I'm really hoping that Trump keeps his word and allows RFK to take on regulatory corruption. The totalitarian federal government in Canada wouldn't be able to gaslight us anymore on what RFK would expose.
Many Canadians who are still "following the science" would be shaken out of their propaganda induced trance.
From my experience, people who exhibit signs of TDS also spend too much time watching CNN and MSNBC and defend all arguments with lies that they heard from these sources. Maybe, if the news was held accountable for spewing lies, people would be able to judge more rationally.
"We are currently trapped in a negative feedback loop." We definitely are. Over the years, so many people have succumbed to government for anything and everything. Remember hearing of the days when a farmer lost his barn to fire, it wasn't government he turned to. The people surrounding his farm would help to rebuild the lost barn. Now, it is, "daddy (government), please give me $ for ....." or "the government should make a law for that" (whatever that is). It has been a steady drip of wanting government running our lives when we should be fostering family and community support.
The barn is a perfect example of what I was trying to get at. And so resonant of the recent issues after the flood in Appalachia with the impotence of FEMA.
Yes, that recent example should wake people up but a friend who lives in North Carolina defended FEMA when I said that it appeared they were standing in the way of just regular folks trying to help. So there you have it. :(
So far, I love this essay. I will finish it tomorrow, but your point about how we cannot but pay attention to politics since it is all out of proportion to its purposes is so right on, I just had to come here and give you my hearty agreement .
Terrific….so much to unpack as I reflect on my own complacency politically, and witnessing my almost unconscious acceptance of a system that is not only *not* working for the people, but it is suffocating and harming us.
You are so right that the government is too influencial in Canadians' lives. I grew up in suburban Toronto in the 1950s and neighbours know one another and they watched out for one another. Also, if someone became ill or incapacitated, their families and friends/neighbours came to them with offers of all sorts of help. When the Canadian government started expanding and social programs were everywhere, people let the government programs look after their friends/families and they played a much less significant role. The effects of such actions reverberate through Canadian society now; this has created a mindseet of dependency and entitlement that I never imagined possible.
Thanks for the great comment - so useful to have that perspective. There is a concept in psychology called "shifting baseline" which over time means things that weren't normal become normal. And for most young people in Canada today, the idea anyone but the government (and god forbid, themselves individually) might be responsible to fix an issue is way outside of their Overton window.
There is very clear data showing that as government becomes bigger, volunteerism and philanthropic giving decreases. This is very logical. I don't much feel like donating to healthcare when I already pay countless thousands of dollars in tax money every year towards it. Likewise homelessness. Likewise addiction treatment.
My son was hired by an English university to teach International Relations although his scholarship revolves around US war propaganda. One year in and they have him working in a three year study, “Countering Malicious Online Security Cultures”, which seems to be gathering more ‘evidence’ for censorship.
If we don’t obsessively watch what is happening at this moment, the Fascists win and we are all muted “useless eaters” who are disposable to our new billionaire overlords.
spot on...and made hugely worse by globalism. The English socialist MP Tony Benn, who obviously was wrong about most things, was of that breed of leftie who revered parliamentary democracy....rapidly sinking under executive and legal power and globalism, which would have horrified him and his like. (He was in fact an aristocrat who renounced his title as Viscount Stansgate to stand for parliament.) He famously had these questions for those with power: 'What power have you got? Where did you get it from? In whose interests do you exercise it? To whom are you accountable?....and lastly and these days most importantly, how do we get rid of you? Increasingly the answer to that is we can't. Politics now is essentially nationalism v globalism, not left v right and as for Mr T, PP here etc etc we can only pray they are honest patriots.
Mr T is not a patriot, he has shown himself to be a globalist ‘acting’ like a patriot… my party of 50 years, the NDP also seems to be going that way under Mr S
Joan - I grew up in an NDP household and leaned that way when I was young. I feel the NDP's motto should be "There is no problem we can't fix if we throw enough of your money at it". They are beyond hopeless.
well it seems many of your party are steeped in TDS and think he is 'literally Hitler' like the US Democrats, but you do have my sympathy as a long standing member, the way your party has changed as I understand it, as an immigrant. The astonishing letter the NDP leader in NS put out yesterday rivals the Guardian newspaper offering its staff counselling!
