U.S. Politics and Learned Helplessness
How and why Americans stay complacent.
This country has a problem.
The way learned helplessness has been ingrained into the American psyche is why any of this is still happening. Americans feel so completely, utterly powerless against the system.
How corrupt of a judicial system is it that we are more afraid of being arrested than saving our people?
There's also the fear of being killed, which is another discussion about the corruption of our law enforcement.
But I want you to think about how they try to escalate every crime to its maximum punishment, how they frame innocent people, how they plant evidence & manipulate you into lying.
Not to mention the rampant physical and sexual abuse that people in custody and in prison face daily.
Overcrowding. Solitary confinement. Slave camps. Death camps.
The president promoting the death penalty and removing any restrictions on cops’ ability to kill. The end of habeas corpus and due process.
To save our people and ourselves is to risk a lifetime of literal torture.
But this is just the enforcement of learned helplessness by the state: a corrupt correctional system that does not “correct” anything, but rather punishes and tortures with impunity. This is how the state enforces the culture of helplessness.
But it doesn’t start there. It’s an ideology that has intentionally and repeatedly pervaded every aspect of American life.
It is not an accident that you feel disconnected from even your local policies and politicians.
How many of you know what government positions are on your local ballot in the next local election? Who is running? What are their policies? Does your state have referendums for citizens to vote on policies? What policies are on the ballot?
Do you even know what day your election IS?
If you’re not actively seeking out this information yourself, if you’re not involved in local politics, you probably don’t know the answer to most of those questions. In an age experiencing the death of cable news and local newspapers, how are we supposed to know what’s going on in our towns? Practically nobody has cable anymore. Almost nobody reads the local papers anymore, particularly young people.
If you’re under 40, you probably don’t have a clue what’s going on in your local politics other than a handful of incredibly uninformative billboards and yard signs telling you to vote for SMITH WHITEMAN for a position you’ve literally never heard of.
Facebook often has pages for local news stations, but how many young people use Facebook? Not many, compared to millennials and gen X.
Imagine a world where your local government keeps you informed of elections through the mail, including the candidates and their platforms, including policy referendums. Or third places and community spaces with public boards that keep citizens up to date, in easily accessible locations.
Imagine if you just knew what was going on around town without having to go out and look for it because it’s an essential public service and would keep the people engaged with their communities.
Instead, elections are obfuscated. Civic education in school is underdeveloped. I should’ve had to memorize every elected and appointed position in my local county instead of every stupid fucking president.
“Goodness” in mainstream media is depicted as a person who doesn’t kill the killer, even if they’ve ended dozens or hundreds or thousands of lives.
The hero who never takes a life is seen as the ultimate pillar of justice.
Just want to posit this little notion: What if contemporary media didn’t depict the killing of one evil person as somehow the same level of depravity as being an abuser or pervert? How different would American culture be?
I think we would fight for our rights a little harder.
We’d be less afraid to take a stand, to make a move. Less afraid of direct action.
Even if there is no intention to ever introduce a fellow to his God, a situation can turn dire in an instant and knowing that you value your life above the oppressor’s is an underrated but necessary form of resistance against fascism.
Because of this intentional programming, we are afraid of trying to take control.
Piping hot take: Terrorism isn’t a real crime. The government is supposed to submit to its citizens; it should be afraid of us. If the government isn’t serving its people, then do we not have the right to demand change?
Writing letters to your senator does nothing when they’re in the pockets of corporations. In other countries, that’s called bribery and it’s illegal. In the United States, we call it “lobbying” and it’s just accepted as part of the political campaign process. Companies own our politicians and the state.
Then how else do we fight for what we deserve? When they don’t listen to our words? We disrupt. If pacifism isn’t working, then violence is a justifiable escalation.
Especially to the lives that are destroyed every day from insurmountable debt, low wages, unaffordable healthcare, underfunded public infrastructure which leads to unclean water and failing electric grids, economic collapse, ecological collapse.
Pollution. Runaway rent prices organized through a corporate loophole. Union breakers. Right to work states - more like the right to be fired. Home insurance that doesn’t cover what you need it to. Underfunded and underprepared disaster response organizations.
If we as a society want progress, we have to make it ourselves. We have to take it for ourselves. Organize your coworkers and neighbors. Host a local forum for discussion. Get professional training and encourage others to do the same. Join a communist or socialist organization, local or national.
“We have nothing to lose but our chains” is an outdated Marxist slogan. We can lose our families to slave camps, now, for political dissent. But don’t let the fear win. We can’t let the fear win. We must not comply.
Maybe in my lifetime I’ll see a socialist revolution. But I can’t do it alone and neither can you.