Carte Blanche: The Year We Stopped Asking Why

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Let us admit that a general malaise has been building for quite some time. The sense of hopelessness that comes with a 24-hour news cycle, Instagram algorithms, and the sheer stupidity of partisan politics. Participation in most things political has become more tiresome than most can remember, and it is not worth the irritation it entails. The problem is that not everyone shares this view. As we look at our elected leaders, we see a class of individuals who are keenly aware of how vitriolic things have escalated and have come to accept it, actively participating in it. What has this all gotten us? It has gotten us exactly where we find ourselves. Exhausted and not without good reason. Everything is more expensive, houses are beyond reason, and jobs seem to be evaporating with the influx of AI. Americans, like much of the Western World, are worried, growing anxious, and angry. The promises made by the generations before us haven’t been kept, and now it is the younger generations' responsibility to shoulder the burdens they left behind.  All of these issues and more are exactly the reason now is neither the time to lose faith nor to give up. Now is the time to have an honest conversation about what is happening and decide on a path forward. But above all, to act and not give in to the desire to submit to the world as it is.

The numbers don’t look great. The latest Gallup polls paint a picture of distrust and uncertainty. Congress holds an approval rating of just 17%. That proves there are still things that an overwhelming majority of Americans can agree on. The number alone should be enough to boost confidence in the ability to change. If 83% of Americans don’t believe that the 538 elected members of both the Senate and the House of Representatives are fulfilling their duties or are making decisions that positively impact the lives of those they represent, then there is no shortage of those who want change. The alternative is the state of affairs that we are currently living through. Complacency has ensured that corruption and scandals are becoming the norm, regardless of party. Whether it’s the welfare fraud in Minnesota or the President using his office for business dealings. Each day brings fresh headlines of politicians engaging in near-constant abuse of their office for personal or political gain. Infrastructure, education, healthcare, housing, energy, the list goes on of issues that require attention and are under a state of decay or near collapse. These situations have become so overwhelmingly alarming because, for decades, the average citizen has allowed politicians and appointed leaders to fail in their duties. Is it all the fault of voters? A great deal is. We the people decide the direction of our country, and if we don’t, others will. Inaction is in many ways more deadly than overaction.

Education has been the greatest of moral failures for quite some time. The idea of intellectual integrity and courage is one of many casualties some have willingly sacrificed to gain some sense of belonging or acceptance. By silencing dissenting voices and actively suppressing civic education, we find ourselves among generations who have neither the idea of civic discourse and engagement nor the stomach for it. Our universities and schools have been turned into ideological battlegrounds, and we have stopped asking why. The outcomes of those battles in ivory towered institutions can be seen in every failure and inability of the current ruling class. There is no desire for compromise, nor are our leaders willing to consider the possibility that they could be wrong. Slogans and the need for struggle and confrontation have become the only language, if it can be called that, that most are willing to use. It’s time for that to change. It doesn’t mean we must go back to how things were. Technology means that there is no going back, only forward. What it means is that if we want things to get better, we must move forward into a new direction. One where we take a more active role in deciding, rather than letting others set the odds of success by doing nothing to make change a reality.

There is plenty of manufactured doom and gloom every day. Many people are in the business of convincing themselves and others that we’re all one catastrophe or scandal away from the utter collapse of the world and our lives. Nothing could be farther from the truth, so long as we believe that to be the case. The last few decades have not been high points for tolerance or cooperation. The fruition of decades of government mismanagement is coming to a head at once. No matter how things turn out, that doesn’t mean that’s how things have to be. The power to bring about real and transformational change is always within reach. If we want the exhaustion to end, voters must come together and decide to hold accountable those who will not hold themselves accountable. The power of the vote is proven by the countless millions and immense energy spent by those trying so hard to suppress the voices of so many. A life of freedom is a life of burden to keep away those who would exploit it, but it’s the only life worth living. To live such a life is to be courageous by one's very nature. Let us return to courageous acts, both physically and intellectually, and let us ask again why and why not.