#42: False Divisions in the US, Why They Exist and How SCI Helps to Unite Society
The US appears to be more divided than at any time since the Civil War. However, unlike the Civil War era, today’s divisions largely are caused by public deception. In his Farewell Address, President George Washington warned that vested interests would use public deception and political parties to divide society, control government and concentrate public wealth. This has occurred strongly since the 1980s. Today’s public divisions largely are false in the sense that they would not exist if citizens had full, accurate information.
Deceptive media and other flawed systems drive public deception and division. Improving these systems is essential for uniting citizens and empowering them to work together on their many common interests. This post discusses how flawed systems falsely divide society and how System Change Investing (SCI) can help to unite it.
Real Versus False Divisions
Before and during the Civil War, the US was divided by a real issue – supporting versus opposing slavery. However today, most societal divisions are based on public deception, for example, by misleading citizens into focusing on smaller problems and ignoring larger ones.
Real divisions exist on issues like abortion. But citizens agree on most major issues. To illustrate, nearly all people want a strong economy, good jobs, a clean environment, good education and healthcare, low crime, healthy communities, strong international relations, and efficient, effective government.
Some might say that people agree on these higher goals, but not on the means to achieve them. However, this also largely is a deception. If citizens had accurate information about the systemic factors shaping society, they would realize they also largely agree on how to achieve goals.
Why False Divisions Exist
Strong divisions between Republicans and Democrats, or conservatives and liberals, did not materialize overnight. They've been developing for nearly 40 years. Prior to the 1980s, Republican and Democratic politicians often put country ahead of party and worked together. Political discussions frequently were respectful. Today, they regularly divide communities and even families.
Many systemic factors cause these divisions. Three of the most important are deceptive media, suppression of critical thinking, and declining quality of life.
Deceptive Media. The most destructive incidence of deregulation over the past 40 years probably was the removal of the Fairness Doctrine in 1987. This drove public division and made it more difficult to resolve nearly all problems (thus making it a highly destructive form of deregulation).
Under the Fairness Doctrine, major media was required to present both sides of controversial issues. If a media announcer made a factually incorrect or illogical claim, experts illuminated this on rebuttal. This compelled honest, dignified, respectful media. After 1987, media could make inaccurate, inflammatory claims (i.e. lie) without rebuttal.
Since then, divisive media routinely blamed problems on the other major political party. Nearly 40 years of this vitriol created disdain and often hatred for people on the other side. Conservative media, for example, routinely made false claims, such as liberals want communism, Marxism, high taxes, big government, burdensome regulations and unrestricted immigration. But when asked, virtually all liberals say they don't want these things.
Liberal media and commentators also make false or misleading claims, for example, by saying that conservatives want to destroy or at least not protect the environment. Yet when asked, virtually all conservatives say they don't want to harm the life support systems that enable their families, the economy and society to exist.
Deceptive, unaccountable media also misleads and divides citizens by making dishonest arguments. For example, they routinely provide evidence that supports their positions, but fail to disclose facts that oppose them. People are misled into supporting positions that they often would oppose if they had full information.
Immigration provides a good example of public deception. Republicans sometime say that Democrats have an open-door immigration policy, implying that anyone is allowed to enter the US. This irrational, inflammatory position distracts citizens from the facts. In reality, essentially all Republicans and Democrats agree that immigration should be restricted and illegal immigration prohibited. An honest discussion would reveal that many aspects of both parties’ programs are similar (e.g. border security, screening entrants). It also would discuss the numerous benefits of immigration and the fact that nearly everyone in the US is an immigrant or descended from them.
As noted, a main strategy for falsely dividing the public is to mislead citizens into focusing on smaller problems and ignoring larger ones. To illustrate, conservative media often blames high taxes and reduced quality of life on immigration and social welfare programs. However, plutocracy (control of government by the wealthy) and corporate welfare (unfair transfer of public wealth to the top of society) have vastly greater impacts on taxes and quality of life.
Campaign finance laws and other system flaws enable the wealthy to control government and concentrate public wealth. If Republicans and Democrats better understood this, they could effectively work together (i.e. effective democracy) to prevent it. Vested interests block this society-enhancing action by falsely dividing society.
Public division and resulting wealth concentration have benefitted vested interests. But unfairly extracting wealth from society is not sustainable. Given rapidly growing problems, we likely already are in a phase of system transition. System collapse would greatly harm vested interests. They now are better off promoting rather than blocking systemic changes that ensure fair use of public wealth.
Critical thinking. This essential-for-democracy quality has been strongly suppressed by education reform since the 1980s, for example, by reducing liberal arts and expanding standardized testing and curriculums. Analyzing complex, often intangible concepts (as routinely occurs in liberal arts) strengthens critical thinking. Standardized testing frequently emphasizes memorization instead of critical evaluation.
Quality of life. Over the past 40 years, nearly all stock market and economic growth has been concentrated at the top of society, while inflation-adjusted wages remained nearly flat. As a result, today's young people are the first generation in US history that will be worse off financially than their parents.
These and other factors caused financial stress for millions of citizens, suppressed their ability to critically evaluate commentary and problems, and misled them into attacking false enemies (the other party). Suffering, misled citizens are highly vulnerable to deception and division.
Largely false divisions have severely degraded society. They make citizens unable to effectively address major problems, such as environmental degradation, concentration of wealth, and loss of democracy.
Uniting Citizens
Uniting and empowering citizens is one of the most important actions needed to resolve major challenges and ensure a thriving democracy over the long term. Democracy cannot exist if people are misled and falsely divided.
During the Constitutional Convention of 1787, delegates faced real divisions, mainly large versus small states and slave versus free states. However, they put the well-being of the nation before special interests, compromised, and produced one of the most successful countries in human history.
The US and rest of global society face growing environmental, social, economic and political challenges. To resolve them, we must emulate the US Founders. We must respect differences and find ways to work together on our vast common interests.
System Change Investing
The corporate and financial sectors have strong ability to improve the flawed systems that falsely divide and disempower citizens. Through advertising and media ownership, they can compel media to tell the truth and unite citizens. Through lobbying and campaign finance, they can influence government to drive essential systemic changes, such as requiring honest media, fairly using the public wealth, and implementing empowering education that teaches critical thinking.
SCI uses the capital markets to engage companies in these and many other systemic changes. Companies are rated on their efforts to support or block system change. Shifting investments to system change leaders incentivizes companies to drive system change. It also provides extensive financial and competitive benefits to investors and companies.
For more information about SCI, visit our website SystemChangeInvesting.com or contact us at info@SystemChangeInvesting.com
Beyond falsely dividing society, flawed systems also largely are responsible for recent US election results, as discussed here.
