nemorathwald | What Went Wrong in the 2010s, and How the New Politics of Identity Made It Worse

I had ChatGPT summarize a guest post on Jonathan Haidt's Substack, written by Yascha Mounk. The four-paragraph summary communicates more clearly than the original. First, here's a three-paragraph summary of the introduction by Jonathan Haidt:

A major societal shift began around 2014, marked by increased political polarization, rising youth mental health issues, and a dramatic transformation in the behavior and goals of many institutions. Rather than being a simple generational change, this shift is attributed to deeper forces—especially changes in communication technologies that reshaped how people relate to one another.

One key factor behind this transformation is the rise of a set of academic ideas about power and identity that, while once confined to the humanities, gained broader influence in the 2010s in a distorted, simplified, and populist form. The original ideas were often difficult to understand or logically inconsistent, yet they spread rapidly through institutions, reshaping their missions and norms. As these ideas took hold, organizations that adopted them began to experience confusion and internal conflict, losing coherence and straying from their original purposes.

While these ideas may appeal to people who want to address injustice, their practical effects often undermine the individuals and institutions that adopt them. Instead of empowering people or solving problems, they lead to dysfunction, misalignment, and division. Understanding where these ideas came from, why they appeal to people, and how they operate helps clarify what went wrong—and points toward more constructive ways to engage with today’s cultural and institutional challenges.

Here's the summary of Yascha Mounk's article:

A popular idea in today’s politics and culture says that people from different identity groups—especially those divided by race, gender, or sexuality—can’t really understand each other. According to this view, people who face oppression gain a kind of special knowledge from their experiences, and people who are more privileged can't truly grasp it, no matter how hard they try. Because of this, the “right” thing for privileged people to do is to stay quiet, agree, and follow the lead of the oppressed.

But this way of thinking doesn’t hold up. First, it assumes that all members of a group have the same experiences, which simply isn’t true—no group is that uniform. Second, it suggests that only people who experience injustice can understand it, even though people from all walks of life can gain insight into how unfair systems work. Third, it claims that the experiences of the oppressed can’t really be explained to outsiders, which confuses "hard to explain" with "impossible to understand."

This mindset also creates serious political problems. It discourages genuine conversation and cooperation between groups. It gives power to a small number of activists or spokespeople—often those who already hold influence—to speak on behalf of entire communities, even when many in those communities may disagree. Instead of encouraging unity and shared goals, it divides people into separate camps and makes it harder to work together.

There’s a better way. While it’s true that people’s backgrounds affect how they see the world, that doesn’t mean we can’t learn from one another. Real political progress comes from building trust and understanding—through conversation, listening, and shared effort—not from blindly following whoever claims to speak for a group. If we want a fairer society, we need to believe that understanding across differences is possible, and then work toward it.

My own commentary: Suppose I wish to find out your own view, and you tell me that I shouldn't ask you to educate me. You are presuming that there is exactly one view that's shared by everyone in your marginalized group-- as if they all agree with you. Over the past fifteen years or so, I've educated myself in more views than I can count, so I know there isn't just one of them where I can just find out that one and be done.

The only durable solution is to build a relationship between you and me specifically. No education can substitute for you in that process. If I just obey, instead of understand, it would accomplish nothing.

All larger change starts with two people at a time building interpersonal trust and understanding. That's the opposite of you just telling me what to do and I do it, which would require no trust and no understanding. Identitarianism assumes earning trust and building understanding is permanently impossible, but that assumption would make it impossible to build local solidarity, which builds larger systems.

This is a big part of why I've centered my life around things like maker spaces, science fiction conventions, Fluidity Forum, local Burning Man events, open source software projects, Mastodon or Discord servers, authentic relating and circling, board game and role playing groups, and so on. I've learned that what's happening now can destroy small local groups (not just nerdy stuff, but including bicycling groups, druid groves, moms groups, etc) but will never tear down The System which is the actual target.

Here's another summary, this time of "Bowling Alone" by Robert Putnam, and the recent Netflix documentary about his work, "Join Or Die":

Bowling Alone and Join or Die both examine the decline of social connectedness in the United States and the consequences for American democracy, health, and wellbeing.

Bowling Alone documents the long-term collapse of civic engagement—from voter turnout and public meetings to church attendance and participation in clubs and leagues. Americans are doing fewer things together. Though people still bowl, for example, they're less likely to do so in leagues. The book attributes this trend to several causes, including suburbanization, television, generational change, and the pressures of modern work life. The result is a weakening of what’s called “social capital”—the networks of trust and reciprocity that bind communities together and make democratic institutions function.

Join or Die is a documentary that explores similar themes through a more personal and urgent lens. It argues that the erosion of civic life isn’t just a political issue but a public health crisis. When people are disconnected from one another, communities become more polarized, individuals become more isolated, and rates of anxiety, addiction, and early death rise. The film presents social participation—not just voting, but joining groups, building local trust, and showing up—as a vital solution to America’s fragmentation and decline.

Together, the two works make the case that rebuilding social bonds is essential to restoring both the health of democracy and the wellbeing of individuals. The message is simple: if people don’t join together, everything else falls apart.