Elements of a Truly Great Story
In the context of modern American politics
Any significant story, fictional or true, succeeds in revealing some truths about who we are as individuals, as communities, and, in the case of some stories, even as a nation. A great story tells us something about our shared humanity. A great story explores our connections. It confronts our flaws. It acknowledges the potential for destruction, but it also illuminates a path to redemption.
Here at Meet Me in the Middle, we believe that we are in the midst of a truly great story. It is the story of the United States of America and her recovery from the extensive destruction that has come at the hands of a corrupt system controlled by the elite. The ending of her story, or at least this current monumental chapter, has not yet been written. The ending depends on how the American people are connected and their resistance to the forces that drive them apart. The outcome depends very much on our willingness to confront our own flaws as individuals, as communities, and as political tribes. The conclusion of whether we find redemption as a nation or we plummet into decay is yet to be determined, but it is very much up to us.
Every story has a struggle. What is the struggle in this story of America? We suggest it can be distilled to how we deal with morally ambiguous issues. The struggle is evident in the countless narratives that reveal consistent patterns: how fear is used to stoke division, how only the most courageous foster unity, and how our reactivity helps embolden a government that has more and more control over the individual.
Where are we in the story at this moment? The Lefties who can afford it are moving out of America. Of those who can’t, many talk of secession. The Righties would have been in the same boat with a different outcome in the last presidential election. Who even cares anymore about the story of America? Why does this story need to be told? Well, we think the story needs telling — over and over until people begin listening — because it forces us to confront who we are at this moment and what we are collectively turning into.
The story needs to be told with transparency. Free of the rhetoric and free of the skewed and corrupted perspectives. Free of the noise that prevents access to the truth.
This article is not the American story. It is about that story. It is about saving America. It is about unity.
Decline - A Choice Or An Inevitability?
Empires rise and empires fall — humanity has hopefully learned that much from history. It is worth viewing the modern American story through the lens of historic empires so that we may identify common causes of failure or decline among those historically great empires (British, Roman, Mongol, Ottoman, Russian, Spanish). While these empires profoundly shaped world history, they also provide profound insights into the kinds of pitfalls that a powerful nation like the U.S. might want to avoid.
The great empires each faced economic difficulties that were often tied closely to their own military overreach. Does the idea of the combination of inflation and decline in trade with prolonged conflicts that drain a nation’s resources and weaken a nation’s military might sound familiar? That is a recipe for unrest and political instability, also common ingredients in the decline of an empire. Throw in some corruption among the ruling elite and then sprinkle in some factionalism, and we have a recipe for the empire’s centralized power to see greater potential for fracturing.
Empires do not fall due to a single cause. Their power gets eroded away through a complex intermingling of contributing forces, which create or expose vulnerabilities that fracture the empire in multiple ways… until it crumbles. This all sounds painfully familiar to what has befallen the United States over the past couple of decades. But what holds an empire together? What is REALLY holding it together? Is an expansion of centralized power the answer or is it the improved health of connections among citizens and their communities?
The U.S. is already fracturing. If the U.S. does crumble, it seems reasonable that we might be able to look back and see the contributing factors: wars in distant lands, inflation, poor trade arrangements, corruption among lawmakers and the corporations to which they are loyal, and the coalescing of divisively rigid factions. Can we recover from all of that if we can manage to preserve our culture and our societal values? Alternatively, if we lose our moral center, will we certainly be lost?
That genuinely seems to be the crossroads where we find ourselves today. As a nation, we are faced with not just losing our culture, but abandoning our societal values and our morality for the sake of solidarity with a political tribe. Dig into almost any political or cultural issue and you will find someone willing to rationalize or justify the actions of their “side,” even if it is counter to their own morals.
We postulate that the symptoms of our sick empire (military overreach, economic instability, rampant corruption within government) are consequences of an underlying root cause: a willingness to abandon, or at least to concede, our own personal values and morality. We theorize that such abandonment or concession is a choice, not an inevitability. The choice might not be a direct one in which someone declares that they are abandoning their values. For instance, believing the falsehoods and buying into the messages broadcast by propagandist networks like MSNBC is a choice that leads to the abandonment or concession of values. But it is a choice all the same.
