Sunday May 31, 2009, 2:41 pm
“Washington tends to enforce a foolish consistency. If you are someone of some prominence whose views are known publicly, then everything you have ever said in the past tends to be projected forward and everything you say today is projected backward. Any discrepancy potentially brings charges of flip-flopping or hypocrisy or selling-out or whatever. Certainly, these charges are valid in many cases, but the simple possibility that circumstances have changed or that experience or new evidence has caused one to change one’s mind seems never to be seriously entertained. The result is to force people to stick with positions they know are wrong because they less fear being foolishly consistent than being attacked for flip-flopping.”...

When Americans adopted the notion that acting on principle, standing up and fighting for what one believes in, is virtuous, while changing one’s mind, even on sufficient evidence, is unprincipled flip-flopping and unseemly is not known, but it surely has its foundation in the American addiction to ideology which places greater value on belief than on knowledge. This notion’s absurdity should be obvious, but apparently it isn’t. Acting on erroneous principles leads to disaster, and why anyone should be willing to do that is an enigma. Yet even more sinister consequences follow from this notion. Since no prominent person, especially one holding elective office, wants to be labeled “unprincipled,” people are loath to change their views even when they know those views are wrong. Once they have decided that being “principled” is more important than being right, they have no inclination or desire to question the validity of their views by seeking the truth. The result is that these so-called principles become ossified dogmas, debate degenerates into vituperation, government becomes ineffective, and society disintegrates.

But the adoption of this notion along with the American addiction to ideology does not prevent inconsistency, and Bartlett’s comment reveals another trait of what passes for America’s intelligentsia—the curious inability to think past the first level of consequences.

What Bartlett misses is that people hold “principled” views on numerous issues. Holding a “principled” view on one issue can conflict with the “principled” views held by the same people on other issues, and if the “principled” people have no inclination or desire to validate any of their views, the inconsistencies never become apparent to them.

Two such contradictory views are held by the American political status quo, especially on the political right, but often by those termed moderate and liberal as well. One is the view that the family is the fundamental unit of society. The other is the ideological belief in the capitalist system.

The United States of America does not have anything that an anthropologist would recognize as a true society. America consists of a mere cluster of people and groups with various and often opposing beliefs who often have little tolerance for the beliefs held by the others. It has been said that Americans do not live together, they merely live side by side. These individuals and groups openly seek to promote their own interests at the expense of the interests of all. Freedoms of all sorts are being restricted and those people who fall outside of the dominant groups are left to their own devices or abandoned entirely. No true society operates this way, and Americans have obviously never understood Mill’s On Liberty.

In primitive societies, the family, especially extended, is the individual’s support group. When a young mother dies or becomes infirm, when a person becomes ill or incapacitated, when children are orphaned, when people become elderly, the family provides the needed support because it is often not possible for an individual “to operate within his own societal space, assume his responsibilities, and exploit his potential.” [See Steyn below.] Reality is not so benign. But two dogmas of the capitalism practiced in America, what the French call capitalisme sauvage, destroys families—the mobility of labor, and the subsistence wage (or the lowest wage that will buy the labor required).

The insufficient income that results from low wages is a major cause of divorce and when family members are dispersed by having to move to where jobs are, the extended family disintegrates. A year or so ago, a study on divorce rates showed that divorce was highest in those red, conservative states in the Bible belt. Protestant clerics bemoaned this finding, attributing it to their own failure to instill Christian values in their flocks, but they failed to notice that per capita income is also lowest in these same Bible belt states. As the extended family disintegrates, the needed support groups collapse, and the individual who is unable “to operate within his own societal space, assume his responsibilities, and exploit his potential” is abandoned. Abandoning one’s children is considered by conservatives to be criminal, but apparently they do not consider a nation that abandons its people to even be wrong...

Is it not time, overdue, that the church is seperated from the state?...The idiots from the non-idiots?

Monday June 1, 2009, 12:42 am
I generally agree with this article.However, as for Mill’s "On Liberty", it is a load of racist rubbish that attempts to justify imperialism, "to civilise the brown-skinned people", and such a book belongs in the dust bin of history.

