In my experience there's never been any such thing as the "silent majority". It's just something desperately unpopular public figures cling to to convince themselves they (or their policies) are popular.
A largely forgotten show from the late 90s called "Seven Days".
How have we arrived in a world where a grandpa can't tell a corny grandpa joke anymore.
Next you're going to term me that pretending to take your kids nose is akin to threatening torture under the Geneva convention...
Josie and the Pussycats was lampooning our current celebrity obsessed, "influencer" obsessed, consumer lifestyle 20 years ago. Yes, there was certainly celebrity worship back then. But the way the movie portrayed it and the consumer greed that seeks to profit from it feels even more relevant today.
Why did the first notes from The Lion King just burst into my head?
Eight decades later, and all those lessons have been forgotten. Self-interested and shortsighted leaders have risen to the tops of many nations, and nationalistic rhetoric is gaining popularity again.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Strauss%E2%80%93Howe_generational_theory
In some ways, I'm a believer in the "80 year cycle, theory". But to me, it's a much simpler cause. 80 years is going to be roughly four generations removed from whatever the last chaos was (in this case, Hitler and Fascism and the Holocaust).
The generation that lived through it is long dead. They taught their children (My parents) to never forget. They in turn taught their children (Me...Gex X) to still remember what was fought for. And then the current generation (my kids if I had any) have a far less fundamental grasp on that history. We're so far removed from that event that it's been forgotten just long enough that it all makes an appearance again for the very same reasons. Because it's an easy trap to fall into; blaming someone else for your problems.
All this has happened before and it will happen again. It's as simple as "those who forget the past are doomed to repeat it".
Plasma:
"Here's literally all the things... You sort it out, if you want. If not...whatever."
Quebec cares. Probably a little too dogmatically in my opinion. But you're right about east coast culture.
Although I would say that it does have it's own somewhat well-documented cultural artifacts in terms of music, food and drink. We certainly hear more on the prairies about Screech, Great Big Sea and kissing the fish (for example) than most other areas with the exception of Quebec.
Because people are dumb. And I don't mean that in some flippant, off-hand, snarky way. I mean that in all dead seriousness. People are dumb.
The truest line ever written was from Tommy Lee Jones in Men in Black.
"A person is smart. But people are dumb, panicky, dangerous animals and you know it." The novelization of the film actually takes it a bit further and adds "A mob is only as smart as it's dumbest member."
Long story short, group-think skews towards the simplistic and instinctual. This election is close for the same reason that one scared cow will turn into a stampede even though the rest of them have no idea what they're running from...because we're wired to see that if other people are running, maybe we should be too...it's a matter of survival.
A smart person can see past that and resist when they're alone. But get them into a crowd of like minded individuals and we aren't smart anymore. And people like Trump take advantage of that.
What is that, about tree-fiddy American?
Reagan and "trickle down economics" ushered in the 80s and poured gasoline onto Wall Street, empowering a thousand Gordon Geckos to abandon the middle class workers in the name of greater profit.
I used the phrase "tilting at windmills" when discussing current politics and got looked at like an insane person.
No one reads anymore, apparently.