103 reasons we* are doomed in America (and I fear for other democratic countries, too.
(For the optimists out there, please give me your 103 reasons we are not doomed! Specific to America, not things like "the sun", "the earth", etc. ) Bless the optimists...
After the first ten, the list is random.
1. Capitalism - it just isn't sustainable in any way, but boy does it lead to a lot of great stuff and some really scary stuff. And way too much trash and waste. (Which totally relates to number 2 and 3 below which are certainly the most scary outcomes of capitalism.)
2. Climate Change (ocean rise, glaciers melting, heat, cold, flood, droughts, stronger hurricanes, more intense fires, et. al. and refugees in the tens of millions)
3. The rise of the AI - 3. massive disruption and we are not aligned! (This is totally integrated with #1 and should probably be in the #2 position now since Chat GPT 4 came out.)
4. Supreme Court is going down - particularly that the Republicans stole a seat (and also stole about 50 appellate court seats) [edited to add - and another one]
5. The electoral college
6. Gerrymandering brought by the right (and occasionally the left)
7. Congress: particularly the Republicans refusal to compromise on most everything important
8. Trump/Republicans and the fact that so many Americans - about 43% - think Trump is great
9. The coming refugee crisis (as if the one that exists isn't already very bad) as climate change forces migration
10. Voter suppression efforts of the right
11. Most people thinking they have the truth and do not want compromise - left and right
12. Fake news - left and right (and see #23)
13. The internet: GAFA (google, amazon, Facebook, apple) - the dystopian future described in sci-fi works has arrived - the death of privacy, the rise of social media bullying, easy-as-pie mass surveillance, deepfakes, hacking - Russian and malicious, malware, ransomware, ad nauseam.
14. Seeing the past through today's eyes - this is particularly strong tendency on the left. The logic of this will lead us to reject every single person in the past for being "not woke". This thoughtless ahistorical perspective warps the entire past and, more so, the present.
15. Overuse of toxic chemicals like pesticides - and they are everywhere
16. Big pharma
17. NIMBYs
18. Death of public education as we used to know it
19. Bail, traffic tickets, payday loans, parking ticket/impound, lack of access to inexpensive food, decent housing, health care, etc. for poor people - which helps to keep them poor.
20. Fear of black people, particularly black men - which has warped our criminal justice system. A very significant portion of black Americans who are incarcerated are there because of prosecutorial misconduct and mistaken identity.
21. Prisons in America - way too many people incarcerated, way too little rehabilitation
22. College debt
23. Stupidity - remember 100 is the average on IQ tests.
24. Tribalism left and right
25. Guns and gun laws
26. Planned obsolescence
27. Consumerism
28. Smart phones being way too important in too many people's lives
29. Household debt - there is more than there was before the 2008 crash.
30. The increasing threat of violence, right and left
32. The criminal justice system is really the criminal injustice system where truth and fairness take a decided back seat to prosecutors zeal for winning - particularly against the marginal in our society.
33. National flood program makes it worst (and insurance companies benefit.)
34. Critical thinking is not part of our K-12 system in general
35. Paranoia and conspiracy madness (Sandy Hook isn't real, [edited to add QAnon] et. al. - though JFK was killed by our govt! Trust me on this.)
36. Fox news, Breitbart, Drudge and talk radio like Limbaugh.
37. Nuclear capability in crazy hands - and hey, just nuclear capability.
38. Testosterone (it's always been both a blessing and a curse; I think the curse portion is winning now)
39. Racism, sexism, xenophobia and homo and trans phobia
40. Religious extremists of the Muslim, Christian, Buddhist, Jewish, et. al. variety
41. Extremists of the right and left who are not motivated by religion, but by some belief that they have "the truth".
42. The coming pandemic [edited to say: one came; more are on the way]
43. Public transportation infrastructure
44. Our horrible tort system
45 The fact that we have not come to terms with, apologized for or made amends for our history (slavery, genocide and land theft of Indians, imperialism, overturning regimes we don't like, supporting horrible regimes, theft of land from Mexico, Hawaii, and others, et. al.)
