There are many similar videos about the problems in Portland and elsewhere. For an outsider who doesn't even live in the US, it isn't easy to draw general conclusions apart from the obvious ones. For example, the political will to mitigate the problem seems ambivalent at best.
3 comments:
There is a spectrum of reasons behind this. Some genuinely destructive people just want to destroy civilisation and anything that works; that includes both the homeless drug-takers and those who have the same nihilistic attitudes but are more politically articulate. Then there is a group, inspired by Marx, who believe that social problems need to be exacerbated in order to bring capitalism down. And lastly the soppy types: the liberal do-gooders who are too soft-hearted to say no, and are wealthy enough to escape the consequences of social experiments like this.
Hopefully the last group can learn from their mistakes, and the media can help in educating them.
It's interesting how the United States can be seen as a vast experiment where different states implement different state policies - and the consequences can be demonstrated.
Now there are many confounding factors but it seems to me that states and cities that have been heralded as 'progressive' are collapsing - people are moving away, businesses are relocating, tax revenues are falling, crime is escalating, the lunatics are in charge.
Do we know recognise the 'worked example' as proving that extreme progressive views are corrosive and corrupting? Or are there some who still maintain that progressivism will work if only it was done properly?
Sam - I often wonder if there is also a group which thinks there is no solution apart from containment within known locations. Within those locations, the problem will solve itself in that it is out of sight and its inhabitants won't live long now fentanyl is available.
DJ - I'd say the latter explanation is far more likely among progressives - progressivism will work if only it is done properly. Like communism, its apologists say it has never been tried properly.
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