Have You Read "The Fourth Turning"?

The Fourth Turning by Strauss and Howe made a bit of a splash when first published at the end of the last century. It continued to create splash after splash subsequently. And now we see it referenced more and more. Why? Because the chaos it predicted - which has already begun - now seems to be heading into a crescendo.

We're not going to summarize the tenets of that book (which we read years ago). We leave that to you. Just know that a "Fourth Turning" marks a major shift in our society every fourth generation. That last two were the Civil War in the 1860s and the Great Depression/World War II in the 1930s/1940s.

To bring this up now does seem obvious. More and more we seem to be at another turning point. And if the book was accurate in its analysis of history and its prognostications, then its a Fourth Turning.

So that means that the current President has stepped into a role he would share with Lincoln and Roosevelt (FDR). Both exerted what were (and called at the time) dictatorial powers in order to in some way "save" the country. So we should not be surprised that the current guy now exerts similar powers. Nothing new here.

We're not trying to minimize or excuse what some perceive - and feel - as a disturbing series of comments and decisions that seem (to some) a blatant manipulation of our lives (and emotions) in order to accomplish what one individual sees as important objectives for our entire country (which they may or may not be).

But as the debate (Is it really debatable?) over this dictatorial thing plays out, we little people trying to live our lives would do better to pay attention to the unraveling that seems to be accelerating around us. It's that unraveling that will have the real impact - if indeed an unraveling is well under way as The Fourth Turning would posit.

Unraveling? Well, yes. And now the stock market has rumbled (which the opponents of the Big Orange Guy attribute to the imposition of tariffs), we get some breathing room to speak of other things besides markets and the economy. (See last post for some "bigger" thing that should get attention and action.)

After all, the market storm that some predicted and have continued to predict for months, even years, is upon us. The deed is done. As for where we're headed we don't exactly know. But it's pretty much out of our hands.

And that give us a bit of room to take a step back and try to look at the forest (the possible unraveling of our accustomed social, cultural and political order) in stead of the trees (the financial markets trembling and the economy heading into (or already in) recession. 

Now, to be clear, having read The Fourth Turning a couple of decades ago, and having an inclination to think that our society has been unraveling slowly (maybe even a bit quickly) through those years, perhaps you might take all this with a grain of salt. After all, if your view is that the collapse of the family, rampant divorce, sexual license, drug addiction, the increasing deterioration of the value of our money (going on for over a century, by the way) some other select tidbits are just fine and dandy, then any talk of unraveling will seem excessive if not, well, unbalanced, even crazy.

But if you've noticed that things have been trending in an undesirable direction for, to be vague, a long time, then a Fourth Turning won't be outside your wheelhouse.

Wherever you stand on this broad, once-every-four-generations crisis, you may still be firmly in the camp that something disturbing has unfolded in recent months, if not years. It could be a clear and specific vision or it could just be a feeling. Either way, something's at least "off."

A Fourth Turning would explain it. But you may have some other interpretation.

Whatever your view on all this, here's a musical take on what could be a Fourth Turning, from back in the days of the 1960's/1970's when many of us "felt" things coming apart at the seams. It at least gets to the emotional underbelly that accompany such times.

(BTW, we last posted THIS song during the Covid Mess in 2020.)