While the answer probably isn’t yes, it’s certainly becoming a bit harder to find optimists in the West who boldly assert that, on the whole, Western civilization is becoming smarter. Sure, technology is always improving (take that, Moore’s Law skeptics) and we have more and more information at our fingertips. But in this world of short attention spans — somewhere around the 140-character limit — as well as social media and cable news echo chambers which reinforce our views rather than challenge them, a case can surely be made that, at the very least, our politics are getting dumber.
Similarly, President Donald Trump’s campaign did not create the nativist and populist strands of conservatism in the US – they have been around from the days of Shay’s Rebellion to the resistance of the Sagebrush Rebellion two centuries later
Coming to grips with dumb politics, though, doesn’t mean concocting dumb histories. In the US, too many progressives fail to appreciate their country’s unique background, where Puritans, Huguenots, Mennonites, Quakers, Catholics, and other persecuted groups carried with them a healthy distrust of government as they fled across the Atlantic. Their descendants (as well as many other Americans) spread out across the West at a time when there wasn’t much of a functioning central government in the territories, and where the presence of Native Americans and outlaws often precipitated the formation of both close-knit militias and close-knit communities. For countless settlers during the years of Manifest Destiny, “[clinging] to their guns or religion” wasn’t a choice, but a necessity. One which has been passed down through the generations.
Similarly, President Donald Trump’s campaign did not create the nativist and populist strands of conservatism in the US – they have been around from the days of Shay’s Rebellion to the resistance of the Sagebrush Rebellion two centuries later. But it has given the green light to modern-day nativists and populist conservatives who too often ignore the fact that the current infatuation with small government is a relatively recent phenomenon. These small government zealots themselves cling to a narrative that disregards how much of America’s growth from the late 19th century onwards occurred because Washington chose to invest more significantly in public goods that the private sector couldn’t or wouldn’t provide. It also ignores how our mixed economy (note how I didn’t use the term “capitalist”) has always thrived on international trade. Indeed, blaming Mexico and China for our country’s manufacturing decline while turning a blind eye to automation and the gains we make from trade is a lot like censuring Iran for promoting terrorism while disregarding the radical Salafism exported by one of our top allies – Saudi Arabia.
Details? Nah.
Nuance isn’t sexy. But it matters.
If we are actually getting dumber, changing the system would be impossible. But if only our politics are getting dumber, then there is a shred of hope.
Where to start?
As trite as it may sound, we need to look at the Big Picture, which is rarely black or white. Tempting as it is to jump into Carl Sagan mode and harangue on how little we all are given the pale blue dot that Earth is within the cosmos, simply put, we in the West need to take a bigger picture approach and embrace some degree of uncertainty. Our political differences need not define us, nor are they always crystal clear.
This does not mean discounting the very real threats to our values that our lawmakers might be. It does mean listening to those we don’t agree with, humanizing their arguments, and relinquishing our claim to the “truth.” Human nature tends to promote “coalitional instincts” that induce us to link up in “tribal” bonds, which in modern-day terms includes political ideology. But our dumb politics only exacerbates these differences, making coalitions harder to form.
Take the debate over charter schools, which has been front page news in recent weeks due to Secretary of Education Betsy DeVos’ torturous confirmation process. Do students in charter schools perform any better than students in normal public schools — the main measure by which charter supporters argue for increasingly greater shares of scarce education dollars? According to one of the most prominent charter school institutes in the country: on average, no. However, is there a certain type of charter school that bucks this trend and has been repeatedly shown to result in higher achievement? Yes (“high expectations, high support” charters).
There are Facts. And There are Facts.
This example illustrates two of the main drivers of our dumb politics. First, either sides’ answer to the simple question “Do charter schools work?” can be an unequivocal yes or no, depending on how the question is framed, but this erases any attempt at nuance. Secondly, how we form “sides” or coalitions is sometimes ludicrous. Should we expect progressives to not support charter schools that have been empirically shown to result in better student performance compared to publics? Should we expect conservatives to rally behind charters that receive hefty public subsidies yet still fail to outperform their public school peers?
The obvious risk here is of making false equivalencies. There are times when simple questions do result in fairly straightforward answers, no matter how they are framed. Was there a Bowling Green Massacre, as White House Counselor Kellyanne Conway has professed on more than one occasion? Most definitely not, and both progressives and conservatives should have no qualms about calling out the Trump administration on such blatant lies.
Moreover, populism, on which so much of our present-day politics is based, does differ significantly between its right-wing and left-wing variants, with the former evoking fear, and the latter evoking hope. This is a key divergence in our era of economic dislocation, one that resulted in Donald Trump and Bernie Sanders competing for the same votes.
As trite as it may sound, we need to look at the Big Picture, which is rarely black or white
Still, I would rather end on an optimistic path to change rather than a fearful tirade against fake news. Dumb politics and its polarizing symptoms are unquestionably egged on by single-member districts and a lack of campaign finance restrictions, which allow those with the biggest-ticket supporters to shout the loudest. These are issues that cut across party lines and aren’t overly politicized yet, which makes them fixable.
Dumb politics are also kept in place by an uncompromising “overnight change” culture. Given the ease of “clicktivism” and the increasing ubiquity of “keyboard warriors,” especially among Millennials, this may be harder to adjust. But even here there is hope. What Barack Obama, Ron Paul, and Bernie Sanders’ campaigns all shared was an ability to get people off their seats and out onto the streets for more than a year at a time, swapping clicks for clipboards. Reclaiming nuance and rekindling the Big Picture will take much more than that, of course. But it’s a start, and we aren’t that dumb, after all.
