Welcome to the Deep Dive. We're really incredibly
glad you're here with us today. If you've tuned
in, you probably have that familiar itch. Right,
that desire to understand the world a little
better. Exactly. You want to gain thorough knowledge
without feeling completely buried under, you
know, a mountain of information overload. You
want the deep insights, the aha moments, and
you want them delivered in a way that actually
respects your time and your intelligence. And
that's exactly what we do here. That's the goal.
Yeah. Today, we're taking a close look at a piece
of writing that essentially diagnosed the modern
American psyche. We're working from a detailed
breakdown of Tom Wolfe's really seminal 1976
essay. It was originally published in New York
Magazine, and it's titled The Me Decade and the
Third Great Awakening. It's such a foundational
text if you want to understand the culture we
live in right now. Because to truly grasp our
current... This whole landscape of relentless
self -help, personal branding, and frankly, self
-obsession. We have to travel back to the 1970s.
We really do. We're going to explore the underlying
why behind a massive cultural shift that happened
during that decade. And as we dig into these
sources today, I want to encourage you to think
critically about the patterns we're discussing.
Consider how these historical echoes from the
70s are still playing out in your own life and
in your social feeds today. So let's just get
right into the phrase that started it all. Tom
Wolfe actually coined the term that came to define
the entire era in the August 23, 1976 cover story
of New York Magazine. It was later published
in his essay collection, Mauve Gloves and Mad
Men, Clutter and Vine. OK, let's unpack this.
Let's do it. The term is the me decade. And the
core contrast Wolf is highlighting here is the
sudden movement toward what the source calls
atomized individualism. Right. This was a sharp,
just a dramatic turn away from the communitarianism,
the social movements and the shared civic values
that were so heavily prevalent in the United
States during the 1960s. Yeah. If you think about
the 1960s, the focus was largely on the collective.
You had the civil rights movement, the anti -war
protests, the push for really sweeping social
and legislative change. The energy was outward.
Exactly. The cultural energy was directed outward
towards society at large. But as the 70s rolled
in, Wolf observed people turning their gaze entirely
inward. They were retreating from the public
square. And he described this using a really
powerful, memorable metaphor. He called it the
new alchemical dream. Oh, I have that exact quote
pulled from the text. I wanted to read this.
Go for it. wolf writes the old alchemical dream
was changing base metals into gold the new alchemical
dream is changing one's personality remaking
remodeling elevating and polishing one's very
self and observing studying and doting on it
me wow yeah he literally puts me in parentheses
with an exclamation point. What's fascinating
here is how seamlessly that concept translates
to the multi -billion dollar industries we see
today. Oh, totally. Think about the modern ecosystems
dedicated entirely to polishing one's very self.
Today, we might call it self -care or personal
optimization or wellness, but... Wolf identified
the absolute genesis of this mindset back in
1976. It's crazy how early he saw it. It is.
The alchemy was no longer about medieval science
or transmuting physical elements. The magic was
supposedly inside the individual. You were the
base metal, and through enough self -study and
modification, you could become the gold. It's
such a vivid framework. But a cultural pivot
of that magnitude, it doesn't just happen because
people wake up one Tuesday and decide they'd
rather stare in the mirror than go to a community
meeting. Right. There has to be a catalyst. Exactly.
There has to be a structural engine driving the
change. And according to the source material,
Wolf points to a very specific economic transformation.
He argued that the traditional working class
proletariat was effectively vanishing in America.
That is a crucial piece of the puzzle right there.
Yeah. Yeah. Because when Wolf talks about. The
disappearance of the proletariat. He's talking
about the erosion of a very specific identity.
Historically, the working class had an identity
deeply tied to collective labor, union halls,
and shared economic struggle. The whole we're
all in this together mentality. Precisely. But
Wolf notes that they were being replaced by a
massive, newly formed American lower middle class.
So how exactly does that shift in class structure
trigger a nationwide obsession with the self?
