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Every time a pundit on the left screams “civil war,” the establishment media dutifully amplifies it like a national emergency, and hardworking people are left wondering whether to board up their homes or their consciences. Polls do show a deep anxiety: substantial percentages of Americans have told surveysters they think another civil war is at least somewhat likely in the next decade.
But the data tell a more complicated story than the hand-wringing headlines suggest; large, nationally representative surveys through 2024 and into 2025 found little or no rise in actual support for political violence and no meaningful jump in willingness to take up arms. Scholarly research tracking trends in attitudes toward democracy and violence finds many Americans reject violence outright even while admitting the country is frayed. Those hard facts matter more than shrill predictions.
Still, high-profile scholars like Barbara Walter have been right to warn that certain ingredients—identity politics, weakened trust in institutions, and the social-media accelerant—create dangerous tinder for instability if elites fail to act. Her sober diagnosis is chilling precisely because it shows how quickly civic rot can metastasize when elites trade national loyalty for factional advantage. The elite panic and talk of “exit strategies” by a few academics only underlines how out of touch many ruling-class figures are with the real country.
Conservatives should not fall into the media’s fear trap, but neither should we be complacent. Multiple polls over the past several years show a large portion of the public fears violent breakup even if most do not endorse violence themselves, which means perceptions can become self-fulfilling if political actors decide chaos serves them. Political operatives and elected officials who traffic in threats and delegitimization of opponents are playing with fire; that irresponsible rhetoric deserves scrutiny and consequence.
Let’s be blunt: much of this hysteria is manufactured to cow Americans into submission to the progressive agenda or to gin up donations and clicks. When criteria for fear are set by media elites and partisan officials, ordinary citizens pay the price in anxiety and civic distrust. The response from conservatives should be clarity and calm: expose the games, defend lawful institutions, and refuse to be stampeded by virtue-signaling elites who predict collapse while packing emergency passports.
The practical truth is this: modern conflict, if it comes, will look different from the 1860s. Experts point to a higher risk of fragmented, asymmetric violence—localized riots, targeted attacks, and institutional erosion—rather than neat armies clashing on fields. That reality demands prudence, community resilience, and political vigilance, not surrender to panic or provocation. Conservatives should press for stronger local institutions, accountable policing, secure elections, and civic education to blunt the radicalism that thrives on chaos.
So should Americans “prepare” for civil war? Prepare, yes—in the sense of reinforcing families, churches, and local communities, engaging in politics, and standing up for liberty and the rule of law. But preparation does not mean embracing violence or buying into the left’s apocalyptic narrative; it means defending our freedoms with lawful civic engagement, common-sense readiness, and unflinching patriotism. We won’t be terrified into giving up our country; we’ll fight for it at the ballot box, in the courtrooms, and in our neighborhoods.