We believe this is a story worth telling.
A Morally Ambiguous Landscape
A great story has a great landscape for displaying the conflict at hand. The story of modern America can be portrayed in our morally ambiguous political and cultural landscape, which is teeming with examples of values that are in competition and interests that are in conflict. Moral judgment is challenged with abundant frequency in cases where the idea of justice can only be achieved at the cost of individual freedom. As a result, the solution to a problem that might be a moral imperative for one person will almost certainly be viewed as oppression by another. What such problems can we point to as examples?
It is imperative to transition our global energy consumption to renewable resources such as solar energy to save the world, but economic leadership of the past couple of decades pushed nearly the entire solar cell manufacturing sector in the hands of an adversarial country with substandard environmental oversight and controls. The drive to transition to solar energy to save Mother Earth is actually making Mother Earth sicker! And with no measurable improvements to the symptoms that were supposed to improve with the mass deployment of solar cells. Harming the world to save the world seems ambiguous, and that is without even getting into the more morally ambiguous subject of human exploitation associated with maintaining that solar cell supply chain.
It is imperative to protect future generations from a supposed climate crisis even though the remedies are in conflict with the immediate needs of the people and economies of developing nations. While countries like the U.S. and many of its allies enjoyed development and advancement thanks to “dirty” energy, they seek to deny other developing nations that luxury. Thus, these developing nations are trapped in a technological deficit.
It is imperative to allow immigration across the U.S. southwestern border to create opportunities for millions in search of a better life, but many immigrants die along the way, get repeatedly raped before arriving in the U.S., or fall victim to human traffickers. Plus, open immigration policy allows many criminals into the United States and U.S. citizens suffered or died as a result. As if that scenario did not present enough moral ambiguity, now the deportation effort provides another layer.
It is imperative to support foreign wars, which are ripe for moral ambiguity. Support for human rights and relieving the innocent from the atrocities of war is in direct conflict with battling an oppressive and militaristic authoritarian. For the authoritarian to lose, countless innocents must die. To concede is an acceptance that those who have already died did so in vain — that acceptance would unavoidably be accompanied by an acknowledgment that those lives never needed to be lost to an un-winnable war.
It is imperative to stop misinformation. Control over the narrative that reaches the public is maintained by those who control the means by which information (or misinformation) is spread. Algorithms control the flow of information and select the information that is promoted. Should misinformation be limited via algorithms? What about when the “misinformation” turns out to be true information? There is definitely some moral ambiguity in the idea of ethical considerations about content moderation “for the good of the public.”
The “side” that holds the moral high ground is more ambiguous than ever. Gravitation to moral clarity comes with the benefit of certainty but at the cost of nuance and an understanding of real ethical complexities. As the individual seeks more moral certainty at this intersection of conflicting views and ethical issues, the political and cultural world grows exceedingly morally ambiguous.
We believe this makes for a story that is very much worth telling.
A Morally Ambiguous Protagonist
While not an essential element for a great story, an engaging morally ambiguous character certainly is an ingredient for spicing up the story. Imagine a world leader who fits the following description:
Someone who speaks candidly, even at the risk of upsetting many; someone who speaks his mind without the filter that most have grown accustomed to.
Someone who is strategic and resourceful, who uses his skills and experience to navigate complex situations, and whose unexpected maneuvers defy traditions and norms.
Someone who makes morally ambiguous choices, whose decisions raise ethical questions, who prioritizes his quest over those who have unwittingly been sacrificed by the great evil he battles, and whose controversial decisions ultimately lead to a positive outcome despite the concern it provokes.
Someone who is charismatic but flawed, who has stumbled but seeks redemption through sacrifice, and who ultimately strives to make a positive impact despite the personal cost.