Monday June 1, 2009, 5:11 am
Thanks David i generally agree. I believe that soon the world will witness many pool power, wer U.S.A will loose the total inhuman dimonition and aggregation attitude.I hope that will be a lessen to those minority group who bring the U.S.A to this stage, and the American people can unite on change such attitude. It is better if they change there attitude by them selves, rather then being change by others. American people should not forget Abraham Lincoln.

Monday June 1, 2009, 7:11 am
I don't believe that the author of this article has done sufficient research or thought to give justice to this topic.
Firstly there is the paranoid preoccupation with the almighty $$$$$$$., the lack of principles in obtaining that $.... the belief that honesty and integrity are only desirable "impressions" to be cultivated, but not practiced The belief that ANY means justifies the end.....greed is good. The legal system is part of the problem, without a functioning legal system, divorced from politics, operating without fear or favor, you HAVE NO foundation, for a caring, functioning modern society in such a large population.
Deep unelected government/big business, controlling 'their bought people in congress", or government, doing their bidding, instead of acting for the best interests of those who elect them.....and the philosophy of socialize the loss's and privative the profits....blatant obvious conflicts of interest..... without an independent competitive media to keep the Bast***rds honest, you just don't have a chance.Top all this off with a good dose of apathy. If you could remove the corrupt element from banking, government, legal system and the media, then much of the societal woes would just evaporate.

Monday June 1, 2009, 7:54 pm
US society can be susceptible to kind of a non-thinking state, with a lot of focus on entertainment, movie stars, shopping, etc, rather than critical thinking. (But maybe that's true of many places these days.) Some people can get swept up into religious belief and patriotism, and the two kind of blend.

Monday June 1, 2009, 8:33 pm
it won't matter and you won't care but: if you're going to make enormous, broad, sweeping claims about what anthropologists supposedly believe about our culture or society, you need to actually bother to cite someone's opinion to justify such a claim. funny, i live in one of america's most hated and reviled cities, los angeles, and i see examples each and everyday that demonstrate that you are just plain wrong. who gives a rat's behind about politics? that's your judgement on whether there is or is not a society in america? how about the group of people stopping traffic on a bridge spontaneously to rescue a large group of papers that had flown out of an elderly lady's car? or the group of people putting out a fourth of july fire? i could go on and on...and what's true for lumpen caucasians in the bible belt, is it true for all ethnic and cultural groups in america? in all neighborhoods? how is self interest involved in the activities i have cited (to list but two to keep it short and simple) in a way that demonstrates the lack of society you are claiming? this idea of side-by-side living as opposed to living together is an old canard that really is not born out by reality. there are a lot of problems in this country to be sure, but frothing at the mouth about a straw man isnt going to solve anything...

Tuesday June 2, 2009, 1:08 am
Being originally from England I saw almost immediately the lack of "neighbour". It was all family but nothing else. That was 34 yrs ago. Now, having lived in 2 stats before coming to LA I see more family and neighbour, more unity than the Mid West or Florida.
But generally speaking here the author is quite correct in his assumptions but I disagree with the $$$$ too. People are not greedy as what he suggests only the elite are greedy and those that follow them. There is nothing wrong with wanting a good life for oneself and family. There is also nothing wrong with wanting hat for your neighbour but there is something wrong when your government demands that you don't have it.
Thanks David good article perhaps it may wake up a few but I doubt it, too many think they are right and we are wrong.

Tuesday June 2, 2009, 2:36 pm
if you know any true believers, you know they aren't motivated by self-interest and they value belief over knowledge because the "erroneous principle" is god's word. the only way to change their minds is to work from the inside; point out the parts of the gospel where theologins disagree and issues they can safely interpret for themselves. also, i've been told that it's unamerican to suggest that corporate execs and workers share the wealth, but really, it would be the ultimate in democracy to have all workers vote on the salary and duties of the executives at every company.

Tuesday June 2, 2009, 7:20 pm
OF COURSE AMERICANS ARE STUPID, THEY LET NODRAMA STEAL THE ELECTION.