Reply #86: The parallel with the Southern lynchings (and elsewhere)

[TacticalPeek]

that today rings loudest in my ears is the yellow journalism, a key enabler then and now.

Another parallel, which I realize I bend to my purpose, is "Know-Nothingism", from the 19th century political party. The name was more about their original secrecy, when they were the secret Order of the Star Spangled Banner, which members would "know nothing" about. But I always associate their "knowingnothing" with an incapacity for self-examination, or really any examination or accounting. Like chesley #35 above, "I dunno. Kill 'em all and let God sort 'em out."

http://gi.grolier.com/presidents/aae/side/knownot.html
http://concise.britannica.com/ebc/article?eu=394616


And that parallels another recurrent American political theme, anti-intellectualism. I trace some of today's incarnation to former professors Gingrich, Armey and Graham.

from Todd Gitlin:

snip
Probing for historical roots of a mood that was sweeping (if somewhat exaggerated by intellectuals), Hofstadter found that "our
anti-intellectualism is, in fact, older than our national identity." He cited, among others, the Puritan John Cotton, who wrote in
1642, "The more learned and witty you bee, the more fit to act for Satan will you bee"; and Baynard R. Hall, who wrote in
1843 of frontier Indiana: "We always preferred an ignorant bad man to a talented one, and hence attempts were usually made
to ruin the moral character of a smart candidate; since unhappily smartness and wickedness were supposed to be generally
coupled, and incompetence and goodness."
snip

http://www.biology.eku.edu/RITCHISO/antiintellect.html