A Look Back To See Ahead
Subtitle: Our Chronic Culture Viewed From the 1970's
Publisher: AuthorHouse
Published: May 29, 2007
Language: eng
Format: Paperback
Number of pages: 188
ISBN-13: 9781434302076
Subjects: Popular culture; Social Sciences; Essays; General; Popular Culture - General; Self-Help : General; Social Science / Popular Culture; Social Science : Essays; Social Science; Pop Arts / Pop Culture; Sociology
First sentence: Is society sick?  You don't have to reflect on what your parents told you, what was learned in school, or what the media say.  What do you think?  Societal programming makes this difficult.  You are taught to think in a prescribed manner and to take formulated thinking with a smile.  You are not programmed to base your thinking on individual experience, but the collective will of the people.  This is a process that is followed and reinforeced at every juncture of your life.  You are taught what to think, feel and believe, indeed, what is true as society defines truth.  Somehow society has fallen prey to its own refining process, coming to believe its own myths and taboos, and taking itself seriously as the last word in everything.
Description: The current economic crisis was brought on by a well documented series of missteps from the subprime real estate meltdown, to the irresponsible risks on Wall Street, to the failure of leadership in Detroit in the automotive industry, and yes, to the collective passivity of the rest of us.  
 
To dramatize his point, he returns to the chaotic and taciturn 1970s to show what is happening now compared to what was happening then.  Like deja vu, it apparent to him that we are facing situations that seem strangely similar if not precisely the same as nearly forty years ago.  

President Barak Obama could easily step into the same quicksand, because that is metaphorically what it is, if he is not careful.  C. J. Jung might see our new president as the archetypical leader destined to return the United States to the citadel on the hill.  He certainly has his work cut out for him.  

Consider this: for far too long the US Congress has stayed the same, has missed the changes, hasn't had the fortitude to face them, and consequently, it has left the future up for grabs.  

A LOOK BACK TO SEE AHEAD asks the reader to see how little has changed, and why attempting to solve our problems with the same thinking that created them can no longer be tolerated.  Dr. Fisher describes the problem.  He feels there is no shortage of experts who would provide the prescription, hopefully, with the caveat he offers here.
Notes: In A LOOK BACK TO SEE AHEAD, Dr. Fisher argues that early 21th century America is not unlike the 1970s in America, when young people were forced to participate in an unpopular war; when political upheaval was in the air; when corrupt politicians who lied and deceived the electorate reached a crescendo with Watergate; when drugs were ruining lives; when morality took a holiday; when new forms of bigotry and hatred were hatching; when the automotive industry was in sharp decline, while foreign automakers were eating our lunch; when an energy crisis rocked the land with OPEC's oil embargo; and when a paranoid president hunkered down and became a law unto himself.
Table of contents: label: I
title: Perambulating to Perdition
pagenum: 5; label: IX
title: Is Society Sick?
pagenum: 87