It’s Time for a Reality Reboot
We are a deeply divided a country, but if there is one thing all Americans can agree on, it’s the reality that we have a lot of problems.
There are the big ones hitting us right now: Covid-19, the resulting economic collapse and our nationwide reckoning with racial injustice. And then there are the others that may not be in the forefront for everyone but are no less serious. Climate change, healthcare, systemic racism, the national debt, income inequality, opioids, immigration, sex trafficking, mass shootings — they all touch us in some way. But there is only one problem in America that can be considered the most damaging and therefore the most urgent of any single one of those other problems, because it is the one problem that stands in the way of us finding solutions to all of those others.
America’s most urgent problem: We no longer have a shared reality. Let’s call it Problem #1
Why does the loss of a shared reality deserve a #1 ranking? Consider that the starting point for solving any problem is a clear understanding of all of its components: how serious it is, who it impacts, where it is happening, its causes and consequences and anything else one needs to know to fully comprehend its current state and begin the work of finding a solution.
