Sunday Musings
Patience and Civility are running on empty
After spending over 55 years in the publicity-intensive world of radio and TV broadcasting, I deliberately chose a more reclusive lifestyle. My wife, an award-winning broadcast journalist, and I settled in sparsely populated areas, finding relief from the sturm und drange in the peace and quiet of rural living with our Golden Retriever, Gracie – the fifth in a beloved line. Beyond necessities like groceries, doctors appointments and runs to the liquor store, we crafted a life where most things can be delivered; my only regular off-property venture being the relentless, albeit frustrating and expensive pursuit of Micropterus nigricans.
A recent road trip through small-town Alabama served as a stark reminder of society’s continuing decline. Even in the traditional “mannerly” Deep South, the deterioration in basic human courtesy was palpable – from highway drivers to restaurant staff, retail clerks to healthcare assistants. Civil servants, law enforcement officers, and customer service representatives operate with an unprecedented level of apathy and dismissiveness bordering on ‘rude’. They all exude the same charm and efficiency one is customarily treated to at the US Post Office or MVA. The decline is accelerating, with a noticeable difference from even six months ago.
This observation recalls an on-air conversation from 1983 with Michael Nesbitt regarding his book “Megatrends.” His prescient warning about how “High Tech brings Low Touch” has manifested in ways perhaps even he couldn’t have anticipated. As we witness the rapid advancement of Artificial Intelligence, these concerns become even more pressing. The technology that promised to connect us is instead creating shallow relationships across all aspects of life, potentially leading to a future where our closest companion might be a disembodied voice in our cell phones. Dystopia will become a positive
Historical parallels provide little comfort. I once asked my late friend, economics professor Walter Williams, if he thought the citizens were aware of the pending fall of the Roman Empire? “No. By the time society recognizes its decline, it’s often too late to correct course.” Today, despite having numerous warning systems and what some call “Doom Porn” – an industry built around apocalyptic predictions – we seem unable or unwilling to address the fraying fabric in our societal cloth.
The question of survival becomes more complex when we consider: what we’re surviving for? While Prepping has long been wildly popular, how many have considered the world they’re preparing to inhabit? A communist takeover? The World Economic Forum’s vision? A post-nuclear winter landscape? Or the aftermath of a massive electromagnetic pulse? The challenge isn’t just survival but what we’re surviving into. Will it be Huxley’s “Brave New World” or Orwell’s “1984”?
Perhaps most disturbing is the gradual nature of our decline. The incremental loss of rights, freedom, and liberty may prove more devastating than a sudden catastrophic event. Americans’ natural optimism, while admirable, could be preventing us from recognizing the severity of our situation. Like the proverbial frog in slowly heating water, we risk adapting to deteriorating conditions until it’s too late to respond.
Without establishing modern-day versions of Galt’s Gulch, we’re left to rely on the resilience of the American Spirit. While the strongest and most innovative might adapt and survive, the question remains: what kind of world will they (we) inherit? The torture of incremental tyranny might indeed prove worse than any sudden catastrophe, as we slowly watch the erosion of the civil society we once knew.
Prepping for a better life is just as important as food stocks and ammo inventory.
BW
A nation has hit it's peak when it starts to analyze itself.
Some groups will look to the glorious past, others will demand we move to a new brighter future and demand we forget the past. Many people are just sure it's all shit and act accordingly.
The one thing they have in common is the belief that Today Sucks.
Authors like Nietzsche, Sir John Glubb and Alfred North Whitehead all wrote about this phenomena.
Glubb said that a nation of hero's will eventually end up becoming a nation full of thinkers, who are no longer capable of acting.
Whitehead said "Civilization advances by extending the number of important operations which we can perform without thinking about them." Once we have to stop and think through every little thing we are powerless to change anything for the better.
Nietzsche said nations that over-analyze are doomed, only nations that can act without a constant historical evaluation are free to act.
We are in "late state Bureaucracy", we analyze and micromanage but that's all we are capable of doing. The thinkers think, but that's all they do, they don't act. The dreamers dream, but again, that's all they do. The grumblers grumble and get nasty and rude, but that's also all they know how to do. The Bureaucrats actually rule, because they have been granted the power of the purse, while everyone else is paralyzed by doubt.
This is where we are today; we are besieged by Bureaucracy, which is never efficient or pleasant. Bureaucrats love the status quo, it's their lifeblood. Bureaucrats advance nothing of true value because they exist to exist and that's their only reason for being. A a nation run by Bureaucrats and abstract thinkers, who are incapable of action, will suffer from a slow decline until eventually even great empires are only a shadow of themselves.
Where is there room for rugged individualism in a nation run by abstract thinkers and bureaucrats? Why even be polite or efficient when the Bureaucrats are running the show, they are the opposite of polite and efficient and they set the tone.
It all trickles down and that's what we are seeing.
This is life under the thumb of Bureaucracy and it's what comes from thinking rather than acting, it comes from following rules made by Bureaucrats themselves, rather than from citizens who are trying to optimize liberty and prosperity. And no group of Bureaucrats is ever capable of real change, not if there are more than a dozen of them arguing about any given topic, which there always is.
I'm going to coin a phrase here, "Trickle Down Bureaucracy", which explains exactly were we are today. That doesn't just include government Bureaucracy either, it extends into the corporate world which has also been taken over by them.
How does a nation full of abstract thinkers and Bureaucrats better itself? It doesn't and that's the truth we are seeing today.
Great essay! When the Southerners lose their hospitality, America is in big trouble.
Yes, it's the quiet small town life for my wife and me as well. Most everything is delivered. What happens when that system fails?
Our idea of prepping is having emergency whisky, and plenty of Brut and Amstel Light on hand, as well as enough food and water for a couple of weeks. After that...well, who cares?
We are glad we don't have grandchildren.
We do our best to be friendly at the stores and the bank. I crack jokes and hand out shamrocks for St. Patrick's Day. Some people respond in a positive way. There is hope and the American Spirit still out there in the Remnant.
Thanks again for the essay.