Well, it's “election
season” once again – but really, is it ever not election
season? Haven't we gotten to the point where every initiative, every
policy, every program, every bill, every “task force”, every
“investigation”, and so on, is aimed at the next election,
whether for the presidency or for Congress? The American interest,
i.e. the well-being of its citizens, has long since ceased to be a
consideration, never mind “realism” (especially when applied to
foreign policy) and “sustainability” (a favorite buzz word of the
environmentalist faction). Even the environment, AKA “the planet”,
takes, at best, second place when forced to compete with more
pressing shorter-term considerations of power and money
(environmental issues being, at least in theory, aimed beyond the
lifetimes of the present generation, whereas power and money are all
about “ME”, and succeeding generations can eat you-know-what).
The planning horizon of our elected officials extends no further than
the next election, and once that is accomplished the planning horizon
instantly shifts to the election after that. In other words, the
next campaign begins the day after the swearing-in ceremony. The
long-term welfare of the citizenry, whether economic or in terms of
health (which is, or should be, a subset of “the environment”,
which is, in turn, a subset of “the planet”) never enters the
minds of our so-called “leaders” from one year to the next,
except as talking points – and yet they continue to campaign, and
continue, incredibly, to be re-elected to an overwhelming extent.
So, the question is – or should be – what sustains this clearly
maladaptive, and some would even say suicidal, system, where – if
we still have any faith in the electoral system – people persist in
voting against their own best interests, and thus reinforce policies
that have failed time and time again – sometimes spectacularly?
The old chestnut about
doctors is that they “bury their mistakes”, so their mistakes
don't get to comment on their competence, or lack thereof, on the
Internet. Politicians, on the other hand, are like unto miracle
workers. Not only do they not bury their mistakes, they parade them
out in public, and in speeches, as successes – and a few people out
there dare to speak up and argue, but the vast majority remain
silent, whether out of despair or utter apathy. (But they still vote
– which seems to mean that many people shuffle into the voting
booth in a state of despair or apathy. So then why do they even
bother? Read on... )
Well, number one, “voting”
has always been styled as the premier privilege of the citizens of a
democracy – the one essential thing, the sine qua non. Of
course, as we all know, or should know, most of the dictatorships of
the 20th Century, and those that remain, had, and have,
voting – after all, they were/are “people's republics”, right?
The fact that their elections were a total sham was pointed out and
ridiculed by the more enlightened, i.e. the American media and
politicians – all while ignoring the chicanery that contaminated
many of our own elections, both on the national and local level. If
democracy in the “people's republics” was an illusion, then our
own democracy was, at the very least, flawed, and in some case
corrupted to an extent that rendered it meaningless and absurd in the
“democratic” sense. And yet, it seemed that a flawed democracy,
with an electoral system that was capable of being severely
compromised, was better than nothing. In other words, the
illusion of democracy was preferable to the stark realization that,
in many cases, it was nothing but a sham and a cruel hoax.
But we still have to ask
why, over time, ever since the earliest years of the Republic, the
actions of elected officials have tended to contradict the intent of
the people who voted them into office. Seek no further than the
temptations of power, and the felt need to, once power is achieved,
hold onto it at all costs, so the interests of the ordinary citizen
are soon trumped by the interests of the rich and powerful, who take
over control of elected officials the minute the ballots are counted.
And there is nothing the least bit new or unique about this; it goes
right back to our fallen human nature, and politicians are, after
all, human – all too human much of the time. They seek power,
presumably, in order to “do good”, but in no more than the
twinkling of eye their Job One becomes holding onto the power they've
been given by a trusting (say gullible, if you like) public.
And is this tendency worse
in a “democracy” than it would be in a monarchy, or dictatorship?
Well, no, because human nature is what it is – at all times and in
all places. And after all, elected officials can, at least in
theory, be voted out of office, although it's amazing how seldom this
actually occurs (impeachment being ever rarer, and successful
impeachment being the rarest of all). So they must be doing
something right. Right? Or are we totally missing the point when it
comes to our vaunted “democratic” system? If people supposedly
vote, time and time again, “for their pocketbook”, or for some
other concrete reason, and are invariably disappointed, and yet their
voting behavior doesn't change... what is actually going on?