It really comes down to the post -war economic
boom. Following World War II, the American economy
exploded in a way that was historically unprecedented.
For the first time, a massive swath of average
Americans experienced widespread economic prosperity.
They finally had money. They had disposable income.
And with that new money came a profound new sense
of self -determination. When you're no longer
struggling just to put food on the table or keep
the lights on, you suddenly have the luxury of
individuation. That makes a lot of sense. Survival
mode turns off. Exactly. You have the time, the
energy, and the financial resources to focus
on you. You can afford to ask, am I fulfilled?
Money completely rewrites the hierarchy of needs.
And Wolf noted that this influx of middle class
cash radically altered American politics, too.
The source highlights his observation that people
began actively abandoning communal, progressive
and New Deal style coalition politics. Right.
Wolf described this shift with a rather blunt
phrase. He called it taking the money and running.
And just to be clear here, Wolf is making a specific
sociopolitical observation about the decline
of a certain type of political engagement. Yes,
we should emphasize that. Whether you view the
shift away from New Deal politics as a positive
evolution toward individual liberty or a negative
loss of social safety nets, what's central to
Wolf's thesis is the behavioral change itself.
People were using their newly acquired wealth
to retreat into private life. Exactly. We're
just analyzing the mechanics of the shift as
Wolf saw them. We aren't taking a stance on the
politics themselves. He's arguing that collective
political action felt less urgent to a population
that suddenly had the private means to secure
their own comfort. That's the core of his economic
argument. But Wolf doesn't just blame the post
-war boom and call it a day. Here's where it
gets really interesting. He traces the lineage
of this 1970s self obsession back much further
than the 1950s. The source material reveals he
links it all the way back to the aristocratic
European gentry. It's one of the most unexpected
intellectual leaps in the essay, but he makes
a compelling case for it. It's fascinating. He
specifically points to the chivalric tradition
and the philosophy behind the finishing school.
Yeah. So, wait, how does he draw a direct line
from medieval European royalty to a guy in a
1970s American suburb trying to find himself?
Well, think about what a finishing school or
the code of chivalry actually was. These were
aristocratic traditions inherently dedicated
to the building, refining, and displaying of
personal character. Oh, I see. Historically,
only the absolute elite kings, queens, lords,
and knights had the time and resources to obsess
over their personal conduct, their etiquette,
and their internal virtues. The peasant class
certainly wasn't attending finishing schools.
They were farming. They were just trying to survive
the winter. Right. So Wolfe's argument is that
the average 1970s American newly flush with that
post -war middle class cash, was essentially
democratizing an aristocratic privilege. That
is wild. They were adopting the behaviors of
European royalty, trying to cultivate their own
noble character through seminars, therapies,
and self -analysis. So it's essentially the mass
production of aristocratic vanity. That's a great
way to put it. But the bridge between those European
aristocrats and the 1970s middle class wasn't
a straight line. Wolf points out that it was
filtered through the 1960s counterculture and
the New Left. Yes, the counterculture provided
the philosophical justification for this inward
turn. The New Left and the broader 60s counterculture
heavily promoted a recovery of the self, largely
because they viewed mainstream American society
as fundamentally flawed. oppressive or corrupt
and again examining this impartially we're just
looking at their viewpoint absolutely their core
belief was that the institutions of society were
broken so if the outside world is corrupt and
beyond saving where do you turn you turn inward
the only territory you can truly liberate is
your own mind Right. And that philosophy of internal
liberation bled directly into the 1970s, but
it found a very specific catalyst. The source
text notes that this concept spread wildly in
the 70s through the use of the drug LSD or acid.
Yeah. Psychedelics enter the chat. Big time.
It wasn't just viewed as a recreational party
drug for this crowd. There was a pervasive belief
that taking acid would effectively strip away
all that corrupt societal conditioning and unveil
a true and real self. the ultimate tool for that
chemical alchemy we talked about earlier. LSD
offered a fast -tracked, highly intense journey
into the self. And this is where Wolf makes arguably
his most profound and maybe controversial leap
in the entire essay. The religion angle. Yes.
