The survey was conducted by Chapman University and it serves to back up the point that while Americans claim to live in the Land of the Free, deep down, they realize they are living in a corrupt oligarchy.
The Chapman University Survey of American Fears Wave 4 (2017) provides an in-depth examination into the fears of average Americans. In May of 2017, a random sample of 1,207 adults from across the United States were asked their level of fear about eighty different fears across a huge variety of topics ranging from crime, the government, the environment, disasters, personal anxieties, technology and many others.As Statista's Niall McCarthy notes, like last year, corruption of government officials came top in 2017, with 74.5 percent of U.S. adults saying it makes them "afraid" or "very afraid."
Despite the constant fear mongering from the mainstream media and government on boogeymen terrorists plotting to steal our freedom, the public, according to this survey, is not buying it. In fact, the threat of terrorism isn't even in the top 20 fears. Terrorism comes in at twenty-two-below credit card fraud and identity theft.
While this survey is certainly promising, in the idea that people are waking up to government corruption, it is also a telling sign of America's ability to hold two entirely contradictory ideas as self-evident.
This ability, or perhaps better defined as "disability," to hold two opposing ideas, such as the spreading of freedom through war, as being logically sound, is called cognitive dissonance. When one is in a state of dissonance, they may sometimes feel "disequilibrium": frustration, hunger, dread, guilt, anger, embarrassment, anxiety, etc.
In order for cognitive dissonance to work, society must remain just ignorant enough to support and to believe the lies fed to them from the establishment as reality; even though this reality is a complete contradiction.
Once we step back and observe society with this in mind, the reason for this contradictory mental state becomes quite obvious. It is much easier to remain delusional and in a state of suspended disbelief than it is to deal with the opposing ideas held inside one's head. How can one chant "USA is number 1!" while at the same time fearing the rulers of that USA?
Coming to terms with the fact that you can actually be killed by the very entity who claims to protect you from those who wish to do you harm, is a difficult realization.
Fortunately, there are those of us who have 'woken up' to our contradictory existence. This is not to say that we are smarter than others, only that we can recognize our own ignorance and through this self-reflection, seek to lessen that ignorance through entertaining ideas that may make us uncomfortable.
If this survey shows us anything, it is that Americans would do well to entertain the uncomfortable idea that this country they hold so high up on a pedestal has actually long been on a path to become the dystopian nightmare written about in books like 1984.
Americans would do well to remember the words by John Basil Barnhill in 1914 when he said,
"Where the people fear the government you have tyranny. Where the government fears the people you have liberty."
Reader Comments
for instance. 'Democracy' people use this word all the time.
many, many people describe America as a Democracy, when it is clearly NOT.
Democracy is EVIL.
if one finds my words alarming. then one is not familiar with the founding principles of the USA.
I find the results of this poll to be encouraging!
Americans are not supposed to put their faith in the government. quite the opposite.
I am reminded of how the city of Carthage fell. The impregnable city was brought down when the besiegers asked for one hostage. The decision was to give up an old man of no value. This man, embittered at being chosen, revealed the underground tunnel to the inside. Carthage was burned to the ground.
Our military uses the fabled American Dream of freedom of career, and especially education, to open doors to countries around the world. Unknown to most Americans, there are millions of Visa holders enjoying American freedoms that are here thru bribery, the rewards issued to the family's or the powerful dictators and tyrants and petty thieves ensconced in the seats of government around the world. The exploitation of minerals and resources envied by western powers requires the protection of military to prevent the people losing farmland and traditional resources from actively complaining about the theft. With the distribution of the Visa cards to members of the controlling family, the exploitation is protected by a show of the country's military armed with US guns, ammo, tanks, rockets, missiles, grenades, and deadly gas. US helicopters and drones complete the shock and awe tactic. The excuse for the abusive force is always assisting the corrupt government in fighting an opposition group defying the giving away of their livelihood. The US media is not only complicit but fully aware and abets the absorption of the natural resources and the draining of the country's assets all for the rain of heavenly VISA cards bestowing safety and generous education opportunities as well as lifelong careers upon the many foreigners while the US public sees a constantly increasing levy of costs for being allowed to see the American Dream unfold not quite within reach for them or their children.
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