how would you say USA improved and became worse in the last decade or so ?

22 comments

1. Trump brought all the disgusting racists out of the woodwork because he made it okay to be out and awful

2. Far Worse, the war on terror, the massive increase in the spying power of federal agencies, political divisions, economic fragility, media mud slinging, scabs over social issues being torn off for political gain, foreign policy blunders, a lack of common identity and values, the muddying of history and fighting over it,

   While we might not be a dysfunctional nation yet, we’re closer to it than we were

3. I think regular people have gotten more progressive and accepting overall, but Trump created a party that wants to completely upend the country and I wish that didn’t exist

4. A decade ago I could get an abortion when I needed one and survive parenting a baby. Idt I could do either of these things now, and I genuinely find it terrifying that things like legislative hate speech and intentional fuckery are leaving most of us out here to die.

   I might be older than some ppl on this thread bc I’ve been an adult for awhile and grew up in the 80’s. The US is completely unrecognizable socially and politically from where it was—and it was bad enough then.

   The christofascism is putting a damper on my life that I cannot change by myself. That is frustrating.

   Edited for clarity

5. Much worse. I don’t care what size of the aisle you’re on or what you believe.

6. Polarization and extremism on both sides has made this country far worse, and even more detrimental, it’s made solving future problems even more difficult.

   Some folks on the left literally want to repeal the second amendment. Some folks on the right literally want to repeal the first amendment. Neither side can communicate like sane, rational adults. And those who can still choose not to because they’d rather pander to their moronic base who buys into all the pandering and rage-baiting thrown in their direction. This kind of rhetoric fires up the politically engaged, pushing them more and more to the extreme side of the spectrum, and causes the people in the middle to grow more and more apathetic.

   How it’s gotten better: when I was a kid gay marriage was just a California thing. Being trans wasn’t even spoke of at all. Nowadays gay marriage isn’t even really that controversial and trans people are now acknowledged and have massive support from many people. Interracial marriage is ever rising, crime is, on average, decreasing as a trend, and society as a whole is becoming more and more aware of injustices and less afraid to speak out against them. People are also demanding better work-life balance and better working conditions. Also people take technology for granted but have you ever actually been to the rural parts of China, Mexico, or Japan? There are parts of the world, developed parts of the world, where they don’t have the same amenities and luxuries we take for granted and buy our grade-school children for Christmas. Quality of life is something Americans love to take for granted.

7. The crime rate across all of America was higher. Though there are spikes here and there, it’s a lot safer in today’s America than a decade ago.

8. In general, better. Unemployment is down. Wages are up. Medicaid is expanded in more states. Normal people know not to trust everything on the internet. Teen pregnancy, Child mortality and death rates from cancer continue to decline. Marriage equality is a law passed by congress.

   As a small thing, technology integration is way better. I can order food/stuff on my phone, know when its ready and go pick it up or get the delivery. My order is also correct. All the finance mobile apps are way better.

   I feel many of the political issues have always been there — now we just know about them more. The conspiracy theorists, racists, nazis and communists were always there, they just kept quiet since they thought they were the only ones.

   The one big downside is drug overdose deaths, but the seeds of that were already sowed 10 years ago when opioid prescriptions being handed out with abandon.

9. Mixture of good and bad.

   I’d definitely say it’s gotten a bit worse, especially with inflation, and careers barely paying the bills, and lots of Americans are working paycheck to paycheck, and now basic needs are expensive. Car prices have increased too, and I remember the gas fiasco last year when gas was almost $5.

   Back in the day, if you had a college degree you were pretty much set for life, but now even a college degree is barely enough, and salary and wages haven’t increased. Jobs that want 5-10 years of experience but they only are paying you 55-60k for it. Good office Jobs have become so picky now, and you have college degree holders working at Walmart, Doordash, Amazon, Starbucks, when they should have more higher up jobs, such as being the manager for the companies and whatnot.

   The good things about that now, Xennials, Millennials, Zillennials, Gen Z now make up the workplace now, and are working on changing it for the better. The workplace is also changing now too. Nowadays you have women, people of color, lgbtq, disabled people getting into the workplace and high ranking positions are are getting recognized now, and people are now being serious about mental health and erasing the stigma of therapy and counseling.

10. Worse politically, government can’t get anything done. I don’t see any improvements.

11. Rise of Christian nationalism, positions of sides become clear, as with any form of extremism now it’s clear to more people that there can be no middle ground with those who espouse Christian fascism.

    Christian nationalists killed more people than terrorists in USA now.

    The single biggest threat to religious freedom in the United States today is Christian nationalism.

    Christian nationalism is antithetical to the constitutional ideal that belonging in American society is not predicated on what faith one practices or whether someone is religious at all.

    The political ideology that seeks to merge American and Christian identities is deeply embedded in American society and manifests itself in a number of different ways, some more obviously harmful than others.

    The most violent expressions, such as what we saw at the January 6 insurrection, get most of the attention. But the more subtle ones—like state legislative efforts to promote the teaching of the Bible in public schools or to require the posting of “In God We Trust” in public schools and other public places—are also dangerous in that they perpetuate the false narrative that to be a true American one must be Christian—and often a certain type of Christian.

    Christian nationalism undergirds a number of threats to religious freedom, including anti-Muslim bigotry, anti-Semitism, and government-sponsored religion.

    Christian nationalism is a political ideology and cultural framework that seeks to merge American and Christian identities. It heavily relies upon a mythological founding of the United States as a “Christian nation,” singled out for God’s special favor. It is not a religion, but it intersects with Christianity in its use of Christian symbols and language.

    But the “Christian” in Christian nationalism is more about identity than religion and carries with it assumptions about nativism, white supremacy, authoritarianism, patriarchy, and militarism. We call them American Taliban for short.

