7 ms·

>The US used to be a high trust society I don't believe this to be true, or I suppose I would require evidence for this claim that I haven't yet encountered in

>The US used to be a high trust society I don't believe this to be true, or I suppose I would require evidence for this claim that I haven't yet encountered in my life. I find when someone claims that "America used to be so much better" they're completely discounting the experience of all the people who weren't born into or existing in privilege or within the US "in-group." The US has always been distrustful of the indigenous people already inhabiting the North American continent, of newly arrived immigrants, of black people, of single men. Single women were sometimes witches and murdered for it and only recently trusted enough with their own personal freedom, which is being curtailed again. Atheists were never trusted. I really don't think the US was ever a "high-trust" society and there doesn't seem to be any evidence or foundation to claim that it was.

asiachick 4y ago
A society doesn't have to trust minorities to be a high trust society. Japan and Korean are arguably high trust societies but they clearly have lots issues with racism to "outsiders". That is not an excuse for racism. It's just saying your points have nothing to do with high trust or not high trust
- wavefunction 4y ago
  Nobody said trusting minorities was a requirement of a high-trust society but I believe you've completely underlined my point, unintentionally. Immigrants aren't "outsiders" for example. And women and single men, atheists and others I mentioned have nothing to do with race or ethnicity.
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llanowarelves 4y ago
This is an ok summary: "High-trust societies display a high degree of mutual trust not imposed by outside "contractual, legal or hierarchical regulation", but instead are based upon "prior moral consensus". Much writing on the subject refers to Francis Fukuyama's 1995 book, Trust: Social Virtues and Creation of Prosperity, in which he describes "the ability of various peoples to organize effectively for commercial purposes without relying on blood ties or government intervention". A useful test imo is: would you feel comfortable leaving your expensive Macbook, unattended in public, confident nothing would happen to it? In Tokyo? Sure. Chicago, Detroit, NYC... Maybe not. People doing "the right thing" on their own, when nobody is watching. The big American cities used to be more like Tokyo in that regard. Now, you get stolen from and everyone agrees you were stupid and its wholly your fault. [1] https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/High_trust_and_low_trust_societies https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/High_trust_and_low_trust_soc...

asiachick 4y ago

A society doesn't have to trust minorities to be a high trust society. Japan and Korean are arguably high trust societies but they clearly have lots issues with racism to "outsiders". That is not an excuse for racism. It's just saying your points have nothing to do with high trust or not high trust

wavefunction 4y ago
Nobody said trusting minorities was a requirement of a high-trust society but I believe you've completely underlined my point, unintentionally. Immigrants aren't "outsiders" for example. And women and single men, atheists and others I mentioned have nothing to do with race or ethnicity.

deleted 4y ago

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llanowarelves 4y ago

This is an ok summary: "High-trust societies display a high degree of mutual trust not imposed by outside "contractual, legal or hierarchical regulation", but instead are based upon "prior moral consensus". Much writing on the subject refers to Francis Fukuyama's 1995 book, Trust: Social Virtues and Creation of Prosperity, in which he describes "the ability of various peoples to organize effectively for commercial purposes without relying on blood ties or government intervention". A useful test imo is: would you feel comfortable leaving your expensive Macbook, unattended in public, confident nothing would happen to it? In Tokyo? Sure. Chicago, Detroit, NYC... Maybe not. People doing "the right thing" on their own, when nobody is watching. The big American cities used to be more like Tokyo in that regard. Now, you get stolen from and everyone agrees you were stupid and its wholly your fault. [1] https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/High_trust_and_low_trust_societies https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/High_trust_and_low_trust_soc...