What will it take for Americans to wake up?

[x-g.o.p.er]

I would like an opinion on what it would take for Americans to wake up from their reality show loving, movie star worshipping, political disconnection. Now, I am not talking about the folks on this site, or even the misguided folks over at FR.

I am talking about the average American. The guy or gal who works, is seemingly intelligent on many subjects, but doesn’t care about politics in any way, shape, or form, and is absolutely clueless on current events. My brother comes to mind as a perfect example. He works construction, is married and has two kids, is a great husband and father, is one of the smartest guys I’ve ever met….but he doesn’t give a hoot about politics. He thinks there is no difference between the parties, and that they’re both corrupt and beyond help. So he doesn’t pay attention to politics and doesn’t vote.

I thought 9/11 and the aftermath might have been the event that got people involved and connected back with the process. I don’t think it was.

Is there any reason to think that some day, over 75% of people eligible to vote in this country will? Or is our system so morally bankrupt and viewed with such cynicism that 50% will be considered a good or heavy turn out for the next few generations?

I would just like some thoughts on this.

[Supormom]

1. Loss of everything they hold near and dear.

Perhaps another depression like the 1930's? As long as they are comfortable most Americans won't care what happens to others less fortunate. We take too much for granted.

[x-g.o.p.er]

2. That's very true

[IrateCitizen]

8. I think people would then actually welcome totalitarian rule...

I'm serious. I think that if we had another Great Depression, with all of the unrest that would certainly result, a majority of Americans would actually either actively or passively support totalitarian rule.

[x-g.o.p.er]

12. I sadly agree.

If someone came along promising hope, a job, and some personal dignity back, people would flock to him/her.

Look at Germany in the 1930's.

[Warpy]

3. I've been telling the terminally stupid

...that Bush is a Connecticut preppie, a Harvard boy who never did a lick of real work in his whole life, and who is laughing at them for being such suckers and buying his cowboy act. It seems to be hitting them right in the gut, which is where most of them do their thinking.

People know this, it's in the back of their minds that Bush is a rich Ivy League elitist and a wastrel and a lying sack of crap. The problem lies in moving it right up front where they can't ignore it.

Dry facts won't do it for these folks. They rely on symbol rather than substance, fashion rather than fact. Ivy League college boys have always made them feel stupid. Tell them this one is really playing them for suckers, and see what happens.

[x-g.o.p.er]

7. The cynical reply...

Actually, my brother's reply, is that "Kerry has just as much blue blood as Bush does, and Kerry says whatever the hell he thinks people want to hear, so tell me again why they are different."

He's not a Republican, just a political atheist, I guess would be the best way to describe him. Can't stand any of it.

[Skidmore]

4. $5/gal gas in spite of US ownership of all oilfields

in the world.

[IrateCitizen]

5. Noam Chomsky discusses the phenomenon you just mentioned

He talks about the times he has tuned into sports talk stations on the radio. Some of the knowledge that people display about sports is simply AMAZING. And these aren't professionals, they're regular people who work regular jobs and go home at night to their families. But when it comes to sports, they can rattle off arcane facts and statistics like someone who actually gets paid to do so.

Ask many of these same people a question about politics or current events, and their eyes glaze over.

The primary reason that many people have disengaged from the system is that they see it as hopelessly corrupt. And you know what -- in its present form, it is. People here don't like to hear it, but the Democrats are almost as bad in this respect as the Republicans are. The Federal Government has consistently aided and abetted some of the worst offenders of corrupt practice, while actively standing in the way of attempts at true reform.

When you realize this, is it any WONDER that people become disgusted and disengage themselves? I mean, do you think that most people really thought Ken Lay deserved to keep his vacation homes (let alone his freedom) after bilking millions of people (it is that many when you count pension funds) of their hard-earned retirement savings?

Furthermore, something like only 10% of Congressional Districts are actually in play each year, thanks to Gerrymandered redistricting processes. Why should people vote when the outcome is preordained?

As time wore on after Vietnam and Watergate, people decided to retreat into their personal lives because they didn't feel that they could really make any difference with politics. With the situation being what it is, neither political party will advocate reform, because their top members are doing just fine as it is.

How do we then get people engaged so that we can demand such reform? I don't really know. It's difficult in today's culture, but the current events certainly present an opportunity, along with additional challenges. Due to the spectre of terrorism hovering over us, many people are so driven by their fear response that they're unwilling or unable to think reasonably about anything regarding public policy.

I wish I had an easy answer for you, but I don't think there is one to the question you ask.

[x-g.o.p.er]

10. Great analogy...

about the sports. I am a sports nut, too. I think with sports, at least for the most part, people can argue and disagree, but at the end of the day, it's just sports. People don't get as wound up discussing the Twins bullpen, and who should play, as they do over the Twins should get a new stadium.

I think a lot of it has to do with sports being viewed as apolitical. I wish people could have spirited discussions about politics like they do sports, but not spiral into the name-calling, etc., that politics has become. It's a major bummer.