Plato and Aristotle - an easy search really - discussed Tyranny and purported Self Government. You might recall Aristotle favored the rule of the best. We moderns do too. The human psychological health issue appears to rest in this concept. With no assured honest or factual standards for the best but existing for money acquisition as an emblem we are befuddled in a class system. How much land does a man need? Tolstoy aristocrat and land owner who would vote Democrat today tells us: just enough to bury.
I heard a quote recently (can't provide citation unfortunately) with reference to the American system that there is now a fourth level of government - Executive, Legislative, Judicial and now Administrative.
Re Pericles' comment. Indeed. It's the message in the epic film 'Shenandoah' Charlie Anderson (played by Jimmy Stewart) who wanted no part in the Civil War but the war came looking for him when the Union Army took his son.
Americans are far more nuanced and practiced than Canadians (contrary to what they believe) in the abstract concept of liberty. It's rooted in their common heritage. It's much easier to ram home European style censorship bills in Canada than it is in the United States.
I'm ambivalent towards Musk. Maybe you're perception of him is correct but another angle to consider is he was a sharp shark who saw that under the Democrats his businesses were under threat and so he made the shrewd political move to back Trump - and won. He may have come out the biggest winner in this. The billionaire class saw the shift. Even the owners of the LA Times and WaPo (Bezos) took the shocking step of instructing their editorial staff to not endorse a candidate. Which is always a Democrat. Yes, very 'objective' and not biased at all. Nope.
I think he may be serious about protecting free speech but not convinced. His businesses rely on government contracts and subsidies. He's a crony in that way.
I'm really hoping that Trump keeps his word and allows RFK to take on regulatory corruption. The totalitarian federal government in Canada wouldn't be able to gaslight us anymore on what RFK would expose.
Many Canadians who are still "following the science" would be shaken out of their propaganda induced trance.
I'm not so certain. Given tge levels of Trump Derangement Syndrome I've witnessed up here, many would ignore perfectly good info because of the source
From my experience, people who exhibit signs of TDS also spend too much time watching CNN and MSNBC and defend all arguments with lies that they heard from these sources. Maybe, if the news was held accountable for spewing lies, people would be able to judge more rationally.
ApexpredatorEagle, I think the data actually says you are correct. https://pairodocs.substack.com/p/does-watching-the-news-actually-make
Thank you for the link. Good article.
Or CBC...
"We are currently trapped in a negative feedback loop." We definitely are. Over the years, so many people have succumbed to government for anything and everything. Remember hearing of the days when a farmer lost his barn to fire, it wasn't government he turned to. The people surrounding his farm would help to rebuild the lost barn. Now, it is, "daddy (government), please give me $ for ....." or "the government should make a law for that" (whatever that is). It has been a steady drip of wanting government running our lives when we should be fostering family and community support.
The barn is a perfect example of what I was trying to get at. And so resonant of the recent issues after the flood in Appalachia with the impotence of FEMA.
Yes, that recent example should wake people up but a friend who lives in North Carolina defended FEMA when I said that it appeared they were standing in the way of just regular folks trying to help. So there you have it. :(
So far, I love this essay. I will finish it tomorrow, but your point about how we cannot but pay attention to politics since it is all out of proportion to its purposes is so right on, I just had to come here and give you my hearty agreement .
Terrific….so much to unpack as I reflect on my own complacency politically, and witnessing my almost unconscious acceptance of a system that is not only *not* working for the people, but it is suffocating and harming us.
You are so right that the government is too influencial in Canadians' lives. I grew up in suburban Toronto in the 1950s and neighbours know one another and they watched out for one another. Also, if someone became ill or incapacitated, their families and friends/neighbours came to them with offers of all sorts of help. When the Canadian government started expanding and social programs were everywhere, people let the government programs look after their friends/families and they played a much less significant role. The effects of such actions reverberate through Canadian society now; this has created a mindseet of dependency and entitlement that I never imagined possible.
