America and Fear - Part1

Are Americans afraid? Short answer, yes. Of what? Everything. Everything has changed, or so it seems, and we are not reacting well. To be fair, no one could possibly handle the changes we have gone through in the last 100 years or so. When my grandparents were born, news traveled by telegraph and was then reported in the newspapers. They were amazed when regular radio broadcasts began. At that time, especially back in the country where they lived, there was no electricity in many homes. WW1 was reported by wire and in print. It was a good thing no live TV was there because it was a horrific, bloody mess, unlike anything the world had ever seen.

                                                                                                                                                                   

They moved to Ft. Lauderdale, Fl., now a major city, and, at that time, what few roads existed, were dirt. No malls, no supermarkets. a weekly newspaper, and still, a lot of horses on the road. Then, the bottom fell out and the Great Depression hit, followed by WW2. Boys who had never been more than 10 miles from home were suddenly lumped in with guys from all over the country and shipped across the planet to fight enemies they could not possibly understand.                                                                                                                                                            

 By this time, there were cars everywhere, and plane travel was increasing, although it was so costly that most still traveled by rail. Electricity was common and households were growing modernized, with ice boxes being replaced by refrigerators and brooms by vacuum cleaners. And, TV was becoming a big deal.                            

I want you to think. Not that long ago, there was not a TV in every home and when you had a set, your viewing was limited. I remeber a time when we got 2 stations and they were only on the air a few hours a day. Radios and record players were big. Records, those vinyl discs we had before tapes and CDs, were 78rpms, big heavy things that played 1 side at a time, and 33 1/3 rpms that were smaller, but had an awful sound quality. Of course the quality didn't much matter because it was all monaural. I remember my brother-in-law getting a stereo which was kind of cool, but the only stereo records were sound effects, weird things where you would hear a train and be amazed by illusion it gave of motion.                                                

                                                                                                                                                                               Telephones were clunky things with dials and, I remember when you didn't even have a dial. You picked up the receiver and an operator answered and placed the call for you. Even with dials, you, to save money, were on a party line, which meant you shared a line with neighbors. Often, you went to make a call only to find the line in use.                        

I point these somewhat trivial things out to demonstrate the remarkable changes we have gone through. The society we have built seemed like a sci-fi dream to my Grandmother and it has changed radically since her passing. Cell phones and personal computers were not even thought of not that long ago, yet that was only 25 years past.                                                                   

 Changes are a part of life. You cannot stop them, you cannot stand still, but, these changes have come incredibly fast. In some ways, more has happened in the last 100 years than in the preceding 10000, and change at that pace is impossible to cope with. So, fear set in, a natural reaction. Next time, I will discuss more current and deeper causes to the fear that has come to grip America.