So, can we all agree that
there's a disconnect here? We have “voters”, and “candidates”
who turn into “politicians” but then are compelled to remain
candidates until they decide to retire (or are forced to by some
means). But as an arrangement, it very seldom pays off, at least for
the hapless voter, i.e. the “average Joe”, “citizen”,
whatever. It mostly pays off for the people behind the scenes who
choose the candidates, support them, and then once they are in office
call in their chits. So the notion of elected officials being “the
people's choice” is a hoax in many if not most cases. Was it the
“people's choice” when these candidates came out of nowhere and
somehow ended up on the ballot? No, of course not – they were the
product of a very selective and precise vetting process, the main
criterion being: Will this person, once elected, remember who his
“friends” are, and act accordingly? And the selection process
has been developed and fine-tuned to dependably yield results that
favor the people who are really in charge. And if an occasional
“mistake” occurs – if an elected official decides to throw off
the yoke and be their own man (or woman), well, we have ways of
dealing with that sort of nonsense. (On this topic, see a previous post, "Mayor Pete was the Wine that was Sold Before its Time", April 25, 2020.)
And once again, and as
always, the hapless citizen is left wondering what the hell
happened... why they have been exploited and betrayed once again, and
for the umpteenth time. (Won't Charlie Brown ever be allowed
to kick that damn football?) And yet their faith in the system, if
one can call it that, persists – or maybe it's just habit, or, once
again, despair.
Let's try and take a
closer look at this almost universal phenomenon. Let us, for
starters, think about voting, and the voting booth, and what actually
happens when someone is face-to-face with that choice – with
trembling hand holding a pen or pencil, or poised over a button on a
screen or a voting machine lever. This is the real moment of truth.
All of the propaganda, advertisements, speeches, broadcasts... the
papers, magazines, TV, Internet, radio... fade into nothingness at
this point and are replaced by an empty space, a void... but then
what rises up to fill that void? It's the narrative.
Narrative
– A way of
presenting or understanding a situation or series of events that
reflects and promotes a particular point of view or set of values.
Or
– a
particular
way
of explaining or understanding
events;
Or
– a
story or account of events, experiences, or the like, whether true or
fictitious;
Or
– an explanation
or interpretation of events in accordance with a particular theory,
ideology, or point of view.
Note
that these definitions (and there are many more along similar lines)
tend to reflect the utter subjectivity of narrative, i.e. that it's
not factual in the strict sense, but based to a large extent on
pre-existing ideas, prejudices, biases, and premises – not to
mention emotional needs, which, in my opinion, are actually the main
“drivers”. And those emotional needs are based, in turn, on an
array of events and influences that culminated in the mind set of that
person, on that day, at that time, in that voting booth. For we are,
after all, human – which means complex, and unstable, impulsive,
reactive,,, in short, all that the Founding Fathers believed –
naively, perhaps – could be overcome if people were only given the
opportunity and the proper motivation. They were, if you will,
optimistic about human nature. But has their optimism proven to be
utter delusion and folly?
Even
the simplest person is capable of having “deep thoughts” at times
– and the most intellectual and presumably rational and objective
person can be the prey of their emotions, which can cancel out all
attempts at “realism”. And I'm not claiming that these
“irrational” factors come into play in
spite of
reason, or of “the facts”; it's really the opposite. It's a more
rare occasion when reason, and the facts, come into play in spite of
what one might call the more primitive, or juvenile, factors. (In
the developmental sense they could be termed “pre-reason” or
“pre-logic” or “pre-conceptual”.)
One
might say that the notion of the average citizen suddenly turning
into an adult when they step into the voting booth is no more than
wishful thinking. What is every bit as likely is that they will
regress, and revert to an earlier stage of their emotional and
intellectual development when they are confronted by that moment of
truth.
So
what, then, is this all-powerful narrative, and why does it have such
an iron grip on us when we are faced with what should be an important
decision – not only for the individual but as a basis for democracy
itself?
To
begin at the beginning – our perceptions of the way the world is
(call it our “metaphysics” if you like) start being formed at
birth, or even before. Babies are, basically, data-gathering
machines. They absorb everything that they see, hear, taste, smell,
feel – without prejudice or editing. One might say this is the
most objective stage of life, simply because we haven't yet learned
to select, or filter, the input. We never think, or say, "That does not compute", because at that stage everything computes, which is as it should be. And so a view of the world (their
world, of course) is formed – primarily from sensations as opposed
to thoughts “about” sensations. Toddlers have a pretty good idea
of the way the world is – their world, at least. But they also
start getting notions of how they would like
the world to be, and the conflict between the two leads to
frustration (which helps explain why the "terrible twos" are the way they are). How is this resolved? The way they would like the
world to be has to be put on the shelf, after repeated tries and
frustrations – but it never goes away. Our “inner child of the
past” (the expression comes from a self-help book from some years
back) persists, and builds up -- layer by layer -- wishes, hopes,
dreams, and frustrations while we lead a parallel life “in the
world”. Thus is formed the root of a narrative – the one with
the earliest origins – to which we cling (thank you, Barack!) in
some form, even if a vestigial form, for life.