Someone who embodies a certain moral code characterized by its purpose and by a duty to those who are counting on him, even though it might have the appearance of ruthlessness to others.
A leader with complex morality and a willingness to make difficult choices and employ unorthodox tactics? Someone who walks the line between hero and villain?Now, that is a compelling character. That is the kind of character who can navigate a morally ambiguous political and cultural landscape. What would it take for history to view such a character as someone who contributed positively versus someone who caused wide harm?
With such a character in a prominent role in this chapter of America’s story, the saga has clearly become more captivating. Since the glaringly corrupt have failed America for so long, perhaps the morally ambiguous character is an essential element to a positive outcome to this great story.
The Revolution
When told in the context of battling the modern progressive left, the story focuses on the push and pull between the liberty of individuals and conformity to ideology. It features a tension between those who have given into the temptation to simply force their opposition into silence and those who see such actions as an overreach of the progressive orthodoxy. It is the story of a stand taken against cancel culture, identity politics, and institutional capture.
But it is a story of wrestling with deeper truths, about what it truly means to be fair and compassionate in the modern world — and it is a story of two diametrically opposed sides that both claim to champion these truths. One side stood for the collective while the other stood for the individual.
The story is so often told through the eyes of the individual. Like other revolutions, the battle against the modern progressive Left begins with the feelings experienced on the individual level — in this case, feelings that social pressures have silenced you and stifled your dissent and feelings of being forced into conformity.
The revolution against the authoritarian progressive Left has picked up enough momentum to place a new kind of leader in power. The key for this movement is to expose as much about the corruption of the coercive modern progressive Left without abandoning the idea of justice. The revolution has been successful, but the movement is not yet victorious — and it cannot succeed if it results in a further fracturing of our greater human connection.
That is the part of the story that remains. Can we stand for truth and freedom while also acknowledging our capacity for blunder? Can we compromise?
That is a story that we want to keep soaking in!
Bringing It On Home
A world of intrigue. An empire hanging in the balance. A charismatic and provocative leader. A revolution fighting for our values, our traditions, and our morality. These are elements of a gripping story.
A good story peels away the illusions that veil our blemishes and faults. It exposes both the wonderful and the hideous. It provides hope in the face of ruin or disaster. This chapter in America’s story has all of these ingredients.
We believe that is why so many find themselves so enthralled with the unfolding saga. It is truly a captivating tale. The intrigue over what is coming next is tantalizing. Will it be a hero who stands tall or a villain who will fall? What twists remain?
As we collectively navigate a terrain where moral clarity is sought but rarely achieved without surrendering some part of one’s morality, is it reasonable to deconstruct the moral dilemma of America’s story to the level of individual freedom versus collective survival? Is it fair to say that American strength is buckling due to the root cause of the deterioration of our values on an individual level that has come about because of our own choices? If this is as great of a story as we suspect, it should force us to look inward, to confront the truths about who we are, and to decide whether that is who we want to be.
America’s destiny is on the line. The story continues to unfold and WE are dictating how the current chapter ends. We will continue to encounter choices. Do we choose only to attack the other side? Do we double down on our commitment to lying media? Is that what want to be? Or do we acknowledge and celebrate American successes? Do we choose to forge stronger connections with fellow Americans?
We believe that the moral choice is for a positive outcome for this chapter, and it is simple: choose to meet in the middle! Conceptually simple, that is… not so simple in practice. There are no positive outcomes borne of an adherence to one polarized side or the other. If have figured out that anything but meeting in the middle offers no hope of success, then that should be your starting point on any issue — which would start you in an optimal position to succeed. Compromise for the sake of a workable outcome is noble, but just remember not to compromise on truth or facts — or else you will never find yourself in the middle despite your best efforts.
Acknowledging our flaws, adherence to values, a commitment to truth, and a willingness to compromise — these are the choices that will illuminate the path to a satisfying resolution to the struggle that America is facing in this chapter of her story… the path to meeting in the middle.
So, what say you? Are you ready to make the choice to Meet Me in the Middle?