One the most striking things about @davidmweissman’s story is how much his political transformation improved his mental & physical health, relationships & prospects in life.
It’s American pragmatism at its best: Worldviews take hold when they come with practical rewards.
In pragmatic terms, a sign of a short shelflife for current far-right views is that they’re highly inelegant (see: the gibberish of QAnon), risky & lawless (see: the Big Lie), and potentially deadly (see: anti-mask/vax).
Even if they’re initially exciting, they’re unsustainable
And, of course, it’s an enormous cognitive strain to believe and circulate lies.
When your head is full of aggravating nonsense, leading to alienation from dominant culture, you can expect mood disorders, breakups, family estrangement, addiction, debt, health issues, and time in hospitals, prison, and institutions.
You lose a lot of friends.
And sooner or later someone who might be drawn to your worldview says: It’s not really working for him. 🤔
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Watched Inherit the Wind (1960) last night which led me to try to understand the real Scopes trial (1925) again. Amazing how clearly it set the terms for the modern-day culture wars.
A Tennessee state rep named John Washington Butler created the Butler Act b/c he heard kids were coming home from school saying they didn’t believe in God. He figured they must be being taught atheism somehow—or that their parents were rubes, or that God was dead, or something.
But they weren’t. All of the teachers, more or less, were practicing Christians. Like Darwin, the teachers probably would have said they “believed in God” but really didn’t teach about theism OR atheism in school. Sundays for religion. Weekdays for civics.
This country will flourish only when we all collectively withdraw from the culture-war bloodsports.
It’s absurd listening to recordings of Jerry Falwell Sr from the 60s ranting and raving like a lunatic about pornography, drugs, leftists, Blacks, gays, feminists, intellectuals, communists, universities, secularists, Satan.
But he sounds like Bill Barr. Jordan Peterson. QAnon.
Sounds like Fox News every single minute since it launched 24 years ago.
The evolution of individual American intellects — like the brilliant one @espiers gives here—is almost the only thing I want to read.
Did you split with your parents on culture or politics (like Elizabeth)? Are you afraid of your kids splitting with you (like Mad Dad)?
My question for the expanding group of antiwoke parents: What does your perfect private school teach? If you pull your kid out of Brearley what’s your best antiwoke option? And what does the curriculum have in place of CRT? Locke/Virgil/scripture/home economics/“leadership”?
With 30% of adults fully vaccinated, 50% with one shot, what’s left are <18s and the vaccine-hesitant.
Scare stories abt the superstitious & the GOP refusing the vax miss the fact that there are various types of hesitancy & not all are absolute.
Most public health campaigns have to persuade people to take action. Get out the vax. Peoples’ reasons for not getting the vax are rarely ideological or religious. Many more fear needles; lack tech skills; are defeated by red tape; find it inconvenient; overestimate side effects.
Vaccine hesitancy is the new public-health issue.
If you’re persuasive, have a car, or are good at finding appointments, you can encourage someone who’s hesitant and make sure they get to their appointment.