And
I would say that the great cry of the human person – the real
“primal scream” -- is “It's not fair!”, or some variation
thereof. And if this attitude, or premise, retains sufficient power
into adulthood, it can influence our political thinking, not to
mention our relationships, our choice of vocation, and so on. The
urge to make the world “work” – to be the way we would like it
to be – is compelling, but also infantile in a way. The missing
element is willingness to compromise, and – on a more rarefied
level – humility. Humility doesn't insist on “compromise”, or
negotiation, or bargaining; it is an attitude of willingness to
accept things as they are – at least tentatively -- because, who
knows, there may be perfectly good reasons for the way things are
that we are not privy to – but at the same time to work to make
things better, ideally by starting “at home”, with ourselves.
(Wasn't there a Beatles song that said, “You
say you'll change the constitution, well, you know, we all want to
change your head. You tell me it's the institution, well, you know,
you'd better free your mind instead” ?)
Many
teachers in many religious traditions have taught the value of
humility over the millennia. One of the main barriers to developing
humility, however, is that residual infantile “It's not fair!”
attitude, and this flows quite seamlessly into one's personal
politics, and thus collectively into politics in general. For what
is any political idea, cause, or movement other than an attempt to
make things “right” -- or "fair" -- or "equitable" – to re-fashion the world in the image that
we would like to impose on it? There is nothing less humble, or less
satisfied, than a political movement. “Conservatives” –
the real kind, i.e. the ones who want to keep things just the way
they are (vs. the way they were, or are alleged to have been, 100 or
more years ago) -- are fighting battles against “change”,
especially change for its own sake (which is the most typical
variety). If only people would be satisfied with the way things are
now! But what if the way things are now is more like the “continuous
revolution” of Chairman Mao? Then it's no longer true
conservatism, is it? And perhaps in our time there is no such thing,
i.e. conservatism has become self-contradicting.
But
it seems that we have skipped a few steps here. Go back to the
toddler, who is forming a view of the world based on raw data, and
not spending much time thinking about it, or interpreting, or
conceptualizing. They are, in a way, living an unexamined life,
which is perfectly acceptable at that stage. But then along comes
speech, and then concepts and ideas, and (hopefully) some beginning
of moral sense – and, perhaps most important of all, imagination,
which can be defined as wanting that which doesn't even exist, but
which we develop as an image or “wish system” by projecting from
what is, i.e. from what we know. And at that point the “ought”
starts to overpower the “is” – the toddler's alternative world of “like” and “want” starts to accrete names, and concepts,
and connections. And this is also the point at which, thanks to
language and our conceptual abilities, one is exposed to other
people's world view – again, not only the view of things as they
are (the metaphysical) but the view of things as they might be, or
ought to be (which ultimately turns into the political). (Isn't
politics, after all, the art of persuasion – of convincing people
that they ought to think differently, or ought to want what they
don't presently have – and of showing them the means by which they
can supposedly obtain it (starting with the all-hallowed vote)?)
And
who are these other people? Our “influencers”, as the current
saying goes? Well, parents, for certain... but also other family
members, friends, and neighbors – people we know and converse with.
But then we have teachers (whose world view may or may not match
that of our parents – increasingly the case in our time, since the
public schools have fallen prey to “the long march through the
institutions”), and books, television, the Internet, and so on –
that vast array of sources of information, ideas, facts, fancies,
propaganda, threats, rewards – greatly magnified by the
communications media in our time.
How
often have I heard or read complaints by “boomers” that things
were so much simpler when we were kids, and there were only 3 TV
channels (two commercial and one "educational"), and school books, and books from the local library, and
magazines from news stands, and the radio, and that was pretty much
it? The competition for “hearts and minds” was barely a fraction
as intense as it is now, and it can be debated whether this is a net
improvement or an invitation to confusion and, ultimately, chaos and
despair. Can it be that the human organism was only meant to handle
so much information – most of it not sense information in the
natural or “primitive” sense, but only boiled-down, digitized,
distorted remnants? Not even well-developed concepts, but sound
bites? Are we not all victims of overload? And if we are, are we
equipped with the discernment and ability to do something about it?
