An answer to a Discussion Forum question for college: "You finally have a chance to express your point of view. Take a few minutes to first think about, analyze, and then state your opinion on the current state of American democracy"

politics

It's a complicated. I think right now the United States is moving in a
number of different directions, and there are several concurrent themes
that each individually are shaping our democracy and the state of the
discussion around politics, but also the interaction between these
currents is shaping things too. I'll go through each individual theme
and then try to take a big-picture look at how they all interact.

First, one of the major themes of the 2016 election and the political
discussion afterwards is the divide between the anti-establishment and
the establishment. Yes, I realize that this is a theme that the US has
dealt with since its beginning and that this divide has existed in
politics since the beginning of time, but to be honest its never quite
come to a head like this. On one side, we have the Bernie-Socialists,
who want to see our current government taken down and replaced with a
more European-style socialist democracy. They see all the problems in
the current society as a result of class warfare, and seek to fix
everything through government (the fifth paragraph goes further into
this). On the other side, we have the libertarians and populists, two
mutually exclusive ideologies that are both pushing to end the current
government setup. The GOP is almost evenly split between populists and
establishment conservatives, but the Trumpian populists seem to be
winning out, leaving the increasingly out of touch conservatives in a
posture of defense. Meanwhile, the Democratic party seems far less
willing to give up its establishment roots, instead clinging on to
Hillary Clinton and the even more out of touch, corrupt establishment
that she represents. In a sense, we've got four major political
ideologies, and one runner-up: establishment liberalism (as shown by
Hillary), progressive liberalism (lead by Bernie), populist
conservatism (Trump), establishment conservatism (Congress, mostly),
and the runner up is libertarianism.

Second, we have the deep divide, both physically and culturally,
between the right and the left of American politics. Before, there were
liberal Republicans and conservative Democrats voting to keep each
party fairly moderate, so that the drift between both parties was
minimal and there was still some common factual and policy grounds for
the two parties to compromise on. Over time, however, voters began to
self-select to each party, and soon there were almost no conservative
Democrats or liberal Republicans, freeing both parties to live inside
their own little bubbles and drift farther right or left. The physical
divide grew as well: liberals almost entirely live on the coastal
cities, like New York, in densely populated areas where they literally
never meet someone who doesn't mostly share their ideology. Meanwhile,
conservatives mostly live in the landlocked states, again almost never
meeting someone of an opposing ideology. Thus both sides have become
almost entirely unable to speak about anything, having nothing
culturally in common to talk about. Conservatives don't know whether
liberals are evil and masking it with "social justice" or just naive
and hysterical. Meanwhile, liberals don't know whether conservatives
are cold-hearted John Galts or simply trying to achieve the same ends
as liberals (maximum happiness) through different means.

The drift between liberals and conservatives of all stripes has
resulted in an extreme move towards the logical conclusion of both
parties axiomatic beliefs. I'll look at liberals first.

Third, liberals (who control the media, academic and tech industries)
are wholeheartedly joining the post-factual world. They are far more
concerned with how people feel about themselves, and what feels right
in the moment then what actually leads to good results or what actually
exists. They do this firstly because they need to feel the moral high
ground, and in the absence of moral absolutes there's nothing else to
do but kindly support other people, no matter what they think. See, for
example, the Transgender movement, a magical land where men can become
women with a wish and vise versa, DNA be damned. Another example is the
irrational hate for anything the conservative movement puts forth,
whether it makes sense or not, not due to any coherent ideological
position but because they feel like it. #RESIST does not a coherent
political ideology make. This leaves liberals in a debate with little
more than appeals to emotion and tired, worn-out maxims, because if all
you care about is how people feel, and feelings are often in
contradiction with facts, then what do you argue with? They know it
too, and so they consider anything that doesn't agree with their
position mortally dangerous, and any opinion that might countermand or
oppose theirs to be tantamount to physical violence. Since they can't
argue rationally with their opponents, they scream at the sky and ban
all speech they don't like as "hate speech." Their only defense is on
moral grounds and name all those who disagree with them enemies of
diversity, racists, sexists, anything. Even when they are forced to
admit a loss in a discussion, they cannot fathom or accept that their
opinions might be wrong (they have the moral high ground!) and make no
changes to their thoughts.

