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Comment by rayiner

> How did we get to a point where actual data can be outright denied or absorbed based on your political viewpoint?

Our elites—I don’t mean that pejoratively, but descriptively—used to adhere to institutional values. When I joined a prominent NYC law firm 10 years ago nobody commented on the fact that it was named after someone who argued the pro-segregation other side of Brown v. Board. The institution, not only of the firm but the legal process itself-where even segregationists are entitled to their day in court—was a credo that transcended individual politics or individual notions of “justice” or “human rights.”

That flipped sometime in the last decade. Our institutions have been overtaken my millenarianism: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Millenarianism. It’s a belief system that transcends institutional values—in the law, the media, everywhere.

Do you remember “The Resistance?” Where Clinton-supporting government employees pledged to work within the bureaucracy to defeat the agenda of the duly elected President—their boss? The craziness we’ve been seeing from conservatives lately is a reaction to that total abandonment of institutional values.

parent rayiner 4 years ago

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