The US (in particular) has seen a significant decline in trust (think community, as in union, as in Federalist #10 etc.) in all manner of fundamentals of democracy and 'modernity' (tech, science, etc.) in the past several decades. And, bear in mind that there are significant differences in the way people cope with these sorts of changes and the increasing instability* quite generally for many people as well as local and regional communities.
Fire departments, since the time of Ben Franklin, have mostly, to my knowledge, doused fires with "extinguishers," not "accelerants".**
* Especially economic - not in the sense of "time for 'entitlements'", ideally, in the sense of "time to reconsider if trashing the 'New Deal' starting ~ in the 70s might have been a bad idea" ... for those not already thinking that way. Nothing better (socially) than to provide people with meaningful ways of 'acquiring capital.'
The US (in particular) has seen a significant decline in trust (think community, as in union, as in Federalist #10 etc.) in all manner of fundamentals of democracy and 'modernity' (tech, science, etc.) in the past several decades. And, bear in mind that there are significant differences in the way people cope with these sorts of changes and the increasing instability* quite generally for many people as well as local and regional communities.
Fire departments, since the time of Ben Franklin, have mostly, to my knowledge, doused fires with "extinguishers," not "accelerants".**
* Especially economic - not in the sense of "time for 'entitlements'", ideally, in the sense of "time to reconsider if trashing the 'New Deal' starting ~ in the 70s might have been a bad idea" ... for those not already thinking that way. Nothing better (socially) than to provide people with meaningful ways of 'acquiring capital.'
** Outside of stories in books, anyway...