Idle Musings: A Broken Rope

Have you ever seen a rope break? It’s an interesting process and I would encourage anyone to spend five minutes on YouTube and watch a video of it. A taught rope is usually a straight line. When pulled from both ends under increasing tension you can see it slowly stretch out, further and further towards each end with the middle section being pulled ever more taught and eventually beginning to fray and thin out as the fibers are pulled further apart. When the tension increases sufficiently the strands begin to snap and ultimately the rope tears apart in the middle.

This makes me think of our country today, with both ends of the right/left spectrum pulling further and further apart with ever growing tension stretching out the middle. I am increasingly finding the two-party system we have in place, where the only forces at work are the ones at each end escalating that pressure to each extreme, doing a tremendous disservice to the people of this country. The United States is so unique in our makeup. I would posit that we’re probably the most diverse country in the world (no, I don’t have any facts to qualify that, just my own perception). How can so many different races, religions, cultures, ethnicities, ages, creeds etc. be truly represented by only two different ideologies? Personally, I’ve never identified in whole with either side and I don’t even like the whole “middle” ground either because I share beliefs from the entire spectrum. I would like to think of our political and cultural makeup as more of a venn diagram where overlapping circles allow space for people to share various ideas from various perspectives and when appropriate pull in the same direction to get things done. Unfortunately, the linear Right/Left world we live in is creating a “you’re either with us or against us” kind of climate.

Eventually, the rope is going to snap.