"This is an age of mutinies. For more than a decade in America, they've come so thick and fast that they trip over one another: the Tea Party, Occupy, Black Lives Matter, the Resistance, the anti-lockdown protests, the insurrection, the anti-ICE protests. The ur-mutiny, encompassing some of these, provoking and provoked by others, is MAGA."
"We understand these revolts in terms of the dominant political fact of our time, the forever war between red and blue. The mutinies are staged by one side or the other, and every high-profile trial, incendiary speech, and shooting caught on camera divides Americans instantly and predictably into two opposing camps, with apparently irreconcilable visions of what is true."
"The obvious precedent for an age of mutinies is the decade before the Civil War-the years of Uncle Tom's Cabin, Bleeding Kansas, Dred Scott, and John Brown-when pressure built up until it exploded in what future Secretary of State William H. Seward labeled 'the irrepressible conflict.'"
America has witnessed numerous major revolts over the past decade, including the Tea Party, Occupy, Black Lives Matter, and the January 6 insurrection, with MAGA serving as the overarching movement encompassing and provoking others. These mutinies are typically understood through the lens of red versus blue political division, with each side holding fundamentally different visions of America's identity and future. The historical parallel drawn is the pre-Civil War decade marked by escalating tensions over slavery and constitutional interpretation. However, examining deeper historical patterns reveals that economic inequality and political dysfunction spanning decades represent the true underlying sources of contemporary conflict, suggesting the current divisions may reflect broader systemic issues beyond simple partisan opposition.
Read at The Atlantic
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