He synthesizes this psychedelic drug culture
with American religious history. Wolf argues
that the revelatory experience of taking these
hallucinogens wasn't just a secular psychological
experiment. It was remarkably similar to religious
ecstasy. In fact, for many people, it was actively
competitive with traditional religion. People
were pursuing their true self with the kind of
reverence and devotion usually reserved for a
deity. Exactly. If we connect this to the bigger
picture, it explains the second half of Woolf's
title, The Third Great Awakening. Now, for context,
throughout American history, there have been
these massive sweeping periods of Christian revival.
We know them as the First and Second Great Awakenings.
Right, the big tent revivals. Yeah, these were
eras defined by intense religious fervor, massive
crowds, and highly emotional, ecstatic spiritual
experiences that fundamentally changed American
culture. Wolfe analogized the dominant social
trends of the 1970s to those massive historical
movements. So he's saying that the self -help
seminars, the obsessive therapies and the LSD
trips of the 70s were the modern equivalent of
those old school tent revival. Precisely. He
was arguing that the me decade wasn't just a
superficial sociological phase. It was a genuine
religious revival. It was the third great awakening.
The critical difference was that the object of
worship had shifted. They weren't worshiping
a traditional god. The deity being worshiped
was the individual self. It's a massive sweeping
claim to make about a decade usually remembered
for disco and bell bottoms. It really is. And
it's a real testament to Wolf's unique literary
style that he could weave post -war economics,
medieval chivalry, LSD, and American religious
history into one cohesive, entertaining theory.
The source material actually highlights one of
the most famous passages from the essay to show
how he wrote about this intersection of religion
and culture. Oh, the Jimmy Carter description
is a perfect example of his voice. I have to
read this to you because it's just so stylistically
flamboyant. Wolfe is describing Jimmy Carter,
who was running for president at the time, and
he calls him a, okay, deep breath here, a missionary,
lectern -pounding, amen, ten -finger, C major
chord, Sister Martha at the Yamaha keyboard,
blah, blah. It's an absolute mouthful. It really
is. But it perfectly illustrates Wolfe's vivid,
almost musical approach to journalism. He wasn't
interested in just giving you dry facts. He wanted
to give you the exact rhythm and cultural frequency
of the moment. He paints a very specific picture.
He does. By describing Carter with such elaborate,
hyper -specific religious imagery, Wolfe was
highlighting a massive cultural juxtaposition.
You had Carter representing this deeply entrenched
old school, rural religious ecstasy on one side,
while this new urban lower middle class was casing
a totally modern kind of ecstasy through self
-obsession and psychedelics. It's brilliant writing,
but of course, a theory that bold is going to
attract critics. And the source material provides
a really crucial piece of pushback that we need
to examine. We can't just take Wolf's premise
of A Great Awakening as undeniable fact. No,
we absolutely can't. The counterargument here
is vital because it completely flips the lens
on the entire era. The source introduces a cultural
historian named Christopher Lash. In 1979, so
this is just three years after Wolf published
his essay, Lash released a highly influential
book titled The Culture of Narcissism. That title
alone sets the tone. It does. And Lash took direct...
pointed aim at Wolfe's idea that this era represented
any sort of awakening. How did Lash dismantle
it? Did he disagree with the data Wolfe was looking
at? That's the interesting part. He didn't disagree
with the behaviors Wolfe observed. He disagreed
with what those behaviors meant. Lash argued
that Wolf actually provided the very evidence
needed to undermine his own religious interpretation.
Oh, using his own work against him. Exactly.
