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September 27, 2023

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Christopher Rufo, Douglas Murray, and Victor Davis Hanson have all pointed out that we are in the middle of a cultural revolution that is assailing our culture, values, traditions, and institutions, our national security and sovereignty, our economy, our Constitution and rule of law, and our overall quality of life. The percentage of Americans saying they are worse off is at its highest level since 2009.

One of the most fascinating aspects of this obvious decline is that leftists have managed to convince a very large portion (in many cases a majority) of Americans to support the divisive and corrosive policies producing their own destruction.

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What arguments have leftists used to accomplish this? Chiefly, though not exclusively, they have employed a trifecta of completely nonsensical tropes about race, gender, and climate. If you had explained to the typical American a half-century ago that, by the 2020s, America would be undergoing a fundamental transformation driven by new realizations about multiple genders, deep-seated and pervasive white supremacy, and a world literally close to incinerating, he likely would have laughed in your face. The absurdity of it would still be laughable if it weren’t so successful and damaging.

So how did it succeed? Rufo, Murray, and Hanson have done excellent work in explaining the history, concepts, and motivations behind the left’s long march through the institutions to the current revolution, from Marcuse through Bell. But there may be something more fundamental, and that’s how the revolutionaries communicated their message. That may help explain how they could get such a large portion of Americans to support such ludicrous policies (or at least vote for the people who do) and why it has accelerated so significantly in just the last few years.

Image: Smartphone by pch.vector (edited).

When you think about it, this degree of success with such silly predicates can be achieved only by meeting a couple of critical requirements. First, you need most people to be dependent on a single medium/format for the bulk of their information. Second, you need significant control of that medium’s content.

Over-reliance on a single medium makes people more vulnerable to manipulation. This may be why cyberbullying disproportionately affects adolescents and teens who “live” on their smartphones. Furthermore, research shows that when competing channels or media exist—such as strong parent-child relationships—cyberbullying is less prevalent.

After the failed 2002 coup in Venezuela, President Hugo Chavez quickly shut down private media and replaced them with state-run media. This may help explain why, despite almost single-handedly destroying one of the most thriving South American economies and societies in existence, his popularity was near its zenith (57% approval) in his last year in office.

On a personal level, part of why my own family in World War II Germany knew that the Nazi propaganda was exactly that was because they had access to a shortwave radio. With a sentry posted at the window to watch for Brownshirts, they could listen to the BBC for brief periods. The rest of the population was not as fortunate.