Conversation

Even at the height of the Cold War I don’t think “become like the Soviet Union” was ever either a popular or elite aspiration anywhere in the world 🤔 “Become like America” was usually the popular aspiration to the extent elites let American culture be visible, uncensored
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America might be the first and last popular aspirational civilizational condition in history. Elites have occasionally wanted to be French, Persian, Danish, or Singaporean, but masses generally didn’t have enough contact with other cultures to aspire to be like them until TV
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Replying to
And everyone wanted/still wants to be "Third Rome" after the original(s) vanished centuries ago. It remains to be seen if anyone will claim to be the second US, should the current franchise meet its demise.