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In my immigrant parents' (85 years old) generation the country was much more divided than today. The racial, cultural, and economical divides were much wider and prevalent.
In my time (55 years old), I think we start seeing a more informed/educated society, as a whole, whom wants change. The common thinking is becoming a bit more uniform. People are becoming more accepting of each other than previously.
In my kids' (30 years old) generation, I think that they are definitely much more united as a whole. They can see pass the differences in race, religion, class, etc. Their willingness to work with each other is much more natural.
Now, it seems to me that as the people of this country are uniting, there is an element whom is trying to create a divide and send us back 50 to 60 years ago.
Since it's mostly Conservatives making this "we're more divided than we've ever been" claim, I may as well explain why they feel this way since none of them are coming clean about it.
The reason why they say we're more divided than ever is due to one fact: Barack Obama won 2 terms as president.
You gotta be kidding me. Please tell me you're under 40 because the 1980s and even the '60s were a paradise of unity compared to the division you see today.
When you watch TV and see images of protestors in the '60s and the LA riots in the early '90s remember that these were just a tiny, loud part of society back then.
Even back then you'd really just see that stuff on TV in some far away city. Today there is no escaping the counterculture, the hate, the calls of racism. It's everywhere and in your face and it's being taught in every school and on every college campus.
But still , imagine how impossible it would be to still a civil war today.
People are so helpless without their cushy jobs, Facebook pages and consumer conveniences that doing something that would threaten all this stuff like taking sides in a violent secessionist movement is nearly impossible. Things would have to get much, much worse for anything like that to happen.
But that's not to say that people aren't still more politically divided and angry, perhaps even more than they were during the civil war.
But as with China as long as the economy is rolling nothing will happen and there will be no "regime change".
It should be noted that even during the Civil Rights era the center of gravity and primary source of the division was the South - outside the South there was quite a consensus on what the central government should look like and what values it should promote, which was the biggest reason the segregationists were at a disadvantage. The current division blankets the whole country almost equally, not just one region, so if you look at the country as a whole I'd say it is more divided than during the Civil Rights era. I agree with the analysts who have said that the current division is the largest and most durable division since Reconstruction.
Last edited by Ibginnie; 04-28-2014 at 06:39 AM..
Reason: deleted quoted post and reply
Today the majority of the nation does not identify themselves as American. Everyone has a class, category, race, sexual orientation, or religion that they call themselves and for some reason that is the only thing they consider themselves to be. The other day while teaching my class, one of my students made the statement that I was the only American in the classroom since I was the only white person. These kids truly believe that because they are not white they CAN'T be Americans..... who the hell taught them this?
America use to be the great melting pot, now we just look like an explosion in a fast food restaurant.
I can't imagine who is teaching them that now, but when I was in elementary school in the 50s, it was whites who taught me, "You're not one of us."
But I'd say the country is more divided now than it has ever been--it was only divided in two ways back then; it's divided in multiple ways now.
Congress is certainly so partisan today that they can't reach a compromise without coming to the brink of disaster every time. Even in the Cold War, the US and USSR were able to reach treaty agreements without a nuclear confrontation every single time.
But I think things will settle down after we Boomers are dead.
Since it's mostly Conservatives making this "we're more divided than we've ever been" claim, I may as well explain why they feel this way since none of them are coming clean about it.
The reason why they say we're more divided than ever is due to one fact: Barack Obama won 2 terms as president.
Division is in the eye of the beholder. Really, I think the only time the country was really united was during WWII when we were blatantly attacked by a foreign power. Then revenge united us. After, good feeling persisted through the 1950's, but natural divisions reasserted themselves afterwards. 9/11 was another uniting experience, though more short lived.
It isn't natural for a country as large and diverse as the US to feel "united". Montanans have less in common with Georgians than with other Montanans and it has nothing to do with artificial state boundaries and everything to do with their physical environment. Blacks hang around more with blacks, whites with whites, and within the races there are ethnicities that hang around more with their own types than others. That's the way the US is, the way Russia, India and China are. All big countries that have diverse peoples living in them are susceptible to the same divisions. They are natural and precede national allegiances both in time and in feeling.
my "knee-jerk" response is that it's our environment that's more divided than ever...like some have said, the 24hr "news" coupled with social media being spoon fed to a lazy nation is a recipe for disaster.
However, I think Americans are more solidified than we are led to believe by our biased media.
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