I have been asking myself, “Why won’t patriotic and knowledgeable Americans do anything useful in the face of a chronic situation?” I have spoken to so many people about this and I am beyond frustration. They know there is something very wrong with America, but all they do is talk and put their faith in corrupt politicians and a corrupt system. The latest has been Donald Trump. Worried conservatives gave him their blind faith:
- He is Going to Make America Great Again!
- He is Going to Drain the Swamp!
- He is Going to Restore Justice and Constitutional Law Back to the USA!
Well so far that has turned out to be a great disappointment, at least to me. He has not drained the swamp, has not prosecuted obvious criminal behavior, he has not even removed the corrupt people from high positions in government that was his right as a new president by appointing his own choices. I am trying to be diplomatic when I approach current and former Trump supporters on the subject: what if he is yet another in a long line of politicians who have let us down — what do we do?
I see most doing the same old things — looking for a hero/messiah to save the day — but some are starting to show progress. Very slowly. These are smart people! Why is this taking so long?
I then realized you cannot reason with people in mourning. They are not suffering from a lack of understanding… they are grieving.
Then I remembered the Five Stages of Grief. For that is what is really going on. People have watched in shock as everything they loved about the USA has been destroyed, and every institution they were raised to admire and respect has betrayed them. Something precious just up and died. This is not a time for reason, but a time for empathy.
The Five Stages of Grief:
- Denial – avoidance, confusion, fear — it is very common for people to initially deny the event.
- Anger – people that are grieving often become upset and irritated over the situation — they seek a target to blame.
- Bargaining – often defined by magical thinking — calling out to the universe (or some hero type figure) to fix the problem, reverse the disaster, or just make the pain go away.
- Depression – depression often takes some time to set it — there is a lot of shock and other emotions to process first — depression due to grief usually appears when a sense of finality is realized.
- Acceptance – the person is no longer looking to recover what they have lost — they are ready to move on.
I think most American conservatives are somewhere between Denial and Anger. They recognized that there is/was something very wrong, and they are angry that their country has been taken from them. They blamed Obama, Clinton, etc., and voted for Trump to fix it. Some now realize that Donald Trump may just be a fraud, or even if he really is who he claims to be he is just one man fighting against a hopelessly corrupt system. No one is doing anything to fix anything… nor will they. In their anger and confusion they pour their faith into Trump. Now they will either stay in Denial and Anger — and are thus hopeless cases — or they will move past Anger to Bargaining (hoping that some magical force or hero will make the world right — Jesus, Buddha, Mr. T…). Perhaps this blind faith in Trump is part of the Bargaining stage? Those people are making progress. How to get them past Bargaining???? I don’t know. But only those who are past Bargaining are ready to act.
As I look back on my own progression through Grief I realize that I am somewhere between Depression and Acceptance. And I have been at it for twenty years. It was five years ago after the American People voted to re-elect Obama that I finally realized there was no hope for the USA. I gave up on Bargaining for something unimaginable to come along and reignite the American Spirit of Liberty. It was only then that I was able to move on. It was only then that I committed to getting out while I could. I am very glad I did. I am still terribly sad about what has happened to my country, and I am sad that my children will not have what I grew up with, but I am finally actively working to make things better for myself and those I can help. I am creating a new life that is much better for my family.
I am going to try to be patient with others who are perhaps not as far along the stages of grief as I am. But I am also going to look at people with an eye towards what stage they are on. Whether there is any chance they will ever make any progress past Denial and Anger. For most I fear any progress they make will be too late for them and everyone else around them.
I more or less understand why “patriotic and knowledgeable Americans” aren’t doing anything now when the odds are against them mostly, but a much bigger mystery in my opinion is why was their opposition to all of the negative changes (the tax burden going from being minimal to being amongst the highest in the World, immigration shifting from being mostly first World to being mostly third World, the leftists taking over most of the education system and media, etc.) in America over the last 100+ years minimal to non-existent when the odds were very much in their favour?
Other than people being lazy and complacent I don’t think there is a good answer. But whatever the reason for past lethargy, the current situation is so clear as to be embarrassing. The USA with a focus on personal liberty combined with personal responsibility is dead. The 5 Stages of Grief went a long way to explaining it for me. When your mother dies you just can’t say, “Ok, lets move on now. She’s dead and there’s no changing it. Might as well just leave her in the ditch where she fell” No. You need time to grieve. In the case of having the most profound thing in the life of an American who is over 40, the concept of the American Dream, dying while you were not paying attention — this is going to take some time at best. This is an emotional process, not a rational one. For some they will never move past Denial let alone past Anger; a pointless aimless anger that is more likely to lash out at friends than actually accomplish something useful. Bargaining is the key. When people get to the point that they admit the problem and can do so without yelling at the top of their lungs with spit flying out of their mouth, only then can they make any advance although most never seem to get past the “I am still hopeful” stage. All the same it is progress.
Even then at best they will move somewhere else or at least make such a contingency plan, because I think that America has passed the point where fixing the country in it’s current form is a realistic possibility, people who have even a remote resemblance to the Americans of old already make up less than 50% of the population of the USA, and it’s only going to get worse as time goes by (http://www.breitbart.com/big-government/2016/02/11/poll-millenials-prefer-socialism-over-capitalism/).
I think you and others are missing the issue of emotions. These people cannot think rationally about something so wrapped up in emotions. They cannot “move somewhere else” or even consider rational options. They are in mourning. Grieving the death of something precious. For them to act they must move through the stages of grief.
That (when they move through the stages of grief) is what I meant by “even then”,
I should only speak for myself, but I think the real mistakes people make trying to deal with everyday people is not accounting for emotions. Expecting people to be rational when they are not ready for it. Probably never will be.
As for the question of why there was no serious opposition to all of these changes, considering that the situation was and is the same across the Anglo-Irish World and that those countries are the leaders in such behavior, there has to be some common thread.
They were done slowly, with the connivance of religious, political, educational, cultural leaders across the board. The Left took control of the levers and buttons of society. Now they are in control. Those who even realize what is happening are leaderless and adrift.
Yes, I would guess that the various Churches are the main culprits, they are the organizations which used to have the most influence on society, and they obviously didn’t really put much effort in ensuring that unsuitable people don’t reach the top positions in the Churches,