by Shelt Garner
@sheltgarner
The more I think about it, if you want to get all apocalyptic about it, it’s not a Second American Civil War we should be worried about it’s a Second American Revolution.
The reason why I say this is we’re looking at the existential threat facing the United States all wrong. While, yes, there are two sides to the conflict brewing within the United States, the case could be made that once we break the seal on this matter, no institution will be spared.
So, in that sense, it would be a lot more like a revolution than a civil war. The American Civil War actually strengthened a number of existing institutions in the United States after it was all done with. If, say, Trump attempts to take “total control” as Roger Stone would suggest he do, then any domestic insurrection would likely leave no existing institution untouched.
In fact, the United States may be completely re-magined if such a rebellion against Mad King Trump’s Trumplandia succeeded. A lot of bent up political reforms would explode out into the open rather radically in a very short amount of time and, as such, when all was said and done, future historians would definitely mark the looming conflict a “revolution” and not a “civil war.”
One reason why we think we would have a “civil war” instead of a “revolution” is we are, in our minds, fighting the last major domestic war — the American Civil War. But there was a American Revolution before that
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"a historic miscalculation" https://t.co/ij2RoxX6se
— Shelt Garner (@sheltgarner) September 25, 2020
Before we all get too hysterical about any of this, there are some caveats. We could still simply slip into autocracy with our eyes wide open and in a rather peaceful manner. Instead of any great historical drama, it would be a rather prosaic slip into a very American autocracy in the sense that Trump keeps doing what he’s already doing for a few years before the final boom drops. That would give people time to slowly grow accustomed to the change in the American experience and so it all turns into a lulz.
Only when, say, Q in a few years orders his followers to empty the cities and we have American Killing fields will anyone get too upset.
But, we are talking about a huge fucking moron named Donald Trump. He’s a massive self-own artist and, as such, out of sheer criminal incompetence he stirs up the volk in a way no one expects. Some pretty surreal political events might happen in quick success and before we know it, some sort of New Model Army has been established and not even the U.S. Military survives the implosion of the country.
As such, it’s at least possible that Trump without even really thinking about it pushes the country not into civil war, but revolution. Things grow far more radical for both sides and it’s not about states wanting to leave the Union or not, it’s about are we Trumplandia or are we America? Are we an American Union and, as such, take such a massive crisis as an opportunity to renew or covenant, or are we nothing more than a reflection of Trump’s ego? The stakes , as such, grow far more serious on a number of levels.
I will point out that usually it’s a war that leads to major technological innovations, so it’s possible to imagine a scenario where a lot of technology that’s kind of there-but-not-being-used like AI, MX, robotics and automatic comes roaring to the forefront of society because they’re used for military reasons in a desperate pitched battle for control over the geographic area currently known as the United States of America.
All of this is extremely fantastical. I struggle to even comprehend how an otherwise stable nation like the United States could find itself in a position where civil war — or revolution — is actually a near future possibility. It just makes no sense.
But here we are.
