A Movement of Many

Madame:

Thank you for the good wishes.  I am back in whatever form readers feel I usually am (top, middle, askew, sideways, curmudgeonly?).  But I too shared the frustration of having the time to read and think—and having the physical disposition to do neither.

I am following a bit better what you mean on use of pioneer/frontier thought in American political speech.  Some work has been done, although primarily in relation to the notion of American exceptionalism (and its corresponding historical antecedent of “manifest destiny,”  or, as others would put it, American imperialism).  Richard Etulain did an examination in the 1990s.  James Ceaser (yes, that is spelled correctly) also had a relatively recent piece in the American Political Thought journal.  The Frontier Lab is an organization actively promoting such talk in the political lexicon (and founded long after Kennedy’s New Frontier vision, by the way).  Slatta’s work last decade on rugged individualism and how it is popularized in our culture and speech (and how we resist its questioning) may also have relevance in comparisons of frontier violence, rugged individualized justice, etc. and our mass shootings recurrences.   However, I’m not well-versed enough to know how extensive any work is, or what the present state (if any) of academic research is on the focus area you have outlined.  Your questions are pertinent.  Attention PhD prospects!  A possible dissertation thesis!

“Army of one” was a typical Army screwup.  It was supposed to be “Army of ONE,” meaning Officer, NCO, Enlisted, the three types of soldiers, but that was lost quickly, and even if it had remained, would still have confused the potential recruit (who would have presumably had little or no understanding of all that).  

Your words on the effects of isolation—and the implications—describe well the travails of our hyper-individualized society.   Those who are intense Facebook-philes mayhap should take heed.  Isolation and hyper individualism are also major contributing factors to the confirmation bias you note.

Your thoughts on the millenials: Let’s hope that is both the good trend and the results of that trend.  I like that gradual transformation better than the one that has been necessary to effect too many past transformations: calamity/tragedy/suffering.

How to avoid groupthink and rigid conformity in the achieving, you ask?  Perhaps we should look to the elves of fantasy (and possibly their real-life inspirations, the Finns) to see how to have both individual freedom and yet a sense of communal responsibility.

I am as hopeful as you that the trend toward smaller and more sustainable is long-lasting.  A question: What will all the industries—housing, mortgage, furnishing, remodeling, etc.—do when their prey are both no longer abundant and unwilling to expose themselves?

If those industries’ greed—or rather the results of their greed—end up hoisting them on their own petards, lovers of poetic justice may rejoice.

Of course, that doesn’t address what has—in many respects of the word—already been effectively stolen…