Our only hope.
I’ve long been attempting to reconcile the dissonance between the steep curve of progress I know that we currently enjoy by all sensible metrics (life expectancy, poverty rates, violence etc.) on one hand, and the descent into ever-more sensationalistic tabloid idiocy, anti-intellectual populism, and other forms of dumbed-down cultural regression on the other.
This election result shows that this is more than a curious paradox. The divisions are not just ideological, not just red-team vs blue-team; there is a real and important struggle going on here. The intellectuals of the GOP have been sidelined by an anti-establishment candidate who has brought this dichotomy into sharp relief: this is a fight between ignorance vs reason, between domination and entitlement vs understanding and equality, between fear vs compassion.
In a world where things are almost always more complicated and nuanced than a black-or-white simplistic narrative would have us oh-so-ironically believe, this struggle is about as close to good versus evil as you can get. Not this election, nor the candidates themselves, mind you, but the underlying truth of what’s in people hearts and minds.
Today evil has won out over that which is good. No band-aid symptomatic attempts at remedy will fix this — the underlying problems need to be addressed.
The progressive agenda needs to take a more long-term and strategic approach. We need to teach the next generation to think critically, to understand and reason, to become engaged with culture, science, philosophy and politics. These domains cannot be the indulgences of academics and elites, they need to be part of our mainstream school system and part of every child’s cultural experience and social contract.
We need to set kids’ minds on fire with curiosity so that they grow up wanting to know the truth of things instead of convenient lies that satisfy animalistic and emotional prejudices.
We must change our education system to teach children how to think independently. In an increasingly volatile and uncertain future, it’s our only hope.