BEFORE: Barack Obama carries over again from "Inside Job". The Doc Block is focused on all things 'Murica-related this week, we covered economics and today it's civics class. Let's get ready to celebrate July 4, we're only one year away from our country's semi-quin-centennial.
Yes, that's what it's going to be called, I looked it up. I don't think Quarter Millennium or bisesquicentennial are going to catch on, but who knows.
THE PLOT: Centers on America's civic unraveling through the journey of scientist Robert Putnam, whose research on the decline in American community lights a path out of our democracy's present crisis.
AFTER: My films this week are all about America, and our national pastime is not really baseball, it's complaining. Prove me wrong. We've got a long history of it, like when I saw the January 6 insurrection taking place, the first thing it brought to mind for me was the Boston Tea Party, the only difference was that one event was ultimately successful. But the same spirit was there, you might say, we're a country of rebels, which are just complainers taking action. Shay's Rebellion, the Whiskey Rebellion, the Civil War, they all started with complaining about this or that, I'd say it's a proud American tradition if it also wasn't the cause of so much death and destruction.
On a daily basis, we call them "Karens", or, umm, male Karens, people who simply will NOT be silent about what they see going on around them that they perceive as wrong or misguided, including but not limited to public behavior and violations of the neighborhood housing code. And more recently we had half the country complaining about illegal immigrants, so they re-elected you-know-who, but then when ICE started to deport people, then citizens (probably some of the same ones) started complaining that they didn't know that their friends and neighbors were going to be taken to detention centers. Regretting your vote yet?
People used to join community groups to enact social change, but over time Robert Putnam noticed that it seemed like fewer and fewer people were joining these groups - his own father was a Kiwanis member, and he himself was not. It seems like he could just ask himself why he didn't join THAT community group like his father did, and we could then wrap up this doc early, just saying. Well, come on, you never want to join the same group your parents were in, because we all reject everything our parents did and stood for when we're 16 or 17, and then we go forward and live our own lives. Groucho Marx used to quip that he wouldn't join any club that would have him as a member, but I wouldn't join any organization that would admit my own parents, because it would just be a bunch of churchy stuff under discussion.
Putnam wonders whatever happened to that time period, when we had all those Civil Rights organizations and the Women's suffrage movement was working to enact change. Duh, they accomplished their goals, women can vote now and the Civil Rights bill passed, so those groups are no longer needed. I would have thought this was a pretty simple answer, we don't NEED the women's suffrage groups any more, couldn't he just mention this, that they succeeded right out of existence? We also don't need the Sons of Liberty and you don't see many people protesting the war in Vietnam any more.
Putnam had the rare opportunity to study the Italian government at a unique moment in history, when they were trying to de-centralize a couple decades after World War II and create something like state or province government to handle local matters like building more day-care centers and other public issues. Which state governments would be successful and which might not, and how could we even measure this? Through polling and public satisfaction, also they could count how many day-care centers actually got built in each state, as of five years later.
So that's what he did, only he was left with the question of WHY (and HOW) some state governments were more successful than others, or at least perceived to be, and eventually he landed on an answer - in those cities and states with more community groups and community involvement, people were happier with their lives and their government. Social capital, it came to be called, and when Putnam came back to the U.S., he found the same thing to be true, in communities where more people joined community groups, social clubs and even bowling leagues, people tended to be happier and lived longer. (By extension, in areas where brokers sold a lot of subprime mortgages to people who could not afford houses, and then bundled those subprime mortgages to create derivatives that people could bet against, people tended to be not as happy and prayed for the sweet release of death.)
A few years later, Putnam published his findings in a book titled "Bowling Alone", because he noticed the statistics which said that while more people were taking up the pastime of bowling, fewer people were joining bowling leagues. Well, sure, some people just want to have fun and not be pressured to bowl better, I get it. Also, other people suck sometimes, and if you don't like the guy (or gal) who runs the league, you're probably not going to join. I was on a pub trivia team in NYC for nearly a decade, because it was fun AND I liked the people on the team - but when I eventually realized how annoying some of them were, I was a lot less likely to continue. Now I feel like I should just keep trying out for "Jeopardy!" as a solo act, because joining another team would mean putting up with another bunch of self-involved self-righteous people who think they're always right. (Umm, myself included, OK? I can't say I didn't act like that when it came to some topics.)
Another reason for the decline of community involvement over the years is the growth of the popularity of television, also the QUALITY of that TV. For a while there they were running "Must See TV" on Thursday nights, are you having trouble understanding that I must see this? And now with 500 channels and streaming, the Golden Age of Television is NOW, even if you're only watching old stuff. It's only recently that DVRs became popular and we can all record our shows and watch them whenever we want, but older people had trouble setting their VCRs, so show me someone over 65 who knows how to set their DVR to record only the new episodes of "Matlock" with Kathy Bates and not accidentally also record all the old episodes with Andy Griffith that air on another channel. Yes, they can also stream the episodes, but nobody over 65 knows how that works either, prove me wrong.