12. Better in all ways except political integration on things except foreign policy

13. Not just the country, but the whole world is worse off because of the invention of the smart phone. It could have been a great thing, but it just because the home for addictive social-media echo chambers.

14. Most measurable metrics looked to have improved, but I think morale is lower from having to go through so much drama lately, and the internet being much more accessible have kinda broken peoples brains a bit here and there.

15. The only thing the left and right can agree on is banning tic toc, that is how messed up our political system is.

16. I guess I’m old enough now to see what is good now, but not so old that I remember what was bad then. Human history is 99.9% living in extreme poverty and civil strife. We are living in man’s greatest moment. Even 30 years ago, things like looking for jobs, shopping, buying airplane tickets and more were more expensive and took a lot longer.

    But as for today…The worst thing? The opioid epidemic. I don’t get very political, but not addressing the opioid epidemic in the early 2010s is something I won’t forgive Obama for. And Trump for continuing to do nothing. Drug addiction is such an evil and pernicious thing. Full credit to Biden for focusing on this.

    I think political incivility today can be bad online. In real life? I rarely encounter the craziness that you see on social media.

    The extreme right can be best explained via obstinate defiance. It’s not that they’re for anything, just against what anyone else is for. And they’re idiots. People like Marjorie Taylor Greene have managed to lower my expectations for a congressperson.

    But the extreme left isn’t better. The push to prevent free speech on campuses has been especially worrisome. Classic liberalism has been replaced by an intolerant progressivism.

    I think social media has exacerbated the concept of victimhood. It is possibly the worst development. It encourages complaining rather than contributing and is a serious strain on society.

    Fortunately, I think most Americans have finally realized that these are the fringes and are pushing back. I didn’t vote for Biden (or Trump), but I’ve been happy with many of his decisions. I think Blinken is a good Secretary of State and has handled Ukraine very well. All I can hope for in politics is that all sides compromise.

    Other positives?

    We have decreased our carbon footprint far more than other countries. Our CO2 levels are at 1916 levels!

    Technology has certainly made our lives safer. Medicine is far better. Cars are far safer.

    The production quality of music and film is much higher.

    We have more tree cover in the US than we did 100 years ago.

    Water quality is improving. We even have a potential solution to the challenge of herbicides getting into our water.

    Our energy mix has greatly improved. Coal is going away and replaced with gas, renewables and solar. Say what you want about the ecological aspect of this, it’s financially much better.

17. It’s getting worse but there’s always the good things. LGBT+ acceptance, racism, sexism, crime rates going down, they’re all getting better. But for the average American life quality is unfortunately getting worse with 2/3’s of us living paycheck to paycheck and our government prioritizing in foreign affairs, over-bloated military, cutting social safety nets, etc. There’s a clear direction we’re going and it’s not a good place

    10 years ago my parents were paying off their own house. Now they’re living paycheck to paycheck bringing in 120k annually together

18. The US has made some significant improvements in the last decade in terms of technological development, healthcare, infrastructure, and education. We’ve seen a shift towards renewable energy and more efficient transportation. On the other hand, the US has become increasingly divided politically, economically, and socially. We have an ever widening gap between the “haves” and “have nots” and a much more complicated foreign policy. It’s hard to say which way the balance tips.

19. Better? Worse: Rising crime; Dems too afraid to address this issue out of fear of losing their voter base. Pervs indoctrinating children in the educational system.

20. I’d say we’ve gotten a lot better but politically speaking both parties have gotten even more sorted. While I was only 17 in 2013 and just getting into politics, blue dogs and Rockefeller Republicans weren’t borderline extinct. While I am on the conservative end of our politics, I have a lot of moderate views and nuances that I wish were better represented. I think that loss of moderates in both parties has upended the ability to compromise, where you don’t have more people in the Susan Collins-Mitt Romney-Joe Manchin-Kirsten Sinema mold who could find common ground on contentious issues. That’s also killed the ability of people to win in states dominated by the other party at the presidential level, thus degrading it even further. As with many of our modern ills, I blame it on social media’s dark side.

21. Down. Hatred towards LGBT is going up, discrimination is going up. Teaching of civil rights is slowing becoming illegal, Christians beliefs are being forced onto other people.

22. Well, that’s a question that could result in a novel. Economically, we’re in a much better place. 10 years ago we were still in the throes of the recession. Today our biggest economic issue is getting slightly-higher-than-normal inflation under control, and that’s despite just being a couple years removed from the entire world shutting down. Our economic success from Obama’s recovery through Trump and Biden’s Administrations has been incredibly resilient.

    Socially, 10 years ago gay marriage was illegal in about half of America. While we are still fighting the fight for the trans community, the improvements for the LGBT community has been the fastest and most dramatic changes for a minority group in American history in such a short time. 10 years ago it was an incredible risk to be openly gay at work in much of America. 15 years ago, *California* passed a law to ban gay marriage. Today it’s the people who are not welcoming who are frowned upon.

    Politically the discourse has been horrifically lowered. It’s sad to see the rise of Trump-era anti-intellectualism, and all of that. I personally believe overturning *Roe* was an awful step backwards for women as well, which was a product of that era. We’ve come out of it with nearly fully eroded trust in our institutions to do what’s necessary in the face of a threat, whether it be the hesitation by those in power on January 6th, the disaster of our COVID response by anyone but the pharmaceutical industry, the eroding of trust in the media from every direction, and more is a very concerning change.

    Technology has been swift in its change, and COVID helped push forward the work-from-home revolution. We’re seeing some pretty significant impacts from that as people are moving all around the country and even the world to work remotely from.

    There’s so much more to talk about but I’ll leave it at those observations