Lash looked at the consciousness movement and
the obsession with self -improvement. And he
didn't see a spiritual awakening at all. He saw
pure, unadulterated narcissism. And Lash actually
used Wolf's own words to prove this point. The
source notes that Lash pulled a specific quote
from Wolf's essay. He pointed out Wolf's observation
that most people historically have not lived
their lives as if thinking, I have only one life
to live. Right. If you look at human history,
especially agrarian or highly traditional societies,
people didn't conceptualize their lives as entirely
their own. They were part of a bigger system.
Exactly. They lived as if they were simultaneously
living their ancestors' lives and their offspring's
lives. You were just one link in a very long,
multi -generational chain. Your identity was
tied to your family name, the land you worked,
the community you upheld, and the legacy you
were leaving for your children. But the 1970s
effectively shattered that chain. The new prevailing
mantra became, I have only one life to live,
and it belongs to me. This raises an important
question for you to consider as you think about
modern society. What happens when a culture moves
away from that multi -generational communal thinking
where you honor the past and sacrifice for the
future and adopts a mindset of, I only have one
life and it's all about my immediate fulfillment?
It changes everything. It does. Lash argued that
you simply cannot have a true religious revival
or a great awakening if you sever your connection
to the past and the future. Living purely for
the present self isn't spiritual enlightenment.
It's a structural inability to care about anything
outside your own ego. It is the literal definition
of a culture of narcissism. That is a profoundly
heavy critique. It takes the exact same behaviors,
the therapies, the inward focus, the self -polishing
and paints them in a much darker light. Wolf
saw people elevating themselves to the divine.
Lash saw people shrinking their universe down
until nothing else could fit inside it except
themselves. That's the perfect summary. They
were looking at the exact same sociological data
points. The post -war wealth, the retreat from
civic politics, the hallucinogens, the new alchemical
dream. They just arrived at vastly different
conclusions regarding the health of the human
soul. So what does this all mean? Let's distill
the journey we've taken today. We started by
looking at how the postwar economic boom handed
the average American unprecedented level of prosperity,
which in turn provided the luxury of self -determination.
Yep, the money changed the mindset. Then we explored
how the 1960s counterculture, disillusioned with
mainstream institutions, prompted a philosophical
retreat inward. We saw how the use of LSD in
the 70s acted as a powerful catalyst, unveiling
what people desperately wanted to believe was
their true self, rivaling traditional religious
ecstasy. The Chemical Alchemy Exactly. And we
watched as people largely abandoned communal
coalition politics, took their new money, and
ran straight toward the new alchemical dream
of remaking and polishing their own personalities.
And we've given you the two major competing lenses
to view this historical shift through. You have
Tom Wolfe's Third Great Awakening, a theory that
frames this era as a For anyone trying to navigate
the complexities of modern life. Taking the time
to understand these arguments from the late 70s
is an incredible shortcut. You genuinely cannot
fully comprehend today's landscape, a world dominated
by influencers, highly curated wellness retreats,
personal branding, and the endless pursuit of
self -optimization without understanding the
me decade. The roots of our current culture are
buried deep in the soil of the 1970s. Understanding
the origin of an idea gives you power over how
it influences you today. And I want to leave
you with a final thought to mull over as you
go about your week. It builds on everything we've
discussed, but brings it right up to the present
moment. Let's hear it. If the me decade was defined
by a shift from living for our ancestors to living
purely for ourselves, and if hallucinogens and
self -help seminars sparked what Wolf called
the third great awakening, look at how we live
right now. We exist in an era of digital avatars,
highly curated online personas, and algorithms
specifically designed to feed us endless, flattering
reflections of our own interests. Are we still
trapped in the endless narcissistic loop of the
me decade, just armed with much better technology?
Or as we retreat further into virtual worlds
to endlessly polish our digital selves, are we
actually on the verge of a fourth great awakening?
Man, that is a deeply provocative question to
leave on. Thank you so much for joining us for
this deep dive. Keep exploring, keep questioning
the world around you, and most importantly, keep
learning. We'll catch you next time.