There are also internet groups, like on Facebook and Reddit and other sites too. Is it possible that some social capital just migrated to the web, making it easier for everyone? Someone in this doc does briefly mention Facebook groups with regards to a labor union, but also casually dismisses that too, saying it would be much more effective to get out of one's social media bubble and walk down to the factory and discuss this issue face to face with management. Sure, but that sounds like work, and it's WAY too hot out to leave the house. Also, are there some more aspects of my life that you want to micro-manage and tell me that I'm not doing right? Plus, come on, I just voted in a primary election, what more do you want from me?
The advice for everyone to join an organization also needs some kind of asterisk next to it - surely they can't mean EVERYONE - what about those kids that shot up Columbine, weren't they in some kind of bowling league? And there must be some bad organizations out there, too - like gangs and organized crime, joining those can't be good, and I'd lump some private militia groups in there as well. And what about cults? So the advice really should be to join a GOOD group, because there are BAD groups out there as well. Just saying.
Another factor that the charts just don't seem to factor in is the aging of America - there are more people over the age of 70 in America than there ever have been before. Modern medicine has found ways to keep these people alive longer and longer, but it failed horribly at giving them something to do with all that time. More and more people just get old and tired - and a very normal human reaction is just to stay home and circle the wagons, watch the 6 pm news followed by the 7 pm news and go to bed earlier and earlier, so they don't just sit around and regret all their life choices - who has the time and inclination to go to weekly meetings at that point?
But that's OK, because if our founding fathers and our military fought and died for the rights to freedoms, that doesn't just include the freedom to join a group and take civic action, that also included the freedom to NOT do that. You can't make me join a group if I don't want to, I have the right to the pursuit of happiness, and maybe it makes me happy to be a solitary loner, even if I'm only a few steps away from moving to a tiny cabin and working on my manifesto. Any of those countries that require military service from all citizens seem like oppressive regimes to me, honestly I just don't want any trouble, leave me alone please.
Still, this documentary has given me a lot to think about, and this week we're discussing America, so I promise to do exactly that, think some more about it. But I can't possibly leave the house, it's much too hot and also things are going to start exploding tonight.
Directed by Pete Davis & Rebecca Davis
Also starring Robert Putnam, Pete Buttigieg (last seen in "Mayor Pete"), Raj Chatty, Hillary Clinton (also carrying over from "Inside Job"), Eddie S. Glaude Jr., Hahrie Han, Julianne Holt-Lunstad, Glenn Loury, Jane McAlevey, Vivek Murthy, Priya Parker
with archive footage of Joe Biden (also last seen in "Mayor Pete"), George H.W. Bush (last seen in "Super/Man: The Christopher Reeve Story"), Jimmy Carter (ditto), Bill Clinton (ditto), Al Gore (ditto), Winston Churchill (last seen in "A Royal Night Out"), Joan Didion (last seen in "Everything Is Copy"), Albert Einstein (last seen in "Famous Nathan"), Pope Francis (last seen in "The Two Popes"), Bill Gates (last seen in "Freakonomics"), Newt Gingrich (last seen in "Butterfly in the Sky"), Ruth Bader Ginsburg (last seen in "The Automat"), Arsenio Hall (last seen in "Brats"), Chris Hayes (last seen in "About My Father"), Steve Jobs, Lyndon Johnson (last seen in "The Secret Life of Bees"), Megyn Kelly (last seen in "The Accidental President"), Jacqueline Kennedy (last seen in "Personality Crisis: One Night Only"), John F. Kennedy (last seen in "Liza: A Truly Terrific Absolutely True Story"), Robert F. Kennedy (last seen in "Faye"), Martin Luther King (ditto), Gayle King (last seen in "The Last Blockbuster"), George Lucas (last seen in "Jim Henson: Idea Man"), Richard Nixon (last seen in "Tom Hanks: The Nomad"), Lee Harvey Oswald (last seen in "Bob Dylan: No Direction Home"), Jackie Robinson (last seen in "Yogi Berra: It AInt' Over"), Franklin Roosevelt (last seen in "Stan Lee"), Joseph Stalin, Donald Trump (last seen in "Mike Wallace Is Here"), Melania Trump (last seen in "You've Been Trumped Too"), George Will, Steve Wozniak (last seen in "Steve Jobs: The Man in the Machine"), Mark Zuckerberg (last seen in "George Carlin's American Dream")
RATING: 5 out of 10 potluck dinners
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