Two American Families

This PBS documentary might be in the top 3 best I have ever watched. Bill Moyers followed 2 working class families from 1991 to 2024, it tells the story of the middle class decline through their eyes and their very personal and honest struggles.
Nobody probably even noticed, but I haven’t posted anything political here since the day Trump was shot at, nor do I really plan to til after the election at a minimum. I didn’t even understand why that was the trigger, but this doc focused for me that, in short, this forum isn’t reality. Everyone here is of course entitled to their beliefs, and some issues raised here are valid and important. However this is a board of largely older white college educated men, and I would bet that the median net worth on this board is a million dollars or more. Society has largely worked for the people here, so many of the discussions are on things like tampons, crowd sizes, anecdotal one offs that “prove” someone’s POV, and other semi meaningless things. And we aren’t alone, everyone nationally is seemingly segregated in their discussions and by extension viewpoints, leading to almost irreversible silos of contact and even more anger. And even eventually guys like the shooter. So that makes much of our “discourse” wasted or even negative energy.

Meantime, this documentary is the reality for a good chunk of the country, their anger is real and justified, but politicians simply exploit it to win votes while doing nothing to fix it, blaming whatever is politically expedient for them. Until this gets fixed, if it even can be, all the other esoteric battles pale, because without a vibrant engaged middle class we will never succeed as a nation.
Yes it’s long (movie length) but it’s well worth your time.

Two American Families | FRONTLINE

now back to my hole .

 

It’s completely apolitical. Read the comments below in that link, there are basically zero negative comments on it. It’s got an 8.4 on IMDB, which in today’s world alone tells you it’s not political.
What makes it great isn't some big insight or POV. Moyers only talks to set up background with an occasional interview with them. It’s that you basically get to see two families for their entire adult life, and what it means to have been working class as the manufacturing jobs left and the struggles that continue to today. And how open the families are about letting you in with them, their hopes, their realities, their successes, their losses etc. it’s truly a unique look at working class America, and Moyers does it by letting their day to day lives show you.
And actually, these two families are remarkably not angry, at least with what is shown, which makes it even more meaningful and poignant.

 

The point of me saying that is that somehow some way, he came to believe his view was so right and important that he decided to make the decision for the entire country. It’s a symptom of a much larger problem we have, everyone thinks they are right because they are largely in echo chambers that don’t challenge their views.
But leave that statement out if you want, it shouldn’t become the taking point of my OP.

 

It was made in three parts over the years, the other two had been aired years ago, so the 2024 one has the 2013 and original one in it, that’s why it’s so long.