America’s 21st Century Civil War Has Begun
How can we achieve a swift and peaceful resolution? First, by understanding the problem.
Wednesday, February 26th, 2025
As many of you know, I’m in the middle of a divorce. As such, you can imagine I am currently quite familiar with how relationships fail. And — of course — the various algorithms that rule our social media feeds have also discovered my “getting divorced status” sending me an endless supply of “divorce related” content. One video shows up frequently with these super simple messages:
“The problem is the problem. Not the other person.”
“If you fight the other person, and try to make him or her wrong, you won’t solve the problem at all, and you will destroy the relationship, in the end.”
To me, these two messages are very, very obvious. I spent close to three decades in a relationship where all I wanted was to identify the challenges, evaluate our options, consider the pros and cons, do trial periods for various potential solutions until we found one that we both liked best, and then celebrate our mutual success resolving a conflict or overcoming a hurdle!
Sadly, that wasn’t the way things went. And so, our relationship failed. But, who cares? We’re just two people, and we’ll both move on, because we’re blessed to be American Citizens living in the United States of America.
FAR more concerning is what I’m watching happen on the national level.
When 74,999,166 Americans become convinced to deeply distrust, utterly disrespect, and even hate 80,343,917 other Americans — this is what a CIVIL WAR LOOKS LIKE.
When the Democratic Party creates Presidential Ads showing two wives intentionally lying to their husbands about how they voted, while winking conspiratorially at one another while leaving the polling station — that is CIVIL WAR PROPAGANDA.
When 74,999,166 Americans distrust and have no confidence in 80,343,917 other Americans, causing them to avoid or end friendships and family relationships — this is what a CIVIL SOCIETY FALLING APART LOOKS LIKE.
When 74,999,166 Americans lack diplomatic skills or ingrained civility, and they give up all pretences to common decency and respect — this is THE DISCORD THAT A CIVIL WAR FEEDS UPON.
A Civil War is basically a DIVORCE, on a national scale.
It’s a failure of the people and their elected leaders, when it comes to the art and discipline of statescraft, as a means of engaging in productive conversations yielding acceptable compromises allowing society to work together on projects pertaining to the common good.
What causes our nation’s greater than 50% divorce rate? I’m not sure, but that divorce rate suggests over 50% of our citizens ALSO don’t know how to protect, manage, grow and maintaing their other relationships. Including that of co-citizenry.
COVID was an excellent example of our national fragility, with families fracturing down the middle, bits and pieces ricocceting across society — including, but not limited to, “divorces” amongst siblings, parents and children, friends, lovers, employers and employees, co-workers, and even parents who refuse to allow their children to play with the children of families from the “other side of the ideological railroad tracks.” (Yes! I saw a LOT of this, on my own island, during Covid.)
As an aside, I have to say, “forcing children to not be friends” is a tragic return to the deeply divided southern states during the Jim Crow Era. Yet, are the “loud and proud” Democratic Party, Liberal, Progressive zealots of today able to see this? If so, they should try to correct course, because this intolerance is a stark reminder of the Democratic Party’s close affiliation with the KKK of olden days. A reminder that political parties are an outgrowth of the people of the day, which is why deeply racist Southern States where the staunch homeland of the Democratic Party, while Republicans were often beaten and driven out of town for their anti-racist views. But, I digress…
Additionally — Civil Wars Depend On Ignorance
How is it that so many people have never learned how to
(1) debate/discuss an issue for the sake of finding a solution or
(2) arrive at a compromise?
Could it be that we don’t teach these skills in school?
And, yes — my son was on the debate team, so stop yourself right there if you’re going to start lecturing me on the topic. I was one of the parents who volunteered at Debate Competitions, even judging a few! Modern “debate teams” are creeply, to be honest. They’re in a mad race against time, which prevents any real exchange of ideas. And, they only listen to their opponent for the express purpose of weaponizing what’s mentioned. It’s a sham and a paltry, absolutely failed attempt to come anywhere close to the concept of VALUABLE DEBATE, much less the ART of DIPLOMACY.
Is this being done to us on purpose? Probably!
Could our national, collective ineptitude (with its resulting high divorce rates and crumbling national cohesion) be intentional? Yes. In fact, there is plenty of evidence for nefarious forces being at work in America, seeking to turn us against one another.
As I am a Red Pill living in a Blue Bottle, I see the behavior of “liberals under attack” far more than I personally witness “conservatives under attack.” There are simply very few conservatives in my area! So, let me be clear, I’m 100% confident there is extremism on both sides of the political divide.
But, today I’ll speak to what I see, witness & experience, which is this:
The extremism of people inundated with “Blue Pill Messaging” is created on purpose with an endless campaign of fear and hate-mongering narratives designed to turn people into anxious, quivering, raging, desperate, and “sky is falling” Chicken Littles genetically engineered with “grab your torch and pitchforks” cartoon DNA.
Unfortunately, people are not cartoons, and riled up crowds are very real and very dangerous!
In one century, they’ll stone a woman to death, in another they’ll behead thousands, in another they’ll lynch an innocent man, in another they’ll massacre a tribe fleeing northward into Canada, and in another they’ll lock up entire families for years because of their skin color, culture, and beliefs. Add WARTIME to the mix, and you’ve got a recipe for all the tragedies ever known to mankind.
What do we do about that?
I grew up in the Sesame Street Era, and with the help of the Muppets and Mr. Rogers, I learned a lot about listening to other people and coming up with a solution everyone could be happy with. Of course, for this to work, the other person needs to also want to compromise or cooperate! And for that to happen, we usually need the “mutual listening,” because the exchange of information leads to changed views and opinions plus more empathy and kind friendship, making it easier to compromise as we intrinically WANT to help the other person as much as ourselves.
Unfortunately, listening and compromise are rapidly diminishing skills.
Consider the following three images (Original Post, My Comment, and a Reply).
Here’s a woman saying:
“Don’t worry! We can hold our nation together, even if that boogey man in the White House is causing trouble, WE are strong enough to persevere and keep America’s social contract intact! We, we, we!”
But, then she gets something other than a “yes, yes, I agree” comment, and she instantly moves into:
(1) Name Calling & Labeling
(2) Derogatory personal attacks
(3) Uses favorite invalidating term of the century “Conspiracy Theorist”
(4) Puts words in other people’s mouths
(5) Diminishes other person’s concerns
(6) Invalidation 101
In other words, we aren’t managing to maintain the social contract, even in incredibly easy and safe “social media” environments like Facebook — so, what hope do we have of seeing anything better at the top of the power pyramid?
More to come…
Matthew 5:9
New International Version
9 Blessed are the peacemakers,
for they will be called children of God.
Matthew 5:9
The Message
9 “You’re blessed when you can show people how to cooperate instead of compete or fight. That’s when you discover who you really are, and your place in God’s family.