A Culture Shift
May 03, 2021 By: Nick Carraway Category: Uncategorized
I sat there in the bleachers watching my daughter play in her last volleyball tournament (indoors) of the year. I listened somewhat intently to the conversation next to me. It was hard not to at least catch bits and pieces of it. Admittedly, I was already a little annoyed.
Seating is limited at these things. Usually we bring in our own chairs and space is on a first come first serve basis. Here, you weren’t allowed to bring in chairs. We all had to fit on the bleachers. The usual course was to vacate as soon as your child is done playing so someone else can fit. These folks didn’t do this. So, I was already admittedly bemused.
They spent a good 20 minutes complaining about the mask mandate. We all had to sign a waiver before entering. Yet, a tournament official had to ask them to put their masks on. They resisted of course, but at least did so quietly. The official finally gave up. I understood her plight. How was she going to enforce the rule herself with a handful of people that were refusing to abide by the rules?
These two seemingly isolated things (refusing to give up seats and refusing to put on the mask) were immediately linked in my mind. It is something I’ve thought for a long time and have had a difficult time articulating into words. Most people link this to politics somehow. The conversation somehow shifts to mouth breathing conservatives or triggered liberals. That’s certainly where their conversation was going.
We have had a culture shift. Naturally, everyone has their own opinion about such things. We differ about where it started. We differ about when it started. We differ on who is to blame for it. Yet, I think it’s something most of us see. Then it becomes a part of the cultural lexicon. For some, it is somehow positive. For others it isn’t. For me, it is impossible to put into words without giving away my thoughts about the phenomenon. The best I can come up with is that we have become a much more self-involved society.
If I were to avoid mincing words I would simply call it selfish. It’s difficult not to be judgmental. I can only imagine someone saying something similar about something I’ve done or said. I have definite opinions about where it comes from and who is at the heart of it all, but at the end of the day I think that is much more of a distraction.
The fight over masks has definitely highlighted this trend. Yet, it would be a mistake to consider the mask debate to be the central issue here. It is simply an easy manifestation of it. People are more self-involved and consider the plight of others to be outside their purview. I had a family member literally say, “I got mine. Go get yours” when the subject of taxes came up.
It would be overly simplistic to say this is an American thing. I think that’s largely true for historic and systemic reasons, but I also think we didn’t used to be this way. People gladly sacrificed during World War II when they were asked to do so. Few if any railed against rationing or any of the other shortages that resulted from meeting the needs of the soldiers first. People stepped up and did their share and then some.
We can point to other periods in history when this happened and there are modern day examples of this too. We banded together following 9/11 and we’ve done it after wild fires, tornados, and hurricanes. So, this isn’t some old geezer pulling the “back in my day” routine. We are fully capable of supporting each other and looking out for the needs of the whole group. For whatever reason, we are conditioned not to.
That’s the ultimate divide in our politics. People overwhelmingly support programs they believe they would benefit from. If you don’t directly benefit then that support drops precipitously. Why should a 50 year old support free community college? Why should someone with a cushy health care plan with their corporation support Medicare for all? Why should someone living in their gated community support any programs that help the poor? When we convince ourselves that it’s every man and woman for themselves then we tend to reject the idea of actions that would help others.
Like you I have been in the same boat. I am pretty darn sure that these folks have never heard of Louis Pasteur and his germ theory which is no longer a theory but a reality. I have run into so many people who have never heard of not so ancjent history where people died a horrible death from a simple cut. Sterile procedure helped to bring down such lethal statistics. Andhow about death by childbirth? Same deal. Clean hands, clean towels, etc. And they also do not understand how sterilization works regarding surgical instruments. In sum, they are just plain dumb. And no, you don’t have to put up with them. They are literally by their own choice on their own where their health is concerned. unfortunately, these are exactly the same ones who sue a doctor or a hospital for what they perceive to be inadequate or even malicious treatment. They got it “coming and going”. They oughta sue themselves. They are their own worst enemy. Unfortunately, they have no boundaries about taking othesr down with them.
1You’re right that there has developed a strong “me first, me last, me only” attitude amongst some of the general population. For whatever reason, too many people view the world, and our society, as a zero-sum game where you need to grab whatever you can before someone else does thus depriving you of whatever it might be.
I put it down, at least in part, to right wing talk radio where the underlying theme is “the other” is coming to take away “x” so you need to look out for yourself, screw the other guy.
2I think it’s mostly a milder version of “rolling coal”- defiance. I imagine the unmasked shoppers at my Rural King exchanging smug looks as they encounter each other, especially since RK has a mask policy.
3Just had an ” exchange” buying pool chemicals outside of the store.
NY has a mask mandate so that was not the problem.
No it was his insistence about telling me about the fake chlorine scare, made up by the media to get people to buy chlorine.
4The new ” toilet paper ” scare.
Just looked at him and said ” oh, for God’s sake” in a loud voice and walked right past him.
That was a very charitable comment on what I was really thinking.
I read that today is Machiavelli’s birthday. He believed in winning at all costs and this seems to be the GOPers attitude. They should wake up and realize that even the Medici couldn’t go that far and neither should they. Wear masks, be polite, pick up your dog’s poop and even get a vaccine – if not for yourself, then for the rest of us!
