The Rant of a Millennial - Thoughts on Political Discourse

Firstly, let me begin with a bit of a disclaimer. This author is a bit of an optimist and a firm believer in the enlightenment ideal of progress, a wannabe economist and humanist, this is in addition to being a 20-something clueless. I wanted to write this out of sheer fear at what I consistently see in the world around me. Namely the political discourse of today. We tend to forget that rhetoric matters and our actions have an impact upon future generations, the unborn that don’t have a voice today, but surely have to pay for the consequences that are not of their making. 

Progress is dependent on one thing and that is the idea that every generation strives to make their world better for the next. Maybe I am misguided but this adage doesn’t seem to stand, the narcissist Millenial in me insists this to be the case. So what do I see as the major problems today and what exactly do I take issue or rather issues with? 

Blame-Game

Humans are hardwired to do this. We are not adept at not being able to grasp or understand something that seems alien to our sense of reason. This is why our ancestors came up with the idea of magic or even God (though to be fair I am a believer in a watchmaker God or my world would be exceptionally dull and without purpose). Now it seems to be about nations, other people, systems. Unemployment? Blame the Mexicans in the US. Or blame the EU in Europe. It couldn’t have anything to do with technological growth, bad policy implementation and living beyond the constraints of reason from an individual government policy perspective. 

Every system is one that is dynamic and a tool for an outcome, not an end in itself. It is when you impose a model for the purpose of  controlling your environment beyond reason (masquerading as ideology) that things become problematic. Capitalism is not an end in and of itself (even Smith wouldn’t say so), it is a means to an end, like marxism. We all know how the imposition of Marxist modes of thought on an Feudal society like Russia ended up or its imposition on an agrarian society like China ended up. Fighting about the welfare state or whether it is fair is rather redundant unless one can prove that it makes society worse off. People are people, breathing individuals not tag lines defined by their politics or ideology. And institutions don’t sit in vacuums either.

One recent trend has been to blame “the Chinese” for the pandemic. Whilst it might’ve originated in China, generalising or starting a blame game is not only futile but dangerous. History tells us this, remember Versailles and the punitive measures imposed by the French in their own Short-Sightedness, I believe most of you are aware of where that got us. 

The other trend has been to blame institutions which are mechanisms for outcomes not outcomes in and of themselves. 

The UN or the EU was not created so that leaders have a photo-op, it was for the purpose of ensuring that we don’t kill our neighbours constantly. The Marshall Plan that acted as precursor to the EU was for this purpose as well. So when you look at the EU, ask yourself the question, how often has the continent had wars pre-EU and afterwards? The problem was when the measures came to be ends in and of themselves. Imposing vastly different systems created for different reasons upon nations and peoples in a one-size fits all approach, ECB and common currency being one of them. 

Same with Multilateral institutions like the UN and WHO, thinking that they might be apolitical is the first mistake, they aren’t meant to be. They are platforms in which people and states come together for ascertaining common ground. They are a mechanism, nothing more, nothing less. 

If one were to argue against them, fine, but do so with a reasonable alternative that might prevent wars or self-interested nations. 

Nationalism

Note - All people outside of Africa trace their ancestry to single migration out of Africa 50 000 years ago. So we’re all really cousins (maybe Adam & Eve wasn’t so far from reality?)

I always find this one rather funny. Don’t get me wrong, we all need to feel like a community and wish to have some sense of commonality. But how many people are aware of how recent this phenomenon of nations is? 

In fact one might even argue that the concept was created in the Treaty of Westphalia in 1648, so less than 400 years old. Might seem a long time, but not within the timeframe of human history. Moreover, nations were created again for the purpose of peace and common good, not for war. Before that much of Europe had fluid territories, based on marriages of elites and empires. In China which developed the first mechanisms of statehood, it went through several stages including the warring three kingdoms period. The unity came through enterprising dynasties, not because of homogeneity. Same with India, most of Africa (ever wondered why most of the countries in the Region have such straight lines, you can thank the colonial era for imposing a foreign concept on essentially tribal peoples that didn’t naturally evolve into what they are today). 

We are all mongrels. 

Be a patriot, but understand nationhood is an idea. More importantly that nations are made of people not land, anyone with those ideals can be part of that nation. Something that most seemingly forget. Remember the roots of the United States or the DNA of most Indians today or in fact even Australians. Can one really say that because the indegenous peoples were here first than it follows suit that they are the only real Australians. 

Basically understand that generalisations with tags don’t make sense at all. An Indian, a Chinaman, an American bla...bla...bla...Think human.

Short-Termism & Nostalgia

This is something I find rather frustrating to watch. Slogans like ‘Make America Great Again’ or ?n India’s case that somehow our ancestors were great scientists beyond today’’s generations. Rather ridiculous. Nostalgia does not serve a purpose, one learns from history, acts in the present and looks to the future. Not the other way around. 

Like Rousseau’s social contract about the origin of civil society, the past and the ideal is a starting point not an end point. The past was not ideal but one must believe in a starting point (not literally). The American constitution when it was written was still during a time of slavery and marked abuses of power that stayed up till the Civil War and further until Martin Luther King Jr. It did not even have Women’s suffrage until 1920. But beginning with the starting point of the persuit of happyness is idea. Beginning with the starting point that there are certain aspects of the past that might be worth bringing back is okay. But saying that you would like to go back there dispenses of all the good that intermediary generations of done is beyond the pale. 

Starting from the point that the past was better is a form of mean-reversion and in itself self-defeating. 

The other frustrating thing is that in any policy debate people don’t talk of the silent majority. No not the middle class. But the unborn, the billions of future generations that do not have a say. Every dollar of debt you take onboard, everytime we destroy nature (by the way mother earth heals herself, all we destroy is our chances for the propagation of our species, if we all died tomorrow it would take about 10 000 years for us to be no more than fossils much the same as dinosaurs) is taking away from our future generations. 

Whether you believe in Climate Change or not is irrelevant, why would you not use technologies that are renewable in nature in any case rather than depleting finite resources? And don’t tell me that there is no money, if the Fed can conjure 6 trillion out of thin air to sustain parasites like myself (oh by the way I work in finance and I love it) than one can certainly find ways to make it cheaper, one just needs vision. Like we did when we spent on landing a man on the moon. By the way even if I’m not American, I take pride in it as a Human Being and Individual.

Paternalism & a loss of Individuality

We have laws regulating everything from Drug use, Alcohol and Gambling. As though that wasn’t enough governments around the world continue to intervene in our private lives. Since the start of this pandemic, 84 countries have passed emergency measures increasing the power of the big brother. 

We fought hard to get to where we are, millions died for it. How in the world are we giving it away so easily? It is not only bad from a self-interest perspective but downright insulting those who have died for the cause of Liberty. 

In terms of laws that seek to curtail everything from illicit substances to gambling, all I can say is this, you expect those very people to have the responsibility to vote and decide the future of the nation but not enough to trust them to be responsible about making rational decisions when it comes to their health or finances? What is the logic, I ask?