Culture Clash – America’s Fall to Authoritarianism

“Danger! Danger Will Robinson! Danger!”—if you are a science fiction fan or popular culture nerd—you know this line is from the Robot of “Lost in Space” 1960s television (later 1998 movie), whenever Will Robinson was in danger. The United States of America, at this moment, is in such a state. A crisis that only an arm flailing, over the top, globe headed, yelling robot may get the attention of the American citizenry writ- large to take action.

The mass movement of populism has the American public hyper vigilant swing arms wildly at the institutions of a judiciary, executive, and legislative bodies of government. And, now the waves of populism are swelling against the fourth pillar of democracy— the Media. Almost every day, there is a new allegation of the media doing wrong or some story that is faked by the media.

Unfortunately, for the citizenry of the United States, a portion of the population is irrevocably lost in chaotic emotion about the fourth pillar. Both sides of the aisle are stewing in their stubbornness of partisanship. Neither willing to concede to other’s perspective or willing to acknowledge the value of the other’s experience, while

obfuscating through the media hipster, spinster, and provocateurs that only view that is correct is theirs.

The medium of the media exponentially perpetuate the public’s emotions and technology only amplifies chaotic of populism and culture. As Marshall McLuhan argues in his book, ”The Medium is the Massage: An Inventory of Effects” that,

“All media work us over completely. They are so pervasive in their personal, political, economic, aesthetic, psychological, moral, ethical, and social consequences that they leave no part of us untouched, unaffected, unaltered.” [p. 26]

Thus, the continual nature of media, including the materialistic items from our clothing on up, impacts the human condition and all our senses. This is McLuhan argument in a nutshell, which he proffered in 1967. Now fast forward this is argument to the 21st century and how the 24-hour news cycle, the Interwebs, and cable television informs the Western-American experience, and, how one can perceive as well as understand the cultural ennui that compounds the public sense of loss and purpose.

The 2015 primaries and 2016 election cycle in the United States demonstrates how the oversaturation of Media both over and underestimates the impact of an individual within the currents of history. The election of the current President of the United States amplifies this argument and illustrates how an individual can shape the populism of the masses into a hyperbolic base and corrupt the rationality of civility. The venality of civility distorts partisanship and disenfranchises so that the “center cannot hold” together the extremes. Basically, the loss of rationality has begotten a deeper age of selfishness and grievance. And yet—the election of 2016 brought new found energy, intensity, and urgency that can only bring the clash of two cultures together at once—one being of authoritarianism and the other being popular civil evolution, which advances human rights.

The cultural ennui that brought the forces of authoritarianism to bear witness with the election of a president that states emphatically the only “he can fix” the wrongs and that only “he tells the truth” has a certain portion of the public ceding their rights to a narcissistic messiah. Checking out of rationality and reaching with an unfettered emotion of a two-year, their messiah, allows his portion of the public to believe that the main-stream-media (MSM) is becoming or has become the “enemy of the people.” His distorted belief chips away at the very pillar of the democracy that they want to protect.

Nonetheless, for those who want to evolve civilization to the better nature of our angels, the cultural ennui that besets their boredom, now energizes them to participate in the election of the president. They too, however, are racked with over- the-top frenetic emotion, and, believe that MSM became the propaganda machine or an arm of the current president. This distorted view hinders discussions and the furthering development of the human conditions.

The Media, or at least portion of it, is waking up to the frivolity of the president’s administration but needs to do better job of informing the public writ- large so that our democracy endures.

But alas, the authoritarian nature that is purveying through the current president’s administration has our republic faltering (even after 25 days). And, the attacks on the fourth pillar makes it more difficult to maintain the democracy that is America. The administration requirement of loyalty at all cost besieges freedom and installs betrayal. The two extremes are clashing. Clashing are the cultures of freedom and authority. Clashing is the mediums. Clashing are the massaging messaging (McLuhan), which inundates the public class and corrupts the elite. Yes, the United States of America fall towards authoritarianism clashes with core values, ethos, mythos of America, and, whether we survive as a nations determines whether those core beliefs are stronger than the mass populism and self-loathing that has insinuated its way into the public forum.