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0 pointsmalandrew6y ago0 comments

I wouldn't even say it is just the threat model that changed. Humans in developed markets now have a very unhealthy relationship with death to the point where any policy that minimizes death is acceptable consequences be damned.

We no longer see death as a normal and natural part of life like previous generations did because it's not as prevalent as it once was.

The threat model you just described in another era would have more likely been met with acceptance if the alternative was to give up our hard fought for freedoms.

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4 comments · 2 top-level

shadowgovt6y ago· 2 in thread

I don't think I can point to an era in US history where an attack on a couple buildings resulting in thousands dead would have been brushed under the rug as "Well, death just happens." I'd even argue that's not a healthy response to a human-caused tragedy like that.

Seeing death as normal and natural carries its own antisocial pathologies. War is more justifiable if "Everyone has to die some time."

malandrewOP6y ago

That's a strawman that doesn't try to interpret the point I'm trying to make from the strongest possible position. I'm not suggesting that an event like that should be just brushed under the rug as "Well, death just happens."

I'm saying that the response to that event such as the Patriot Act and other safety-above-liberty-at-all-costs measures would have received a lot more scrutiny and been seen as disproportional. Just like your strawman is not a healthy response, neither was the response we had to 9-11. The goal of the terrorists was to fundamentally change life for Americans and get them to abandon their principles. Well they succeeded beyond their wildest imagination because we responded by dumping many of our freedoms in response.

shadowgovt6y ago

My understanding of the history of American responses to being attacked inclines me to disagree with that assessment. Consider how many liberties were given up during WWII after Pearl Harbor---the government basically nationalized resource distribution. To say nothing of what Americans considered tolerable to do to their Asian-American neighbors.

mrfusion6y ago

Yet we won’t find longevity research.

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