[IrateCitizen]

14. I think you're missing it -- it's a PASSIVE DISTRACTION

When you're watching spectator sports, you're not doing anything -- you're just sitting there absorbing it all in.

The way that some people know so much about a passive activity says something about the way that it conditions people to get heavily invested in things they have no control over.

I have a brother-in-law who is like this, with the way he follows sports. Myself, I like to watch a bit of basketball or football or hockey (personally, I think watching baseball is like watching grass grow) -- but I don't obsess over it, nor do I schedule my life around it. The one possible exception might be the NCAA tourney, but that is only for a very limited part of the year.

[PfcHammer]

6. bet many WOULD cough up $5/gal n/t

[Dogmudgeon]

9. Gas at $15/gallon

Mass unemployment, over 40%.
Cost of food up by 500% with limited availability.
Rolling blackouts everywhere.
Mass evictions for unpaid rent.
Mass reposessions of homes for mortgage defaults.
Curfews. Limited (or not-so-limited) martial law.
Driving limitations, gasoline rationing.
Suspended elections.
Medical care essentially ends for over 60% of the population.
Abrupt climate change, leading to unbearably cold winters, with tens of thousands of deaths from the cold.
Revelations of staged terrorist attacks to bolster support for the government.
The emergence of political "Death Squads", religious maniacs killing physicians, and active "militias".
Organized crime takes over keeping local civic order.
Daily horror stories about wholesale death and destruction in other parts of the world, especially the "third world".
Universal draft by old-fashioned dragooning (kidnap into the military) of teenage boys.
Use of thermonuclear weapons in warfare.
Loss of hope.
No future.

--bkl

[x-g.o.p.er]

11. Good points...but

only if it happened to them or immediate family member.

[PfcHammer]

15. only AFTER FCC banned American Idol, reality tv shows n/t

[sangh0]

13. A pointed question might wake them up

"Do you think the US should establish a permanent military presence in Iraq, or should we pull out as soon as the Iraqis get back on their feet"?

http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=view_all&address=104x1352644

[maggrwaggr]

21. sorry, that question will make their eyes glaze over

most people just don't care about such things

[Karenina]

27. The Iraqis ARE "on their feet."

As hard as the U.S. military is trying to knock them down, they ARE "on their feet" rebelling against a power that has engineered their deaths in the HUNDREDS OF THOUSANDS. What will it take for American citizens to wake up and smell the coffee?

Well, if by the end of this week there could be no plausible deniability on reports of 500 AMERICAN SOLDIERS sent to the great beyond for G_d to sort out, perhaps the citizens of the occupying force would GET A CLUE.

It is SO GROTESQUE that it has come to that. This drip, drip water torture of "2 per day" doesn't even warrant a mention in the *corp controlled media. 500 in a 48 hr. period. FILM AT 11. This is the ONLY thing that would capture those warped short attention spans.
:cry: :puke: :cry: :puke: :cry:
:argh: :argh: :argh: :argh: :argh:

[ElsewheresDaughter]

16. we need to teach our YOUNG children in elementary school that THEY have

the power ....we need to teach them civics better...take them to townhall and town council meetings and school board meetings let them speak at these meetings about things that effect them...take them to the county court houses to view trials that are of interest to them...take them to work one day a month at a homeless shelter...make them work one day a month at the senior center or nursing home...take them with you when you deliver the meals on wheels ...empower them and teach them to speak truth to power...disscuss politics at the dinner table and in the car....read the papers with them talk aboput whats in the news....bring them to the polls with you when you go to vote and allow them to pull the lever...it works!

let the children know that they are important and what they do is of value to themselves and their community.

my kids are very active in the community...even if they are almost the only ones that are....they are instrumental in bringing other children into the process especially when it is an issue important to them....like lobbying for a skateboard park or computers in the youth center...

[IrateCitizen]

18. If you don't mind, I'll highlight the most important part of your post

my kids are very active in the community...even if they are almost the only ones that are....they are instrumental in bring other children into the process when it is an issue important to them....like lobbying for a skateboard park or computers in the youth center.

And by doing this, your kids are helping demonstrate to others that it IS possible to get things accomplished within "the system". You may not win all the time, but you CAN make a difference.

[x-g.o.p.er]

32. A glimmer of hope!!

I teach my kids cic\vics, also. What they get in school is horribly inadequate.

Thanks for putting a smile on my face...

[JPZenger]

17. Almost All Job Growth Was Part-Time Jobs

The Bush Administration has been rejoicing about an estimated 308,000 new jobs created last month. They are hoping no one looks at the numbers too closely.

Of the 308,000 new jobs, 300,000 were an increase in the number of persons with part-time jobs. These 300,000 are listed as persons who were seeking full-time work, but were only able to obtain part-time work.

A large part of the jobs increase was also because of the ending of the California grocery workers strike of 3 large chains of stores.

Here's a quote from the very end of the AP article:

"He noted that most of the increase was because of part-time workers. The number of people who worked part time for economic reasons rose to 4.7 million in March, up from 4.4 million the previous month."

[LDS Jock]

31. Now there is some info

that wasn't reported on the news. All I heard was 308,000 created. Yippee!!! Only took three and a half years for ANY to be created. And even then, the unemployment rate went up. Hmmm..

