Politics

Conspiracy

I don’t think the world operates on a web of conspiracies the way some people do. I feel like the exact opposite is the case. I believe people are trying their hardest these days to make sense of everything that’s happening when the truth of the matter is most likely that there is minimal rhyme or reason to most of it. One of my favorite themes revolves around the fact that we live in an 8 billion person world and that such scale of human existence is overwhelming almost every aspect of life whether we realize it or not. A reality that I see in this country much more than in places like continental Europe is that there remains vast stretches of open spaces. 28% of the U.S. landmass is still owned by the U.S. government. That is far and away mostly in the western half of the country. But 47% of the country is considered unoccupied (again, more the case in the western half). This compares to Europe which is almost all privately owned with only a small part of it unoccupied. Naturally, this speaks to this part of the world being often called The Old Country, which is to say that it was inhabited by man earlier and more densely for one reason or another. Continental Europe has about 282 people per square mile whereas the continental United States has about 111 people per square mile. The range in density in the U.S. has New Jersey with 1,280 people per square mile versus Wyoming with 6 people per square mile. The interesting question would be which of these two extremes leads to more conspiracy theories among the residents.

Asia has a density of more than double the U.S. at 256 people per square mile and the range goes from Singapore with 20,000 per square mile to Mongolia with 5 people per square mile (I guess that makes Singapore like New York and Mongolia like Wyoming). Japan, with its xenophobic ways is an island with 899 people per square mile, less than Taiwan with 1,668 people per square mile versus China with 375 people per square mile and India with 1,073. I find that these human density statistics are a fascinating way to contemplate the mood and propensities of these cultures. Russia, with its massive lands boast a density of 23 people per square mile, which is not surprising, making it much like Canada with its density of 10 people per square mile. Meanwhile, Iran has 153 people per square mile and Brazil has 65. Interesting and thought-provoking data points.

One could argue that either way. On the one hand, crowded places take their toll on people to be sure and cause several brands of human mental distress. But then, so does isolation and the lower density locations where people are more left to plumb the depths of their own minds. I am torn as to which is worse. I imagine for me, having lived most of my adult life in New York City, where there are 27,000 people per square mile. I lived in Maine for four years while growing up and there were only 44 people per square mile. I now live in San Diego County, where the density is 735 people per square mile. I think its appropriate to look at the whole county since Escondido with its density of 4,184 per square mile is less like my day-to-day experience than the broader county total. I like having nearby open spaces to drive my motorcycle through when I choose, but I equally like having neighbors. We have four households on this street with one more on the way and another possible in the future. Most of what I see around me looks like nature and only a few other homes are visible, but we feel like we have neighbors and a community.

When I watch one of the House Hunter episodes on HGTV, I see people who crave isolation from neighbors and ones who can’t live without nearby community. Man is fundamentally a gregarious beast. We are naturally social and tend to live in groups. There is good evidence of this on historical/archaeological grounds since as far back as we have discovered evidence of man, there is evidence that he has lived in social groups. Communal living was always a standard survival instinct. Also, from a biological/evolutionary standpoint, research shows that our brains are wired for social interaction. We have specialized neural circuits for face recognition. Language ability is innate, suggesting that we evolved with the predilection for social communication. Even infants are born with a preference for human faces and voices above all else. We have also studied the psychological basis of all this and noted that prolonged isolation typically causes mental health issues since social bonds are crucial for psychological well-being. We naturally form social hierarchies and groups as further evidence. Culturally, humans tend to develop complex social structures and create institutions that facilitate group living. Our most severe punishments often involve social isolation. Clustering in cities, towns and villages is not happenstance but shows a decided preference for communal living rather than spreading out evenly across the available landmass. Most biologists agree that being social isn’t just a choice – it’s a fundamental part of our biology. Nevertheless, city dwelling and village living are still two extremes that fall within the bounds of normality and too much of either extreme on the wrong half of humans can cause the sort of distress that leads to conspiracy theories.

What we are seeing these days (at least over the last ten years of Trump World) is a largely rural population of the United States building up a head of conspiracy theories against the folks that are clustered in the cities. The distrust of institutions goes hand and hand with these conspiracy theories and may even be at their core. Strangely enough, the Democratic model of the welfare state disproportionately benefits those rural communities and disproportionately taxes the urban populations to bear that cost even though it is those same recipients that seem to most dislike the “deep state” and the institutionalization of America. We may be about to learn, thanks to a second Trump administration, how those same rural red folks feel about the dismantling of that “deep state” and the potential loss of those benefits they have been enjoying. I feel like the rural red coalition that has led the MAGA revolt has been driven by this somewhat overarching and irrational fear of that 8 billion person world out there even though the very things that help them survive that world are what they seek to dismantle. And yet, the urban teeming masses better understand the need for communal norms that force us all to think about the collective rather than ourselves alone. Urban blue folk understand intuitively that helping others helps them. Meanwhile, those MAGA folks prefer to ignore the needs of others.

I recently saw an article that may be the best definition of the Trump phenomenon that I have seen so far. It says that the appeal of Trumpism is that it gives permission to people not to care about others. Kim has added to that the observation that Trumpism also gives its followers the permission to be as crass and rude as they wish in expressing that lack of caring for others. I believe that we may see a shift in conspiracy theorizing in the next few years. People are likely to miss their institutional support network and may well shift the blame and their ire back where I think it belongs, which is on corrupt politicians (like Trump) and those who would manipulate the system (like Elon Musk) for their own sole benefit and perhaps the nihilists like Steve Bannon who just want to burn everything down. Now THAT is a conspiracy I can finally get behind.