A Nation Coming Apart
The meaning of the American idea in 2019
December 2019
In This Issue
A nation coming apart: articles by Danielle Allen, Caitlin Flanagan, James Mattis, Tom Junod, Lin-Manuel Miranda, Adam Serwer, and others. Plus the demise of "I'm sorry," Texas secessionists, Leslie Jamison on Garry Winogrand, the tribe of Peloton, Queen & Slim, how to raise kind kids, and more.
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Photograph by Sam Kaplan; prop styling by Brian Byrne How America Ends
A tectonic demographic shift is under way. Can the country hold together?
S. B. Walker The Places Where the Recession Never Ended
A conversation with Tara Westover on the urban/rural divide
Mark Pernice The Dark Psychology of Social Networks
Why it feels like everything is going haywire
Ilya Milstein Too Much Democracy Is Bad for Democracy
The major American parties have ceded unprecedented power to primary voters. It’s a radical experiment—and it’s failing.
Part II: Appeals to Our Better Nature
Erik McGregor / LightRocket / Carolyn Van Houten / The Washington Post / Getty / The Atlantic The Dishonesty of the Abortion Debate
Why we need to face the best arguments from the other side
Puppet: Andy Gent; photograph: Grant Cornett; prop styling: Anna Surbatovich My Friend Mister Rogers
I first met him 21 years ago, and now our relationship is the subject of a new movie. He’s never been more revered—or more misunderstood.
Jonno Rattman Can Marriage Counseling Save America?
Borrowing techniques from couples therapy to bring liberals and conservatives back together
Part III: Reconciliation & Its Alternatives
B. B. Cronin The Road From Serfdom
How Americans can become citizens again
Alex Stikeleather The Enemy Within
Our grasp on what it takes to sustain a democracy is slipping.
Illustration: Mendelsund / Munday; Bettmann / Getty Civility Is Overrated
The gravest danger to American democracy isn’t an excess of vitriol—it’s the false promise of civility.
Todd St. John The Role of the Artist in the Age of Trump
And the power of stories that are unshakably true
Essay
Elizabeth Bick The Photographs That Made Me Feel Less Alone
Garry Winogrand captured ordinary groups of unknown people in all their beauty, humanity, and radiance.
Dispatches
Rendering: Patrick White America After Trump
Even if he loses the next election, the damage he’s done to our political system will be lasting.
Arinze Stanley The Movement to Make Texas Its Own Country
Daniel Miller is fighting to divorce his state from the union.
Chloe Scheffe Sorry, Not Sorry
Why public figures stopped apologizing
Gillian Garcia Melina Matsoukas’s Unflinching Eye
The director has collaborated with artists such as Beyoncé, Rihanna, and Issa Rae. Now she is set to premiere her debut feature film—a romance set against a backdrop of police violence.
Bob Jacobson / Getty / The Atlantic I Joined a Stationary-Biker Gang
Peloton aficionados say the latest exercise craze gives them a sense of community they sorely missed.
Na Kim Stop Trying to Raise Successful Kids
And start raising kind ones.
George Georgiou Watching Americans Watch Parades
Photos from the sidelines of 2016
Culture & Critics
Illustration: Simon Montag; Netflix Goodbye to the Goodfellas
In The Irishman, Martin Scorsese offers a stunning elegy for a distinctly American figure: the gangster.
Celina Pereira Jefferson’s Doomed Educational Experiment
The University of Virginia was supposed to transform a slave-owning generation, but it failed.
Star Tribune / Getty Margaret Atwood Bears Witness
Over the course of her writing career, she has explored the power and limits of personal testimony in times of crisis.
Diana Ejaita Frederick Douglass’s Vision for a Reborn America
In the immediate aftermath of the Civil War, he dreamed of a pluralist utopia.
Front & Back
The Commons
Readers respond to our October 2019 issue and more.
PAUL HARRIS / GETTY Hunter S. Thompson’s Letters to His Enemies
The great gonzo journalist understood America’s fractured politics long before the rest of us did.
Poetry
Paul Spella
