Exploring & Pondering the Quagmire of the Dis-United States

by Jeff Bloom • February 14, 2025

As I’m sure most of you are doing, I’m trying to keep my feet on the ground while pondering our current situation in the U.S. It’s far too easy to get caught up in the emotional upheavals and the hopelessness, despair, and claustrophobia that result. And, this messy emotional quagmire just clouds and disrupts our thinking, not to mention pretty much ruins our day-to-day lives. 

So, with as much clarity as I can muster, I’d like to analyze our situation from the perspectives, of complex living systems, time, and change. The major frame for understanding our situation involves complex living systems. All living things and social and ecological systems are layers of interdependent and entangled complex systems. Although the idea of “complexity” may sound daunting, paradoxically it is actually quite simple; at least, simple to grasp at a more general level. Simply put, complex systems, which are living systems, tend to be self-sustaining, self-maintaining, self-reproducing, and so on. Unlike mechanical systems, which are highly predictable, complex systems are not entirely predictable. In some situations, we may be able to say that if we build a baseball stadium, they will come, but who the “they” are we don’t know, when they will come we don’t know, and there’s always a chance no one will come. And, the stadium could always get wiped out by a tornado, or the funding disappears and the stadium is never completed. In addition, mechanical systems are linear, cause-and-effect systems. If there are cycles, like in an gasoline engine, the cycle is basically a straight line bent into a simple loop. Gas and air are mixed and squirted into the engine’s cylinder, where the spark plug ignites a spark, followed by an explosion, which pushes the piston, then the piston goes back up pushing out the exhaust fumes, and the process repeats. In complex systems, the processes are non-linear and often consist of multiple, interdependent looping and recursive processes, where all sorts of adjustments and changes can occur in order to maintain continuity while addressing changing circumstances across multiple contexts. 

Each cell in our bodies is a complex living system that is interdependently intertwined with other cells and other types of cells. This pattern of interdependent entanglements applies to all levels of scale up to the biosphere as a whole, including all of our social systems or social contexts. Now comes the hitch. For centuries, especially since the 1600’s, Western societies have adopted the worldview popularized by René Descartes that interprets everything in our world, living and non-living, as consisting of mechanistic, linear processes. The United States was established in it’s Constitution as a mechanistic entity.  Part of that approach for a social system was the development of laws, policies, and other procedural orders. Here, I’m not saying that these laws, policies, and orders are necessarily bad, but they do present certain problems that are not usually addressed at the time of their creation. While complex living systems are inherently flexible, which is necessary for survival and continuity, the nature of complex social systems is thrown off kilter when people try to mechanize and control them. This mechanization process is an attempt at solidifying the system, which creates varying degrees of rigidity. Depending upon the degree of rigidity, adapting or adjusting to changing circumstances can at worst be prevented, and at best be made difficult to make adjustments in a timely manner. 

And, speaking of “time,” our relationship or perception of time has changed drastically from the beginning of an independent U.S. The Constitution was created to address the concerns of the time. At this time, communication travelled slowly, by foot, by ship, or by horse. After the development of the railway in the 1800’s, news travelled a bit more quickly, although horses were used for local deliveries. The telegraph sped up short transmissions, But, once radio and telephone arrived on the scene, message and news could travel quickly around the country. Time had steadily sped up. Now, with the internet and social media, news, information, misinformation, and disinformation spreads faster than a pandemic. Almost instantaneously all sorts of information, including videos, can travel around the world. And, now with the frightening entry of AI, fake videos abound and spread like viruses on steroids. Not only has everything sped up beyond imagination, but our minds are being inundated with true and false information to the point where it’s difficult to tell them apart. 

The Constitution is way beyond out-of-date. It was not written to be flexible. And, the systems of governing that were developed in the beginning haven’t changed all that much. They are antiquated and rigid. Our justice system takes way, way too long to have much of an effect on anything critical in our fast time society. Our congressional system is no longer anywhere close to being representative of the populace, but is heavily influenced by money, which was not as severe an issue in 1790. Capitalism hadn’t yet taken its death-grip hold on society and its politicians. 

Now, we’re living in a dysfunctional system that’s unable to adjust to changing circumstances. It is rarely, if at all, possible to change a dysfunctional system from within the dysfunctional system. Yet, that is what we see some of our politicians trying to do. Now our system of government is on the verge of becoming a runaway system. And, runaway systems inevitably collapse. 

To save what’s left of this society is going to require stepping out of the system, how ever that might manifest. But, if we wait too long, more damage will be done, more suffering will occur, more loss of life, and the more difficult it will be to recover. But, stepping out of the system to save the system might be a good thing. It is an opportunity to re-create a flexible, adaptable, and just system, where money is taken completely out of politics. Where justice can be just and rapid. Where the wealth is more distributed and the billionaires pay their share of supporting our society. Where we actually can have a democracy that adheres to the principles and characteristics of a government for, by, and of the people. 

© 2025 by Jeffrey W. Bloom

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