Sometimes, assuming the worst is the best policy.

Assuming the Worst

By William Kilpatrick


Sometimes it pays to assume the worst. Jews who assumed the worst about the Nazis in the early days of Hitler’s rule fled Germany to safe havens and survived. Most of those who assumed that the situation couldn’t get any worse stayed put and did not survive.

The disposition to assume the worst goes against the grain for Americans. Except for a small minority of conspiracy theorists, Americans tend to be of the optimistic sort. It would be difficult to convince most of them that bad times lie ahead. That may be because nothing really bad—bad in the sense of large-scale devastation and loss of life—has happened on these shores since the Civil War. The next most trying time for Americans after that conflict was the Great Depression. But very few living Americans have a clear memory of that period. For that matter, few Americans have any sense of history and, thus, no measuring stick against which to compare the present. We could be slipping into the next Dark Ages and many would be none the wiser.

Speaking of the Dark Ages, you may have noticed that they seem to be staging a comeback. Sex slavery, crucifixions, beheadings, and other seventh-century Arab customs now vie for headline space with computer hacking and space probes. The recent resurgence of Islam version 1.0 is just one of many reasons why it might not be wise to assume that better times are right around the corner.

Any event or series of events can be looked at from either a glass half-full or a glass half-empty perspective, but there are a number of trends about which we may be justified in assuming the worst. Take the matter of rising racial tensions and divisions. The optimistic way to look at recent events in Ferguson, Missouri, New York City, Tampa, Oakland, and elsewhere is to assume that they result from misunderstandings. Those of a Pollyannaish disposition further assume that those in power are doing all they can to restore calm. That’s one way of looking at it. Another view—more gloomy, yet probably more accurate—is that many of those in power want to exacerbate racial tensions.

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