5@Diane: Are you sure this wasn’t about the shortage of Chorine pellets (?) for pools? It was on the news last night that there may be a shortage and they are urging people NOT to hoard the available supplies–like people did with toilet paper.
6lol “What were they thinking?” Or, not. For a collection of “hold my beer” activities wander through the WMDBS for the series Fun with Gunz as written by Ms. Juanita Jean Herownself.
There are also plenty of oops moments to be found in reading the daily headlines. Kansas state rep, attorney, and sometimes substitute teacher Mark Samsel earned himself a “WTF Thinker Award” for sexually assaulting a teen in a classroom full of witnesses.
Or, on any given days, Congress competes with Louie Gohmert. Today is “G” day with Gaetz, Greene and Grassley competing for a Gohmert Award. It’s only lunchtime in Dee Cee, so there will be more …
7Selfish, entitled, arrogant … . I think it was the Literary Site that recently had a headline asking “What is the American sentence?” Although I didn’t read the article, I think I had the correct answer: “I’ve got mine; f**k you.”
8Good story Nick.
9Common courtesy? Not that common, is it?
Constant reader/lurker, occasional commenter here – This is something that I’ve been thinking and seeing for a long time. I see too many people that are confusing TV/media reality with TV. It was illustrated most clearly with Benghazi – the actual noncomprehension of how much time it takes to get jets ready and to travel where you need to go. After all, it takes so little time on TV and movies.
Add to that the “maverick is the hero” myth and the “lone hero” myth that is part of American story and folklore, and it slides so very easily into the every man for themselves mentality (and fetishizing “freedom!”). How many movies and tv shows display violence as the only and preferred way to end a fight/argument? Everyone is the hero of their own story, and the story focuses on themselves.
10re: “We banded together following 9/11 and we’ve done it after wild fires, tornados, and hurricanes.”
I don’t know about 9/11 or hurricanes. But I’ve been around tornadoes and wildfires (plus floods)… and gotta say there is a great deal of altruism and neighbors helping each other … but law enforcement also sets up road blocks and sets a curfew because there are also jerks around. And ofthere there are curmudgeons who won’t help and don’t accept help, either.
11My CulturalAnthropology professor put it simply.
Here’s the version for four year olds, which I
taught to one this morning:
“One Monkey is No Monkey”
Humans are social animals. We support each other because we evolved this group protection and support, physical and mental.
If you leave the group, or it leaves you, you will likely die, maybe of loneliness or suicide by cop.
12Such “mask” misinformation rhymes historically; now it’s much amplified by social media.
View the graphic reportedly from a 1930 cartoon booklet called “Health in Pictures.” The “anti-everything” figure shown seems particularly timeless.
https://twitter.com/Padraic_Judge/status/1389047619448721411/photo/1
13It’s at the core of of everything repugnantcans push.
14Unrestrained capitalism depends on it.
In the worldview they propagate, every person’s motives are purely selfish. Anyone who does something generous or altruistic does so for the good feeling it gives themselves.
And anyone who claims otherwise is a dirty socialist.
In their worldview, selfishness is virtuous.
Has anybody noticed their favorite new buzz-phrase?
Virtue signaling.
Apparently all of us who hang out here just talk a lot about giving a crap about anyone else so we’ll look good in each other’s eyes and feel good about ourselves.
And not admitting it just makes us liars, not worthy of trust.
They despise us for it. Because even entertaining the notion that we’re right is admitting something about themselves and their ideology that would be repugnant.
To Jesus.
Your post fits well with a plaintive question from an MSNBC deskgirl edon’t know her name) who asked yesterday why people become trump cultists. It’s simple.
First, about 35-40% of Americans (and, I don’t know, maybe everybody) are natural fascists. They want somebody to tell them what to do.
About 35-40% of Americans hate their lives, their crappy jobs, boring spouses, ugly homes, unpleasant neighbors. It’s the “Take this Job and Shove It” crowd. (Lots of overlap between the two groups.)
Not just any loudmouth jerk can touch both these hot buttons. Trump does. Decent people were at least irritated by the pussy-grabbing tape.
The Johnny Paycheck crowd adores trump because he does all the things they dream about doing.He doesn’t pay his bills, he bangs women, he doesn’t answer to a boss, he doesn’t worry about his bills (though perhaps he should).
Women react as readily to these symptoms of jerkdom as men do. That’s why only trump can carry the mob. Don Jr or Hawley or anybody else won’t create the same alliance.
15Two of the crises you mentioned during which we pulled together, WWII and 9/11, had one thing in common: an enemy we could collectively hate. iow — the “other” to unite against.
I contend we weren’t so much pulling together during those times as wanting to show the Germans and the Islamic extremists [and some lumped all Muslims in that group] that “we” were better than “them.”
With hurricanes, tornadoes, fires and floods, perhaps the “other” could be the crisis. Or maybe there’s an inherent ability to put ourselves in someone else’s shoes when a calamity that has no face hits? Dunno.
At this point, though, most people seem to have decided that the “other” is “anyone who disagrees with me.” And the group that “I” agree with seems to be getting smaller by the day.
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