Fascinating read in Slate "Are We Becoming Eastern Europe Circa 1980?"
Lessons from the fall of the Eastern Bloc.
By EMILY GIOIELLI and LESLIE WATERS
APRIL 23, 20205:07 PM
https://slate.com/news-and-politics/2020/04/is-america-becoming-eastern-europe-circa-1980.html
Weeks into the coronavirus lockdown, Americans are becoming more and more accustomed to shortages we never would have imagined in the recent past. On Wednesday, another of the largest pork processing plants in the country shut down, increasing fears about potential meat shortages. This is on top of the lack of basic necessities that has left people asking why they can’t seem to find any toilet paper. Our sophisticated global production network—allegedly the nimblest, most efficient supply system in the world—seems unable to make basic adjustments. Last year, former White House adviser Sebastian Gorka warned that Democrats “want to take away your hamburgers” by passing environmental legislation. It turns out that unsanitary working conditions that allowed the virus to spread among plant workers were the real threat to the meat supply. Perhaps most critically, people all over the world have been left wondering how it’s possible that the wealthiest country in history cannot seem to provide basic medical equipment to doctors and nurses and lifesaving care to its citizens during an emergency. These changes to America’s usual way of life have come as conservative leaders and groups have quietly backed organized rallies against stay-at-home orders, with protesters saying they’d rather risk death from the virus than live with economic disruptions.
As scholars of Eastern European history, we immediately noticed a connection between the disruption of supply because of logistical challenges and the idea of making sacrifices for an ideology. Indeed, these were some of the very failures of communism over which American-style capitalism had confidently claimed victory three decades ago. Now, history may be replaying itself here with a different ideology but similar devastation to the public.
One of the most enduring images of 1980s Eastern Europe is people queuing up outside of stores for scarce goods. But people were resourceful; they leveraged personal connections to skip lines and made do with ersatz products when something simply wasn’t available. A handful of articles have appeared recently arguing that Eastern Europeans are uniquely equipped to deal with the new shortages because they’ve lived through bare cupboards before. The outcome of those deprivations, though, was nothing short of the collapse of their region’s sociopolitical system.
snip
For Havel, the antidote to living within the lie was “living in truth.” This meant recapturing individual dignity and power by refusing to reproduce the lies of a corrupt regime. He also argued that political categories and parties didn’t really matter; the real question was whether you could “live like a human being.” Now more than ever, it’s a worthwhile question for Americans to start asking.
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well worth reading it all. trump (and putin) - what the hell are you doing to this country?