Fourth, social justice has morphed from a morally commendable and
practical movement into this strange, contradictory (third wave
feminists hate transgender women because they haven't had the "female
experience" and instead have had "male privilege" most of their lives
and so shouldn't be considered women) amalgamation of feelings and
anger in the name of "equity" and "diversity." They've taken the words
of the Declaration of Independence and the Constitution and completely
misunderstood them: they've decided that in the name of diversity all
ways of living are equally good, and if that's true than the only
reason that all outcomes are not the same (the only reason everybody's
not rich) is because there must be some unfair play involved. They want
equality of outcome, not equality of opportunity. Thus they name
conservatives heartless because conservatives believe that everybody
should achieve according to their ability and that living well is not a
"right." And since all ways of living are equal, isn't everyone equally
able and qualified to have input in the government? Liberals have lost
sight of the fact that the United States is not a democracy, this is a
federal republic and as such was designed to be ruled by elected
officials, who know what they're doing. Instead they believe that the
number of people backing a movement or decision is an accurate
depiction of its moral value, and as such anything supported by the
majority must be right. Thus they want to tear down the ancient
structures of our government and replace it with a direct democracy, if
they can, because in the absence of a moral absolute (in the name of
diversity and equity there can be none!) the majority gets to decide
morality. But if two wolves and a sheep vote on what to eat, what
becomes of the sheep? Is its death morally right, because the majority
decided its so?

And at the same time, liberals defend minorities purely because of
their minority status, their difference from the surrounding culture.
What is the logic connecting this? There is little. The thousands of
different cultures that make up the patchwork of our society have many
different needs and Democrats have attempted to please them all.

Conservatives haven't' gotten free of this either. Conservatism is in
favor of whatever came before, whatever is old and established: thus
they can claim victory when nothing changes, even if the status quo is
liberal. How does this help? How does moving backward or staying still
when the place your in is a quagmire help? Of course, their stance is a
reaction to the blind forward-barrelling of the liberal progressive
side, but that does not make it right or correct. Yes, if something
ain't broke don't fix it but almost everything is already broken.
Conservatives can't see that. The populist movement, lead by Trump, is
a reaction to the out of touch liberals and stone-set conservatives: do
what's good for the people, is the populist motto. But the real actions
taken show a different motto, not too different in tone from the
liberal mindset: do what the people want, it says. But again, is that
right? Is what the people want also what is good for them? Not always.
In fact, rarely.

And so Conservatism has a third movement, libertarian in ideology even
if it doesn't always call itself that. Lead by the younger generation,
its a revival of coherent ideology similar to that of Bernie Sanders'
movement.

In conclusion, the United States is in a state of drastic transition.
The state of its old ideologies is a hysterical madness on one side,
and a stony old-fashioned brand of out of touch on the other. But in
the midst of this, and the crazy struggle to tear down institutions,
new ideologies, coherent ones, are springing up. It remains to be seen
if these new ideologies take hold, and if these institutions survive,
and whether we'll be able to heal our nations divide. One thing's for
sure, though: educating people about the history and structure of our
government, and the uses of our important mechanisms, like the
Electoral College, is vitally important: conservatives support these
establishments for no reason they can articulate, and liberals hate
them for reasons that make little sense. Perhaps classes like this will
be part of the healing and transition process?

A final point, as well, must be made about the actual systems around
which these ideologies eddy and flow: they were designed with the good
will and intellectual acuity of philosopher-kings in mind. While
adequate in the early years of our republic, they failed to understand
that people operate on largely selfish motives, and since that is true,
working in politics encourages and provides incentives for the worst
kind of behavior. They government is too dominated by personal whim and
individual personalities, instead of the oiled machine that it should
be. Over time, the wheels and cogs of this governmental machine have
rusted and atrophied and our government is almost as corrupt (perhaps
more so) than the European governments that predate it by decades.