[tom_paine]

19. I don't know: something that hits them personally

A Draft?

I just don't know what can knock our collectively complacent countrymen & women out of their stupor.

Each of us? Communicating one person at a time? If anyone has any better ideas, I'd love to hear 'em!

(although as you can see, things like "a draft" is nothing we can help happen, so the one-person-at-a-time thing is the best we have that we can effect personally)

[x-g.o.p.er]

33. Something personal, yes...

a draft, no. Maybe if it was them or their child that got drafted. But a draft in and of itself would not do it...because American Idol is coming on.

[izzie]

20. That is what I hear more than any other thing. They are all crooks.

Interesting.

[kaitykaity]

22. A liberal radio network?

I have to have faith in the inherent intelligence and goodness of the American people as a group. I also think that enough credible Republicans have begun to smell the stink inside the White House and they are repulsed by it.

[x-g.o.p.er]

34. No one trusts the media...

be it left-slanted or right-slanted. My brother, who I use as my example, hardly ever watches the news, much less listen to talk radio. Besides, he's outside working all day. I would bet that he doesn't even know about Air America.

[outinforce]

23. Civility In Politics

It is just a guess on my part, but I would guess that a lot -- an awful lot -- of Americans are increasingly turned off by what they see in politics -- from both sides.

Because what I think the people you describe see is an increasing tendancy, on the part of both parties and both sides to any issue, to demonize the people on the other side.

Many people know personaaly other people who hold positions on political issues which are quite different from their own. They know that people who differ with them on the issues of the day are not "hate-filled" or any of the other names that activists like to use when describing people who hold points of view that differe from their own. Rather, a lots of people know that their friends who differ with them on political issues are good and decent people.

So when they hear suggestions that these good and decent people are somehow not good or not decent, they know that they are being lied to.

And I would guess that most Americans are smart and savvy enough to grasp the concept that if someone is lying to them about their friends, then the people doing the lying probably have some other agenda that they are concealing or lying about. I think a lot of Amercians would appreciate an honest and thorough discussion of the issues -- and not the rancid and rancerous politics of demonization that increasingly characterized not only what they see and hear in political advertizements and on TV and radio, but, sad to say, more and more on internet discussion websites.

[maggrwaggr]

24. many don't register to vote due to the jury duty thing

I live in LA County in So Cal. Since I registered to vote, I've been hit up three times for jury duty. This last time, I pleaded financial hardship because I work freelance and there's no freaking way I can do jury duty without it harming me and my family big-time.

Yet they're now telling me my request has been denied, that I MUST report for jury duty even though it might cost me thousands of dollars.

It fucking sucks, and most people that I know don't want to register to vote for this very reason.

If I worked a regular job I'd be happy to do jury duty, but I do not.

If they wanted to reimburse me my full day rate for jury duty, I'd be happy to do it too.

[Steely_Dan]

25. The Dilemma

This is an interesting discussion. I have often wondered why the American people didn't rise up and drag this man from the oval office. I am truly baffled why so many Americans don't seem to care one way or the other. I know that many feel impotent to effect change. And, it is true that it takes being effected personally before many will take action.

There is an additional dilemma that I see existing in our desire to see change. I have struggled with this for quite sometime. I have noticed that on many occasions, people from our political persuasion are faced with almost wanting things to go "bad" to help insure that people will be fed up and effect change. I'm torn between not wanting people to be hurt and/or damaged (further) and wanting things to get so bad that change "must" happen.

The other day on this board I saw someone post in the subject line: "Good news, unemployment is up." Of course, this is good for effecting change and having further ammunition against the Bush administration...but...

Does anyone else face this dilemma???

-Paige

[camero]

26. Total economic meltdown

People dying in the streets. Crime running rampant (by that I mean mass food riots). Even then some of the yuppies in gated communities will just ignore it.

[kelvinminus]

28. In theory, anything that kills nastily or often. In practice, nothing.

Why nothing?--because whatever it is would have to threaten the lives of everyone equally. Otherwise the rest of the population will easily dismiss the threat: they'll figure they're in the wrong lifestyle or demographic to take any sort of drastic action--I'll even be so cynical as to say there will be many on the right wing who'll think the lives threatened are expendable anyhow.

Problem is, no such threat seems possible to me. There'll always be safety for those who can afford it: just don't enlist, cancel your flights & buy duct tape, move to a community that's semi-shielded from crime/pollution/evil government propaganda in the schools. Even a strategy that only offers protection from danger, not immunity, will provide plenty of grounds for distraction from & denial about the overall threat.

Now, if the earth could crash into the sun in a way that is obviously our corrupt society's fault, then perhaps...

[Imalittleteapot]

29. Until they are personally hit by loss of job, loss of

civil rights, loss of breathable air and water, etc. they will not give a darn. What's happening to the people in their world, in their country, in their state, in their city, in their neighborhood, matters not, as long as they don't see it and it doesn't affect them personally.

[rumguy]

30. a couple shots of really good whiskey