[gsf_emergency_2]

>there are legitimate reasons to think institutions are illegitimate but I think there’s something self-perpetuating about distrust, people find meaning in it.

The lack of institutional self-awareness is why it's not especially mental to find most humans more trustworthy than any institution. There's a bit of grandma's wisdom in not worrying about Kennedy or being a fan of Luigi.. then there are borderline cases like Shkreli or the CEO of UHC-- they seem to have the non-sentience of the upper-percentile institution (which btw includes almost every place of higher learning in the US, exceptions to be investigated for their unusual processes..)

I suspect the Ben Franklin thought of Congress as a bunch of his peers & not an institution (placeholder for one of PG's underworked cluster of ideas around informality)