11i The Deterioration of America

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11i  The Deterioration of America Update 25 September 2021.

The reader's reaction to the chapter title might well be “The deterioration of the writer!” (i.e., another case of senile nostalgia for "old, good days.") Well, maybe? As an American, a New Yorker, a Bronxite, my memory goes back to 1940. Also I have a culture comparison as I am expert at living in Japan on and off since 1954 and have visited many cultures and nations. Plus I am well read on history and future u- and dys-topias.

The above don't (sic) make me right and you wrong; but it do (sic) dispel the dismissal of my view as merely senile nostalgia.

That I am going to badmouth U.S.A.!  I am aware it is still  one of the best places to live in and it remains a metaphoric and literal pot of gold for immigrants. 

In judging a society or nation or culture over 80+ years of one’s life, and in longer range and place based on travel, history and literature, one has to control for the evolution of behavior and the advance of technology. Average human life in advanced industrial society now is happier and healthier than in previous generations because thanks to science we live longer, have more leisure, and more things to do in our leisure. The USA and many countries are more equal-treating especially for colored race, ethnic minority, disabled person and the outlier in sexuality. This is a trend that derives from Ancient Greece through the fifteenth century Renaissance and eighteenth century Enlightenment and into nineteenth and twentieth century techno revolution. I do not credit a particular country though I do credit particular movements like anti-slavery and women's suffrage. It is part of evolution of culture. Controlling for those factors, when I look at USA today compared to 1945, I see deterioration; it is a nation increasingly dysfunctional.  And - Wow! - Ugly as atheist Hell must be!

                   But hold on! I am probably prejudiced because I'm an American who has seen how good it has been and could be and can be. What really has been happening in the world are 2 confusing things. First a tremendous improvement in standards of living and ways of life due to science and computers. But secondly, a deterioration of the people's overall culture much of which is due to overpopulation. It's a complex question that I simply allude to here and allow readers to make their own decisions about what kind of society they prefer.  But I will touch on a few aspects now.

Population: In 1945 the US population just topped 130-million; in 2007 it passed 300-million. At that rate, it will triple by 2035. Venture capitalists who always admire growth may cheer but any hands-on experience of a few days real living on the streets in big cities like New York, comparing my 1945 recall to my reality there in 2021, shows that despite technological advances there has been an overall increase in breakdown of normal services – education, postal, police, sanitation – and an unpleasant gross excess of human bodies at any time of day. And keep in mind the increase in human flesh is not high IQ; so in relative terms, the human intelligence has dropped. And, again Ugly! And you see it starting with leadership, e.g., Donald Trump vs FDR.

The masses are about as intelligent as they were in 1945 but what is most obvious  is that today, the intellectual elite has sunk to the level of the masses. Where are the great political commentators like the Walter Lippmans, the high class critics like H.L. Mencken? Where are the great novelists like Hemingway, Faulkner, Steinbeck? Where are the original dramas of an Eugene O'Neill and the delightfully dialoged movies of a Preston Sturges or an Ernst Lubitsch? Where is the great cubist art of a Picasso or the abstract art of a Jackson Pollack? Where are the heros (sic) of yesteryear? Like the mountain snows, like the forest grapes; the heros (sic) are lost – lost somewhere in pages of the dictionary between “heroin” and "herpes."

The Dumbing Down of America is a phrase from the 1960's. As its words suggest it means the process by which the USA population gets less and less smart so that, eventually, we reach the famous Generation of Dunces also called the Comic Book Generation. (Cf. The Marching Morons!). Due to a combination of intelligent people not having children, and excessive breeding by less intelligent people (The Kallikaks!)  the world has become full of morons, with the exception of an elite few who work slavishly to keep order.
In the real world, I, Dr Edward, here in Yokohama, am in the unique position of being lucky enough to be still alive with my full set of marbles despite having been born in 1933 and I AM LUCKY to be blessed with a memory of my experiences starting from 1940 at age 7. And a further unusual fact about me is that at the rather advanced age of 88 now, an age at which most humans are close to or at the nursing home, I remain sharp and in fact I am smarter today than I was; the reason being that, thanks to following http://physiciansnotebook.blogspot.com, and http://adventuresofkimi.blogspot.com, I continue both to have a healthy brain and also continue to add knowledge to that brain by an idiot-savant-like obsessive reading program combined with an intense curiosity about everyone and everything.
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Then what about standards of beauty? Take female beauty: cf. the ugly Kim Kardashian and the fetish with big siliconed tits (women’s breast,  vulgar). Reminds me of a joke by the late US comedian, Lennie Bruce, where he says "She was wearing a see-through sweater you wished you couldn't see through" That is how I feel when I look at the photographs of all the prominent women who want to show their bare breasts to the world. Kind of a vague disgust at the stupidity and the un-esthetic view.

  Dumbsville USA, I call it. But for most of you who grew up in it, today's action all seems normal because you never had it so good. Many of you are living off inherited or insurance money from the previous generations, and the rich economy in USA is from financing the wars and selling the weapons of mass destruction that American propaganda falsely claims are in the hands of those we invade. "War is a Racket" after all.
  Well, global overheating (And, now, Covid-19!) is going to (and now is) have one good effect: It may clear the way for Science-Civilization, and I hope that happens as soon as possible and as non violently as possible. Although I won't be around to see it, I hope my one small voice will help guide it.

           END  OF  CHAPTER. For next click 11j The Future/What Can You Do/Final Words/End of...