In the little more than half-a-generation, since a young bi-racial, Harvard Law School Graduate named Barak Obama set out to prove that America was ready to embrace a complete change in race-based socio-political viewpoint, much has indeed changed, though hardly in ways he envisaged. Especially in the interactive sense he anticipated.
Most noticeable is the widely apparent inability (or unwillingness) to consider differing behavior or points of view. Whether this is racially related is not yet wholly apparent, despite disturbing poll results noting that the strongest expressions of racial antipathy still occur in portions of upstate New York. Examples, though, are still too inconsistent and scattered.
More disturbing is the utter lack of courtesy or consideration for differing ideas or behavior. Also the hostile and pugnacious language used in response. This is particularly evident in the generally impatient and impolite attitudes shown by young drivers (of both sexes) to elderly drivers of both sexes.
What we have obviously lost is the precious capacity for humane language, in the intricate process of verbal contact. The most necessary first step toward reconciliation. In fact, the chaotic combination of trash-level TV and a computer coded lack of language leverage, have delivered us to our own Twenty-First century version of ‘The Tower Of Babel.’
Now, if there were only someone who could understand how this all came about and would then come up with their own singularly miraculous code word, to halt and reverse this depressing process. But alas, there isn’t and they won’t.
The views expressed by commentators are solely those of the authors, and do not reflect the views of this station or its management.