Thanks for the great comment - so useful to have that perspective. There is a concept in psychology called "shifting baseline" which over time means things that weren't normal become normal. And for most young people in Canada today, the idea anyone but the government (and god forbid, themselves individually) might be responsible to fix an issue is way outside of their Overton window.
There is very clear data showing that as government becomes bigger, volunteerism and philanthropic giving decreases. This is very logical. I don't much feel like donating to healthcare when I already pay countless thousands of dollars in tax money every year towards it. Likewise homelessness. Likewise addiction treatment.
Big Government stifles community spirit.
I totally agree🙏
That is so sad for a pioneer country like Canada🙏
Well written and expressed. I appreciate having this summarized.
My son was hired by an English university to teach International Relations although his scholarship revolves around US war propaganda. One year in and they have him working in a three year study, “Countering Malicious Online Security Cultures”, which seems to be gathering more ‘evidence’ for censorship.
If we don’t obsessively watch what is happening at this moment, the Fascists win and we are all muted “useless eaters” who are disposable to our new billionaire overlords.
Excellent essay, I especially liked the Thomas Jefferson quote thank you for bringing it to light
Good observations.
Great article!
Very sage
spot on...and made hugely worse by globalism. The English socialist MP Tony Benn, who obviously was wrong about most things, was of that breed of leftie who revered parliamentary democracy....rapidly sinking under executive and legal power and globalism, which would have horrified him and his like. (He was in fact an aristocrat who renounced his title as Viscount Stansgate to stand for parliament.) He famously had these questions for those with power: 'What power have you got? Where did you get it from? In whose interests do you exercise it? To whom are you accountable?....and lastly and these days most importantly, how do we get rid of you? Increasingly the answer to that is we can't. Politics now is essentially nationalism v globalism, not left v right and as for Mr T, PP here etc etc we can only pray they are honest patriots.
Mr T is not a patriot, he has shown himself to be a globalist ‘acting’ like a patriot… my party of 50 years, the NDP also seems to be going that way under Mr S
Joan - I grew up in an NDP household and leaned that way when I was young. I feel the NDP's motto should be "There is no problem we can't fix if we throw enough of your money at it". They are beyond hopeless.
well it seems many of your party are steeped in TDS and think he is 'literally Hitler' like the US Democrats, but you do have my sympathy as a long standing member, the way your party has changed as I understand it, as an immigrant. The astonishing letter the NDP leader in NS put out yesterday rivals the Guardian newspaper offering its staff counselling!
Plato and Aristotle - an easy search really - discussed Tyranny and purported Self Government. You might recall Aristotle favored the rule of the best. We moderns do too. The human psychological health issue appears to rest in this concept. With no assured honest or factual standards for the best but existing for money acquisition as an emblem we are befuddled in a class system. How much land does a man need? Tolstoy aristocrat and land owner who would vote Democrat today tells us: just enough to bury.
I heard a quote recently (can't provide citation unfortunately) with reference to the American system that there is now a fourth level of government - Executive, Legislative, Judicial and now Administrative.
Absolutely
Re Pericles' comment. Indeed. It's the message in the epic film 'Shenandoah' Charlie Anderson (played by Jimmy Stewart) who wanted no part in the Civil War but the war came looking for him when the Union Army took his son.
Americans are far more nuanced and practiced than Canadians (contrary to what they believe) in the abstract concept of liberty. It's rooted in their common heritage. It's much easier to ram home European style censorship bills in Canada than it is in the United States.
I'm ambivalent towards Musk. Maybe you're perception of him is correct but another angle to consider is he was a sharp shark who saw that under the Democrats his businesses were under threat and so he made the shrewd political move to back Trump - and won. He may have come out the biggest winner in this. The billionaire class saw the shift. Even the owners of the LA Times and WaPo (Bezos) took the shocking step of instructing their editorial staff to not endorse a candidate. Which is always a Democrat. Yes, very 'objective' and not biased at all. Nope.
I think he may be serious about protecting free speech but not convinced. His businesses rely on government contracts and subsidies. He's a crony in that way.