History: The Politics of Self-Destruction

 Indulging in looking for the future from the past: The Best Troll Rome Ever Knew (LARB).

For a person who spent most of his adult life angry about ever so many things, I do not understand our politics of destruction.  

 The cycle of conflict, bewilderment, and anger that has consumed the United States over the past three decades reflects something deeper and much more dangerous than a general inability to handle the communication technologies of the internet age. Unsettled political systems destroy their citizens’ sense of appropriate behavior toward one another. At one moment, someone might revel in the destruction of an adversary’s reputation through a quip applauded by a semi-anonymous gallery of observers. The next moment might bring terror that their own reputation is about to be destroyed if their target responds with a devastating reply. And beneath it all is the “obsessive animosity” and “uncontrolled anger” that Clinton spoke about. This is our country in 2025. As Josiah Osgood’s new book Lawless Republic: The Rise of Cicero and the Decline of Rome shows, it was also Rome in 55 BCE. And we know the catastrophe that Roman representative democracy suffered because citizens continued to empower ancient edgelords and the militias that followed them.

While almost everyone draws parallels between the Roman Empire and America, I prefer comparing us with the Roman Republic. We have an imperial presidency, but not an emperor - yet. 

I am coming to the idea that the most radical thing we can do to stave off an imperial government with it loss of our freedom is to engage with each other on an individual basis, not as opposing mobs. This only fortifies my opinions.

This, unfortunately, is where our own politics of personal destruction may lead as we push each other toward greater viciousness and violence. Lawless Republic shows how the small, daily steps we take toward casual cruelty desensitize each of us until, ultimately, we become willing to overlook the humanity and basic rights of our fellow citizens. The abyss then awaits unless, unlike Cicero, we realize that the barbs we direct at others also harm us by eating away at our own empathy and humanity. The best way to avoid Cicero’s end is to turn back from the path of obsessive animosity and uncontrolled anger now, while we still can. 

sch 8/24