www.imdb.com/title/tt0093...

I seem to keep recommending "Democracy for Realists." The book has several good examples of how people's beliefs and perceptions are the results of their partisan affilitions and not the causes. The analyses in the book are consistent with what you are saying in this thread.

For example, if a set of voters describe themselves nonideologically but regularly vote GOP, is their self-description (standing alone) really that useful in understanding how those voters think?

It seems to me that there are good reasons not to take people's self-descriptions at face value and why doing so may obscure more than it reveals.

If a set of voters describe themselves in nonideological terms but consistently vote for one of the major parties, should we say that they are nonideological? Or that their ideology is revealed in their voting behavior? Or that there is a mismatch between self-description and voting behavior?

That's how I look at things when I am feeling pessimistic. People will read less and less; they will outsource their thinking more and more. Such a world seems appalling to those of us stuck in the past, but for newer generations it will seem natural and good. But I don't always feel so pessimistic.

So those of us in love with books and a literary culture are, perhaps, just stuck in a past that was already dying by the time we were born. The world of social media and AI seems like an immeasurably worse future for us, the way that TV seemed like a monstrous future to Bowles.

What strikes me is the idea that in times of rapid social and technological change, people are constantly left stranded on islands of the past. Their worlds are constantly being overtaken by the inexorable transformations of time and technology. All they retain is a pitiful nostalgia.

"that people in my generation will think are great and wonderful. Perhaps people born in 1975 will think otherwise. I mean, people born in 1950 think television is great."

"the future will be immeasurable worse than the future that we can see. Naturally" When the interviewers asks if he is a pessimist, Bowles responds, "You can hope for anything, of course. I expect enormous things to happen in the future, but I don't think they'll be things. . ."

"--and in most respects it has--but that's meaningless. What does one mean when one says that things are getting worse? It's becoming more like the future, that's all. It's just moving ahead. The future will be infinitely 'worse' than the present; and in that future. . ."

He says: "I don't think it will ever be put right; but then again, I never expect anything to be put right. Nothing ever is. Things go on and become other things. The whole character of the country has changed beyond recognition since my childhood. One always thinks everything's got worse. . ."

This is what makes the fight so difficult. We are not just trying to hold the line on reading books in school; we are facing all of the cultural forces telling people that reading and all of the habits it inculcates are no longer important, that they are obsolete and not worth preserving.

In many important ways, the anti-literature push in education is downstream of the anti-literature trend in the larger culture. Literature, reading, and book culture are no longer a central part of society. They have been pushed aside by film, TV, the internet, and now AI.

Death Bar

One take-away message of "Democracy for Realists" is that such people tend to vote based on how well the economy has performed in the two quarters before an election and tend to use their vote to punish the ruling party when times are bad. These voters are not easily reached through "messaging."

It's all magical thinking and denial of reality. "Your answer sounds too difficult and certain, so I will pretend there is an easier and more definitive solution." I think people don't know enough history, or else they would realize that winning elections is preferable to other possibilities.

The other logical mistake is to think that the choice to revolt was one that could be taken at only one time. As the colonies continued to grow in population, expand in territory, and develop economically, the same pressures that led to independence would have only increased.