The Inflection Point

As I sit here on a chilly early March night, ensconced in my bedroom office, I ponder the question: Are we in some really unique times? In the wake of arguably the most divisive Administration in modern history, the election of Joseph R. Biden as the 46th President of the United States, the legal challenges brought forth to challenge the results of the election in swing states, the insurrection at the United States Capitol, the wild conspiracy theories promoted and propagated by Q Anon followers, Trump supporters, right-wing media and social media posts – what is driving the current state of affairs? All in the midst of year long global pandemic that has claimed the lives of over 500K of our fellow citizens and caused severe economic turbulence for many. More striking is the denial of reality, or the fact that many of us reside in our own bubbles, our own interpretation of reality. That you observe the bankruptcy of getting into heated debates with total strangers – or people you thought you knew in the absence of an agreed foundation of truth.

In my blog from September 28 of 2017 – The Third Reconstruction – I attempted to explain periods of social and racial advancement being met with an equal but opposite force of racial animus and grievance – the backlash. I outlined periods in our history from the Emancipation Proclamation, the subsequent freedom, political and economic attainment in Reconstruction, the Civil Rights Movement of the 1950s & 60s and the election of the first African American President – Barack Obama in 2008 and how each were met with resistance. How Jim Crow and segregation was a response to the first progression, the Southern Strategy, evangelicalism and supply-side economics the response to the second, and lastly the Tea Party and the surprising Electoral College victory of Donald Trump in 2016 as the third.

But what in my opinion makes this period unique is for the first time in American history, the majority population of European or Anglo descent faces demographic eclipse. I’ve read articles stating that we will be a majority-minority country in less than 20 years, with states like California already reaching that milestone. With the backdrop of a rapidly changing world technologically, climatically and diminished stature of a superpower in the United States – a nation that may have experienced its zenith economically, culturally and militarily in the mid to late 20th century – but is on a slow decline as nation states such as China continue their rise. There is a palatable fear amongst a particular demographic that they are losing their country, their premier status or privilege. Cable news outlets such as Fox News or AM talk radio have now for several decades given validation to these anxieties. But now social media platforms, whether it be Facebook, Parler or a number of alternative sites have exponentially propagated the sharing of grievance, victim-hood and anger.

Response engulfed in emotions of anger, anxiety and resentment oftentimes leads to irrationality. Thus I believe why the embrace of conspiracy theories, gaslighting and outright lies about the integrity of the 2020 elections have become prominent. The Republican Party of my youth had policies and a platform that I oftentimes disagreed with, but at least there was an attempt to initiate public policy and to govern – even though those policies favored capital over labor and sought to privatize the commons. In observing the recent CPAC convention in Orlando, FL this past weekend however I saw a major political party transformed into a cult of personality – bereft of any platform of governance. A party that seeks to only amplify and promote animus and anxiety, a party that seeks to obstruct meaningful progress, a party that seeks to destroy and ameliorate as evidence of the deaths of seven people on January 6, corridors of our Capitol with urine soaked carpets and feces plastered on walls. A party that has come to represent a small but boisterous segment of our society that would rather end the experiment of democracy in favor of autocratic, fascist rule that would preserve their privilege.

You see we are indeed in a period of inflection – a period where America is forced to deal with its sins of enslavement, genocide, and predatory capitalism – which has led to the gulf between the very wealthy and the working poor – illuminated in stark relief by COVID-19. The bill that has come due requires reconciliation and reparations of those damages in her pursuit of becoming a global superpower. The test before us is will American live up to her ideals as a Constitutional Republic with equity and equality for a multi-cultural society? Or will she succumb to those sins and descend into anarchy and authoritarianism to preserve minority rule for the former majority demographic? These next four years will be evidentiary.

P.S. – Interesting post from DailyKos regarding the cowardice of former VP Mike Pence: https://www.dailykos.com/stories/2021/3/4/2019292/-Mike-Pence-returns-with-an-op-ed-endorsing-the-most-important-issue-to-Republicans-vote-suppression