Similarities between the loony left and the British Crown in 1770

A few years ago there was book published, The Escape from Hunger and Premature Death, 1700 - 2100 by William Fogel.  It quantified the caloric content and nutritional value of diets in America compared to those in Europe and England at the time of the American Revolution. 

Americans have the tendency to simplify the causes of the Revolution down to self-rule, taxation and liberty.  The taxes the British sought to impose were intended to cover the defense costs incurred by the colonies against Dutch, French, Spanish and Native American conflicts.  These were not insubstantial costs and the British wished to raise revenues in the Americas for American defense.

Which doesn't sound unreasonable.  But everything has a context and simple governmental actions are often opposed, not because of their actual impact, but because people don't believe that the actions are taken for the reasons provided.  

Fogel does the leg work to point out another consideration.  Anglo-Americans in the colonies ate better, were healthier, lived longer, and grew taller than their fellow subjects of the King in Britain.  Americans lived nearly 50% longer than Brits on average, seventeen years of extra life.  

When viewed from that perspective, any effort by the Crown to impose costs and restrictions on Americans could justifiably be seen as an effort to bring Americans down to the level of the British.  Shorter lives, unhealthier lives, less nutritional lives.  

Of course a revolution seemed a reasonable response to such clear efforts to reduce the quality and quantity of life by the British government.

And when you put it that way, suddenly some of the angst and popularism of the past decade takes on a new aspect.

The government, or at least Washington, D.C., has had fairly persistent campaigns to reduce quality and quantity of life.

We want to force you take an untested vaccine that turns out to have multiple morbidity and mortality consequences.

We want to reduce the value of money, thus reducing your wealth and your income.

We want to increase your taxes.

We want to take away your capacity to defend yourself.

We want to make it more difficult to own a car by increasing its cost and restricting where you can drive.

We want to make your housing more expensive.

We want to make your energy more expensive.

We want to take away your conveniences like air-conditioning, heating and gas ovens.

We want you to eat insects instead of meat. 

The list could go on.  Some of these things are trial balloons rather than real policies.  Some of these are unintended consequences.  Some of these are stated policies with little prospect to be implemented.

But no wonder modern Americans are looking at Washington, D.C. and advocacy groups in the same way as Americans in the 1770s looked at the British Crown and its proposals to accept a lower quality of life.

Umm.  Thanks, but no.