Civilization on the Brink?
No, this does not happen overnight, but the salami approach has been repeated throughout history.
But, I leave the exquisite description to Bill Whittle:
Cut those cords of love of and pride in country – as the elites have cut them in every civilization before us – and from your seat on the moon you will see the brightest light in history wink out. The rest of the world will soon follow. You think I exaggerate? When has this not happened in the heartbeat of civilization? We once stood among a family of nations dedicated to fighting oppression in the form of fascism and communism. Now, we and one or two others, but for all intents and purposes we – America alone – stands against the tide of 7th Century repression and submission. Civilizations rise and fall. Barbarism is eternal. If you think the threat is not an existential one you have some reading to catch up on. How long will the next darkness last? A few centuries? All of the readily available tools to build a new civilization – the ores, the coal and oil – all these are gone. Monks in stone cloisters cannot build photovoltaic cells. If this civilization falls, as have all others – from a lack of belief in itself – then civilization and medicine and science may very well never return. Those are the stakes. And how – pardon the profanity – how ironic is it that those libertines, those most determined to be able to do whatever they want, whenever they want, and at no cost to themselves… how ironic, how pathetic, how tragic, how infuriating and indeed, how insane is it that they – they alone – now control the mythology and the message of the workshop of our identity?You may agree with this too:
I have said all of that simply to say this: I know my people and I study our history. The single thing that makes America so exceptional is the belief of its people in American exceptionalism. It is a simple cause and effect relationship, easy to understand from using your own common sense and the examples in your own life. The confident and the bold do bold and confident things. The shameful and self-loathing? Not so much. And Hollywood as it exists today is using all of its vast talent to turn us from the former into the latter.