriptions or make donations to support it. I believe that financially supporting real journalism is every bit as important as voting.
https://www.adfontesmedia.com/

[zsn]

Any of you in this thread see "BlackKKlansman"? You will know the real meaning of "MAGA".

[Deleted User 89]

I think there is a large group of Americans that have gotten really lazy. They don’t want to go make something for themselves. They sit by without learning to code, thinking they can always have a job with the union. They don’t stress education to their kids. They don’t try to represent the moral high ground. They don’t put serious effort into parenting, finding it easier to let the cell phones, you tube, and the neighbor kids to parent their own.
Remember how Joel Embiid scoffed at how easy classes at KU were to him? He was used to hours of homework everyday and his parents making sure he did it.
Grown men escape to video games. Grown women escape to hours of Facebook. Antidepressants are common.

so much truth

[ousdahl]

I think there is a large group of Americans that have gotten really lazy. They don’t want to go make something for themselves. They sit by without learning to code, thinking they can always have a job with the union.

This makes a lot of sense. The MAGA message seemed to really hit home with those in manufacturing. Problem is if we play to that crowd, we're going to be left behind. Going backwards is not a good thing.

MAGA is a bad message. Should be Make America Greater.

Hillary countered Trump’s mantra with, “make America whole again,” and look where that got her.

[DCHawk1]

I think there is a large group of Americans that have gotten really lazy. They don’t want to go make something for themselves. They sit by without learning to code, thinking they can always have a job with the union. They don’t stress education to their kids. They don’t try to represent the moral high ground. They don’t put serious effort into parenting, finding it easier to let the cell phones, you tube, and the neighbor kids to parent their own.
Remember how Joel Embiid scoffed at how easy classes at KU were to him? He was used to hours of homework everyday and his parents making sure he did it.
Grown men escape to video games. Grown women escape to hours of Facebook. Antidepressants are common.

This is great.

To what do you attribute these problems?

[DCHawk1]

This is so nuanced.

I think much of the idea of “used to be” is tied to bigotry. The MAGA crowd is overwhelmingly white Christian men who believe America was/is/should be a white Christian nation. They are upset about their perception of Mexicans taking jobs they feel entitled to, blacks kneeling about police brutality, Muslims trying to not be typecast as terrorists, and women wanting to pursue professions and positions of power with equal pay to boot.

The larger push for social justice has been countered with their own claims of oppression of the white Christian man by the libtards.

Another angle is the economic one: many blue collar whites frame their manufacturing and coal jobs as some traditional way of life, and think they’re entitled to maintain it. When the free market phases those jobs out*, instead of picking themselves up and pursuing some other living, they sit around feeling sorry for themselves and blaming Obama.

Even if it’s not framed as bigotry, they perceive some rosy Norman Rockwell painting of a past that they think has been tainted by modern influences. Political correctness is vilified, as is any sense of progress that might come to their “way of life.”

A big problem is media, with 24-hour “news” cycles competing for ratings by seeing which pundit can get the most OuTrAgEd! in prime time. What used to be a vanilla reporting of the evening news is a blood-boiling moral mandate against the other side.

*I hesitate to accept Trump or the MAGAs as an actual populist movement, as I think populism should appeal to he popular masses, not just one butthurt demographic. If we DO ever see a populist movement, I think it’ll be overwhelmingly economic, and average joes from all demographics agree upon economic equality.

Shoot, sorry. Long exhausting day at work. I shoulda just ranted in the tourist thread.

Most of this is just Hofstadter's bullshit regurgitated for a new generation. It was lazy and chronologically implausible analysis a half century ago, and the contemporary version is even less serious and empirically sound.

The irony is that the Christian traditionalists and many of the New Left radicals both saw the major issue clearly 50 years ago, i.e. destructive materialism, and both failed miserably in their own way to prevent its ascendance.

For a variety of reasons, both the political Left and the Right are trapped in a pattern of materialist-nihilism. And since nothing today is permitted to be non-political, that means that everything is geared toward the acquisition of shit and nothing more.

[DrPepper]

DC, see my other long post on this thread. Basically, I think I attribute all the lazy Americans who lack gumption, grit, and integrity to a slow creep of lowlife media and subsequent poor parenting.

Where are the strong parents? Where are the statesmen (gender neutral)?

Why are so many just walking billboards with their latest attire and gadgets? Why are they so eager to get more likes? Why do they devote more of themselves to looking good than being good? Why is a fancy vacation/vehicle/wedding more important than a good public education? The food they don’t know how to prepare is scientifically concocted with the optimal proportions of grease, salt, and sugar; but they don’t know any better. They spend vast portions of their day using apps and games scientifically concocted with the optimal proportions of bling, colors, sound, and rewards to keep them there (buying, clicking, viewing ads, generating content for others to make money on), but they can’t control themselves. They don’t know the system is rigged to make them addicted.

Show me the garages that have room to actually park cars in. Show me the families where the kids do chores. Show me the communities groups whereby the neighbors know each other. Show me a home where the parents are not just as short-sighted and childish as the children. Those are the last bastions of a great society. That is where you will find people with an internal sense of worth. That is where people know the value of a dollar and the value of an hour. That is where people develop having respect for their family, for public spaces, and for the common good. That is where it is learned that work is something to be proud of rather than scoffed at.

[seahawk]

Maybe some people (not all e.g. Seahawk) from their tiny viewpoint thought America was great at a time when they were ignorant of what was really going on in places other than where they lived.

I never stopped thinking America was/is great.

But nice try at the smear.

[seahawk]

"Christian traditionalists," DC?

Are you talking about those horrible, evil old men that head up your church in the U.S.?