My observations would seem to indicate that the answer is no, for
most people and in most cases. As with so much in the way of
technology, our reach exceeds our grasp. We create instantaneous
monsters, if you will, but have no idea as how to control them, and
thus become their victims.
So
our narratives are born, and at an early age they bifurcate into the
“is” and the “ought” – “reality” vs. “wishful
thinking”. But hold on. Were all of our influencers, and sources,
over the years purveyors of reality? Because what where they
pushing? Their world view, but surely more of a hybrid of the two –
the way things are and the way they ought to be. After all, stark
reality – “just the facts, ma'am” (thank you, Jack Webb) can
become awfully tedious and boring at times. After all, we are human
beings – always restless, always striving, always curious. We are
not dogs and cats, or cattle contentedly chewing their cuds in the
field. It would be nice to be that existential – that “here and
now”, and many of the hippie gurus, taking a cue from Eastern
religions, recommended that state of mind as the best, and the one
least likely to lead to frustration. And this is not to say that
some time spent meditating – being “here and now” – is a bad
thing; it's been highly recommended, again by wise men (and women) of
many religious and philosophical orientations. But let's admit that
plain contentment is a rare thing, and perhaps should remain so.
(Or, to put it another way, it is perfectly suitable for the human
race to include both contemplatives and “action” persons. In the
proper proportions, they complement each other, and in some ultimate
sense they couldn't get along without each other.)
For
the rest of us, not satisfied with radical contentment or “here and
now-ness” (or the cheap imitation induced by drugs and alcohol), we
have to deal with our narratives, and each person's core narrative at
any given time is likely to be a combination of reality (facts) and
wishful thinking (fantasies). I had a chemistry teacher in high
school who would always correct any student who said “I think...”
He would say “you don't think,
you fancy”.
But isn't this it in a nutshell? And to the extent that a person is
willing to – calmly and deliberately – pry apart the portions of
their narrative that are “the way things are” vs. “the way
things ought to be”... but wait! What's to keep “the way things
are” from being every bit as fantastic (albeit unconsciously) as
“the way things ought to be”? Isn't all of our thinking ultimately
subjective and illusory? Is objectivity a myth, and don't we use our
reasoning powers to, more often than not, simply shuffle various
fantasies around and rationalize the ones we prefer on any given day? Or, isn't there at least a continuum of some sort
with the “actual” (things I'm pretty certain of, because they're
tangible and observable) on one end and the “ideal” (things I
know are not the case, but wouldn't it be nice if they were?) on the
other?
And
– does it even matter, ultimately? If our narrative, or world
view, impacts our lives, our decisions, our relationships, on a daily
basis, isn't it quibbling to talk about how “realistic” various
pieces of it are? Because it's there. Over time, it's arguably the
single largest influencer in our lives, or at least in our thinking
about our lives.
It's
almost like the old question, how can we live knowing that we will
die? And there are many answers to that question, needless to say.
But then, on a more personal, here-and-now level, how can we live
knowing, or suspecting, that our every thought and action is based
on, and conditioned by, something that was imposed on us (or, at
least, suggested to us) by someone else – and that their every
thought and action was, in turn, based on, and conditioned by... and
so on. (Perhaps the first and only truly free-thinking human being
was some cave man who accidently stumbled upon language. He was able
to make it all up on his own, ex
nihilo.)
But
narratives are very seldom completely idiosyncratic. There are common, shared
elements based on, first, the family, and then on the gradual
widening world that each of us experiences – but there are central
tendencies and groupings, otherwise there would be no political
parties or causes. We would each be trapped in our own
pseudo-factual world like patients in the back ward of a mental
hospital (before they were all shut down, that is). So yes, the
reference group (the one we don't choose, and later on the one, or
ones, we do choose) has its agreed-upon narrative, which they
promote, expand upon, and, in some cases, endlessly blather about,
from the coffee house to the student union to the faculty lounge to
Congress to TV and the Internet. (For a sampling of grass-roots
narratives, I can recommend nothing better than that table of male
senior citizens that one always finds at any McDonald's on a Saturday
morning – or any other day of the week, most likely. They talk on
endlessly, but it's clear that they share the same narrative, right
down to the most minute detail. There is no real debate, in other
words – just embellishment, and a friendly competition as to who
feels most strongly about a given issue – or who can talk the
loudest between gulps of lousy coffee.)