46. The decrease of social mobility
47. The sixth extinction is nigh
48. Crazy, crazy amount of spending on defense
49. Bureaucracy
50. Scientific ignorance
51. Factory farming, processed food and the whole industrial food complex
52. Anti-vaxers
53. Cops getting away with murder
54. The fact that human beings often seem to love or need revenge
55. The split of the Democratic party into two warring factions, which is why we have Trump today (and it is going to get worse before it can possibly get better - remember the 60s and 70s people???) To put it another way: The left is cannibalistic. They eat their own. The right somehow manages to come together while the left doesn't.
56. Reality shows
57. The rise of China (authoritarianism seemingly working as well as - perhaps better than - democratic capitalism)
58. The Putin rise in Russia (horrible provocateurs even if their country is screwed)
59. Mental health/ mental resilience getting worse - and few resources to help
60. The feeling of entitlement on the left and the right
61 Housing prices in desirable weather/ cultural areas going crazy. Homelessness exploding. Not enough housing in many markets in the West and South.
62 The inability of so many to delay gratification
63 Internet and gamer culture (it's horribly sexist even though many, many folks who are into the internet and gaming are just fine, of course)
64. The decline of unions
65. The already existing, but soon exploding, pension crisis
66. The death of employer-sponsored pensions and health care without good alternatives
67. No way to die easily when your time is done (adding to our huge debt and a lot of unnecessary suffering)
68. Income inequality and, yet, the richest 20% want even more even though they already have 76% of American's wealth. [edited to say 86% in 2022]
69. Lobbyists
70. Lack of campaign finance reform - rich people buy what they want.
71. Blue state white folks are generally fat and happy so they aren't going to be rising up
72. Red state folks don't seem to give a damn about having competent leaders
73. A nation of immigrants is increasingly anti-immigrant (though other times have been like this.)
74. The insect apocalypse.
75. Violence, sexual assault and disrespect against women
76. Addiction to various things
77. The left not supporting free speech
78. Massive overuse of plastic
79. Venezuela is one precautionary tale
80. Brexit is another precautionary tale
81. People hating and fearing refugees - and there are going to be millions of them
82. The fact that leftists can't tell rightist apart (and think they are all Nazis or white supremacists)
83. The fact that rightist can't tell leftists apart (and think they are all Venezuela-style socialists or communists)
84. The left equating physical violence with language violence – giving intellectual justification for physical violence against verbal violence
85. The fact that the right has all the guns and physical power: the left will be crushed in a civil war
86. The lust for power and money
87. The fact that neither the left nor the right can take a joke
88. Over-regulation
89. Anti-science and anti-intellectual movements
90. The rise of Dominion Christians like Pence and Moore
91. The fact that, increasingly, people stick to their own kind, read their own kind, live with their own kind, marry their own kind, get entertained by their own kind, etc.
92. Coral bleaching, mercury in fish, a huge amount of plastic in the ocean, overfishing, etc.
93. The health care mess in America
94 The infrastructure mess in America
95 Drought in the West, the draining of aquifers many places, dried wells and land subsistence.
96. Medicare/social security crisis - aging boomers
97. Identity politics on the left, which serves to divide us - plus all the over-sensitive stuff like cultural appropriation, trigger warnings, safe space - the left as victims.
98. Republicans cutting taxes - particularly on those who can easily pay way more taxes so all the messes can't be fixed
99. The overdose crisis
100. Nuclear waste - fear Hanford.
101. Too many people with too little resources. (I actually think there will be many less people in a few generations so the population will top off and and, through water scarcity, pandemic disease, famine, refugee death, flooding, heat waves, etc, it will actually start decreasing but still! However, Africa's population is booming. Nigeria is projected to overtake China in population by 2100, with a size 10x smaller. )
102. Soil erosion.
103. Resistance to chemicals - whether antibiotics or pesticides - in which the problems explode exponentially as new ones can't be made fast enough - or are too toxic - to help.
104. Multiple issues with the press!
• "We" is defined here to mean those who feel we are the sons and daughters of the enlightenment. While I think we are doomed, I do think America and Americans have many fine qualities. This is just not that list. Feel free to make that list!!
