Striving for Intimacy: The Role of Sincerity in the US Elections

[sysop]

It might be nice to know that your dentist is generous, but it is irrelevant to the job of cleaning your teeth. Is the same true of the role of sincerity in politics? The current campaign in the US has seen candidates eager to portray themselves as being as sincere as possible. Voters should not be led astray.

http://www.spiegel.de/international/...-a-863695.html

[wondering14]

Mr. Magill, Jr. complains that Republicans spent $2.5 million for a stage, a stage paid for by their own money. He also complains that the stage is well-designed in order to play its appropriate part in the convention. To change the quadrennial convention particulars, the political system must be change. What system does Mr. Magill, Jr. suggest?

And then he denigrates political emotion. Political people are after all, people, therefore emotional, and they are speech-givers, they have an audience to address. How would he suggest unemotionalizing people? How much did the Democrats pay for their stage? And were any of their participants emotional, that is, people? Democrats are still the Age of Acquarius, emotional, types—not the has beens that Mr. Magill, Jr. suggests.

And, has he listened to or read FDR's fireside chats, for example? FDR was serious, but listeners couldn't help become emotional, whether up or down. Did FDR broadcast his chats without the intention of persuading? How would Mr. Magill, Jr. suggest calibrating a speech-giver so that he or she doesn't move the emotional needle?

After reading Mr. Magill, Jr.'s early sentences, I'm afraid that I couldn't get any further into his essay.

Yes, I have never liked the sincerity factor in the US social-structure. It is perhaps linked to the folkish tendency toward optimism even against the facts. I am an American, and have always been rather reserved than outgoing on this sort of display, and this reticence has brought no end of trouble to me and made me feel like I live in a Kafkaesque and dangerous land. I really enjoyed living in Turkey, because the measure of sincerity was not based on strange-facial-expressions. In Turkey, it is considered insincere if you smile too much. Consequently, Turks have a more dead-pan expression. I really liked this, because it was less mask-wearing.

In the USA, we are seen as stupidly sincere, and foreigners want to sit on our shoulders like devils and whisper in our ears, to see if they can get anything out of these stupidly sincere people. Israel, England, Germany, all take turns whispering into out ears. "Help us fight Iran?" or "Help us beat the Serbs?"....whisper, whisper...