But this is also not to say that narratives are merely shared world views. That's
precisely the point. They are unique in the same way fingerprints
are – one set to a person, and no two people have the same set.
But there are definite narrative clusters, if you will, the same way
people naturally cluster into racial, ethnic, religious, and gender groups.
After all, a key element in narrative formation is the culture one is
born into; a good bit of it is, as I see it, pre-verbal or
extra-verbal. People don't generally think much about their
particular “culture” as young children; they just take it for
granted along with everything else – religion, social class,
customs, traditions, etc. In fact, I doubt if very many people, even
upon achieving mature adulthood, think about how different – how
radically different at times – their narrative is from others'.
It's like the old saying, “Fish discover water last”. If you're
immersed in something from the very beginnings of perception, you
don't have to “discover” it; you're living it. In a very real
sense, it is you and you are it. Whatever else we are, or become,
builds on that; it's our foundation or groundwork, if you will.
But
wait! – you might say. What about rebellious youth? What about
the ones who, with every generation, decide that the old folks don't
know anything, and they're going out on a quest for The Truth? Not
only that, but how about all of these “influencers” who
encourage, aid, and abet rebellion – thinking firstly about peer
groups, but also teachers, the media, books, and so on? Doesn't that
old narrative so carefully cultivated by Mom and Pop get tossed
aside?
This
might seem to be the case if we just look at the surface, or the
symptoms. What I suspect, however, is that youthful rebellion is
just that – youthful. The day comes when our youthful rebels will
decide that it's just too much work, or the world isn't getting
better despite all of their efforts... or that more immediate,
material considerations need to be given more weight – you know,
things like earning a living, as dull as that might seem. Notice
that the ones who come to this realization first are invariably
called “sell-outs” by the more hard-core types, but sooner or
later pretty much everyone falls by the wayside in some way, except
for the rare types like Bernie Sanders.
And
it's not that the narratives they grew up with have survived intact,
the way so many ancient Chinese customs survived Mao's Cultural
Revolution. They may have gotten updated, refined, polished,
rendered more “current”, more acceptable, but the roots survive.
They are still their parents' children, in other words. A “rebel
for life” is a rare thing – it happens, and there are many
examples, but most people simply can't, or won't, entirely throw off
that baggage – and in fact, there is no good reason for them to do
so. They are behaving more like natural human beings than like any
idealized “New Soviet Man” or member of “The Master Race”,
who are expected to act in a robotic fashion and have no hidden
agendas and, preferably, no individual personality at all.
To
put it another way – imagine an ancient tree that has survived any
number of storms, hurricanes, floods, diseases, injuries, even
earthquakes. It's battle-scarred, but it's still the same tree. And
narratives – the powerful ones, the ones based on what I call “the
eternal verities” – race, religion, ethnic group, customs –
have a staying power that transcends generations, and even transcends
actual events – history, for example, and “social change”
(which does not have the same depth as narratives, despite what activists would like).
If
you look at current events, you see various narratives bubbling up –
ones that were supposed to be long since done away with, precisely
because they are based on the things that have always motivated
people, both as individuals and in groups – things like, once
again, race, religion, ethnicity – things that defined societies
and even entire civilizations in the past, but which are now
considered hopelessly atavistic and out of fashion. The question is,
can any society, or civilization, survive the lack of these things,
even if in implicit form? We seem to be experimenting with that
possibility at present, with concepts like “diversity”, which is
just another word for deracination, i.e. getting rid of things that
actually create diversity. And yes, it's been tried before, with
less-than-pleasant consequences, as witness Soviet Russia and Maoist
China.
So now we come back, at long last, to poor old Joe Blow, Mr. Average, the plain citizen, etc.
lurching into the voting booth. Is he really concerned with the
latest polling numbers? Is he concerned with the “record” of the
incumbent, or the many promises of the contender? And what about the
myriad of “influencers” and talking heads in the media? They've
been working full time for months, if not years, to talk Joe Blow
into voting a certain way because, after all, he'll be so much better
off if the follows their advice.
But
no. The narrative rises up, like the monster from an old movie
rising out of Tokyo Bay or New York harbor, to claim its own. And
it's the narrative that tells him who to vote for, and his decision
is based on which candidate seems to represent this narrative –
which one is the best match, that is, with ideas, notions, and
“fancies” that Joe Blow has been carrying around with him for
years, and most likely decades. (I don't think that there's a
political “consultant” alive who could systematically come up
with a campaign that would appeal to the collective narratives of
millions of voters. The best he can hope for is that his candidate
will get lucky and appeal to enough of them to win.)
