The United States almost became un-united back in the twenties. There wasn’t exactly a civil war, but many skirmishes around the country for almost a decade. At one point, several states collectively put a transcript together for secession. There were so many problems with that scenario. It would mean a weaker military. One side of the country would be cut off from the other, although there were plenty of mixed-partisan states in the middle. The in-fighting got pretty ugly. Finally, some clever citizens came up with a way to keep the country together, let everyone have their cake and eat it too. At first, it sounded like an impossible idea, but the United States was, after all, the grandest experiment on the earth, so they gave it a try and it worked. States with 60% or more of a particular political preference were labeled either red or blue. Since many citizens could now live where they wanted and still work, since most work was remote and online, people gravitated to their color of choice and relocated. Then, similar to giving power to the states, but at the Federal level, sweeping legislation occurred that allowed certain rights in blue or red states. For instance, abortion was legal in blue states, marijuana was legal, and drugs became decriminalized, which didn’t mean they were legal, it meant that instead of going to jail, a person would get help from the health care system for addiction, similar to what they had in Australia. At first, naturally, drug addicts moved to the blue states, where they set up entire tent or small home cities for them. They no longer had to steal to get their drugs, and one by one, they were given treatment for their addictions, whereupon they were given vocational training and became functional citizens in the society. Crime naturally decreased because drug addicts no longer had to steal, and they didn’t have to constantly revisit the prison system, which simply perpetuated their lives of crime. Needless to say, this disgusted many citizens of the blue states at first, but after the system was in place, it started to work, and life in those states eased into a rhythm.
In opposition to this system, the red states continued the old system of nabbing all drug users, putting them in prisons, which continued to pump out criminals with high rates of recidivism. There were more drugs in the prisons sometimes than outside of them. Drugs were easy to obtain, and rehab centers for drug users were mostly private, meaning they were expensive and only the rich could afford them, but they rarely worked. Thus, not much changed in the red states, but they were mostly happy with the system as it was.
Once people moved to a red or blue state, they tended to stay there. However, there were some jobs that could only be found in a particular region of the country, so occasionally people would have to live in a state that didn’t suit their political philosophies. This created problems, because nothing is ever perfect and there is no such thing as a utopia except in the imagination, but things were a lot better than they had been 20 years earlier. In some ways, these enclaves were like little Israels in the middle of the Arab nations. Mostly, though, they kept to themselves and didn’t create too much chaos. There were some liberal towns in the middle of red states and some conservative towns in the middle of blue states, but it was mostly understood that this was okay.
The red states tended to have more organized religion and the blue states didn’t, not that it hadn’t always been that way, but more and more people lived in areas that suited them, and after all the hooplah and violence and downright contempt for each other earlier in the 21st century, nobody really minded the division. It allowed people to worship or not worship as they pleased. There were different laws for blue and red states, so everyone knew where they needed to go. For instance, in blue states, nobody could be refused a marriage license, regardless of their gender persuasion. In red states, marriages that existed before the new laws were grandfathered in, but no new licenses were issued. This created a problem for people who wanted to live near their families, but they either dealt with it or moved to a blue state. So, people who identified with multiple genders tended to live in the blue states, and people who believed that only 2 genders existed lived in the red states. It was the only compromise that seemed to work. Earlier in the century, people fought the idea, especially the liberals and the LGBTQ community. They believed that everyone should have equal rights under the law, but there was so much bias and hate and violence against them, that when the Red and Blue laws were enacted in the Federal Congress, they realized that it was the only way to keep people relatively safe and happy. It took at least a generation before it became widely accepted, mostly because a new generation doesn’t know anything different, so they tend to accept what is in front of them, until they realize inequities and fight to change them. But, it seemed to be working.
There were other differences. People of color, black, brown, red, and yellow gravitated to the blue states, whereas many white people moved to the red states. There were still plenty of white people who wanted to live in the blue states, so they were much more diverse than the red states. That’s the way it had been for a long time, but after the Red/Blue divide, the red states became whiter, and the blue states just became more like a rainbow.
Of course, this created more problems because people in the red states were often not pleased when their neighborhoods became more colorful, but the violence decreased after the Red/Blue divide. Hatred still existed, as is the case with humans, but since most people knew their place, in other words, where they were accepted or not, the chaos seemed to settle down. Once the violent, machismo citizens didn’t have anyone around them to hate, and had the laws they wanted in place, and there were jobs for them, they had to do something else with their pent-up anger, so they developed sports that were even more bloody than wrestling, and even more testosterone driven than football or rugby. Many of the people from Supremacist groups got involved, breaking limbs and getting as bloody as one would get in a bar brawl, but it seemed to calm the savage beast inside them, and they stopped spewing their hate on the rest of the country.
As for the downtrodden, there were new social programs that helped many of them get on their feet, or at least get them out of the streets and out of gangs. Finally, someone was listening, and realized that the weakest links in society create the biggest problems for everyone else. Police reform took place over the course of a generation, and they were armed with social workers, child-care workers, and other professionals who worked with them side-by-side. At first, the police were enraged that they couldn’t do things the way they had always done them. They felt like they weren’t considered important enough, or that their authority was being undermined, until they realized that their jobs got easier because they had help. Community groups were formed around the country, in both red and blue states, and the police were part of the conversation. Gang members, community leaders, and even drug addicts were invited, as were school teachers, single working moms, and so forth. These were modeled on ideas from other countries that had successfully organized communities to be resilient and start taking care of themselves. It got easier because after the pandemic of 2020, and the reshuffling of people from cities to smaller cities all over the country, communities got more manageable. Resources were also redistributed. Again, this wasn’t perfect, and there were still many communities that resisted the reorganization, and because humans are flawed, not everyone did what they were supposed to do. Still, it was a really good start and one by one, communities were seeing growth, less violence, and more solidarity.
There was a third World War. Everyone thought it was going to be the War that ended the world, but as one can see, it is still here and there are still billions of people living on the earth. It was ugly, as all wars are, and many people were killed, but it was brief, because the countries of the world realized that this insanity would be the end of humanity, so they got together and figured out how to put an end to it. The whole thing began because some small country with a big bomb finally went off the deep end. The bigger powers were at first reactionary, and a few other bombs were dropped, and of course, retaliation took place, until the world leaders had an emergency meeting and came up with a plan. First, they agreed not to attack each other. Then, they agreed that they would push their weight around and give an ultimatum to the smaller countries that had decided to get cocky. They made the little guys realize that together, the Seven Sisters had more fire power than the sun, and they could obliterate the naughty children in a few hours. Needless to say, the little guys pulled back, and the big guys went in and dismantled their weapons. The end. Not really, but it’s too awful to think about anymore.
ADDED in 2023: North Korea, as always, was a problem. They were not the first country to drop the bomb, but naturally, after the first nuke was fired, they threatened to obliterate the big boys. At first, Russia and China wanted to ally with them, but when the war really got going, Russia and China realized a few things. First, that North Korea was a bratty child, a loose cannon that needed to be reigned in, and secondly, that they could essentially hold North Korea hostage, using them to their advantage. Eventually, as things progressed, it became clear that small countries with fire power were like the barbaric groups that invaded larger countries, helping to topple them.
The fallout from some of the nukes and raging climate change events shifted many things on earth. Where people lived, and where they could find clean air. People migrated to different cities, states, and countries. Aside from shifts in population density, there was a reorganization of boundaries. Like everything else, eventually, things started to settle down and get back to some sort of normalcy.
Following chapters: AI & the Singularity; Other tech stuff; Art; People’s purpose;