But
why should this be such a hard nut to crack? The problem is that
there is nothing simple about any given narrative, and the complexity
of narratives in the aggregate is beyond measure. At the very least,
we can say that the well-developed narrative has many facets, to be
sure – many of them quite personal and biographical, if you will.
“I promised my father on his deathbed that I would never vote for
[a certain political party].” “My
family/friends/associates/co-workers would disown me if I voted for
[a certain candidate].” “If I voted for [a certain candidate] it
would make me a traitor to my race/ethnic group/religion/gender.”
“We (meaning family, ethnic group, social class, religion) always
vote for [a given political party].” And so on. (Freud called
this the superego. It's that thing that's stuck in your head that
makes you do what you'd rather not do, and not do what you'd rather
do. It's the “ought” to our “is”, if you will.)
Now,
notice how fact-free all of this is? How non-reality based? That's
the point. This is the burden, the baggage, that people carry
around with them on a daily basis, but it only rises to the surface
on Election Day. This is why the pollsters are so often wrong, and
hilariously so in some cases, because they (1) go by what people say
when they are in a more “factual” or realistic mood; and (2) go
by what people say even though they are thinking something quite
different (a political poll is not a confessional, after all); and
(3) assume that people know their own minds, i.e. don't get cold feet
when they step into that voting booth, and substitute the narrative
for all the ideas they've been ruminating on up to that point.
Loyalty
– a deep-seated desire to remain faithful to all the many factors
and influences in one's upbringing – is a powerful force, perhaps
the most powerful in fact, since one can argue that without it
civilization would never have even developed, and we would still not
be living at anything larger than the small tribal level at best.
(The smaller the reference group, the easier it is to enforce
conformity, which is one reason why systems of central government
imposed on a tribal culture tend to fail, and revert to chaos and
violence. The village chief has power and commands respect, where
the president or dictator in a far-away capital can only rule
indirectly and by fear.)
So
this would seem to be an answer – not the entire answer, but an
important one – to the perennial question of why people vote the way
they do. They aren't voting for the candidate or for his/her ideas
as much as for a narrative of which that candidate is merely a
passing and imperfect representative. And one interesting consequence of this idea is that the
candidate may not be fully aware of the extent, or the depth, of the
narrative that he or she represents. They may “fancy” that it's
all about them, whereas they are, in truth, quite expendable. Or,
they may at least imagine that people vote for ideas – preferably
for the candidate's ideas. But that's wrong too. The narrative is
much deeper than conscious ideas, and in fact (per our discussion of
young children) deeper than the language that expresses those ideas.
Primitive emotions come to the fore – traumas, pain, fear,
frustration, etc. – and we might say that they unjustly influence
the process (which is supposed be so rational, after all), but are
they not the things that, over the course of a lifetime, have the
most impact on our sense of the world and our place in it – our
self-image and self-esteem? Don't they deserve a voice – a say in
the matter? Perhaps rationality and realism are overestimated, and
are, at best, secondary to these more basic drives – more
superficial, more fleeting (witness how political loyalties can often
change at the drop of a hat). Perhaps the notion of elections as
popularity contests is not as off-base as we would like to believe.
Maybe “popularity” is a better expression of the narrative than
that which appears in all the polls and surveys. But if people vote
that way, then can they really complain when, by the cold, clear
light of day, they wind up with “buyer's regret”? But it's still
better than the “walk of shame” home from the polling place when
they think “I sure hope Uncle Louie (of fond memory) didn't see me
voting that way.”
Perhaps,
in other words, we should be more willing to accept the results of a
narrative-laden election. Why look down on people because of the way
they vote – especially their deep motives, of which we know
nothing? Democracy is, at least in theory, based on the assumption
that people are entitled to vote because they are capable of
understanding the issues. But human nature being what it is, perhaps
this understanding is likely to be outweighed by something more basic
and, yes, more complex. Does this mean that democracy is a fatally
flawed system because it's based on an erroneous premise? A better
question might be, even if it is flawed, are the alternatives any
better? We seem to have long since settled that question in favor of
sticking with the system we have. If it should one day crumble under
its own weight, it may be for any number of reasons, but one might
turn out to be the power of narrative and its ability to create
contradictions to the extent that they would prove fatal. For one
thing, as cultural distinctions – a key factor in narrative
development – dissolve in the so-called “melting pot” (even
though it is mythical to some extent), resulting in what E. Michael
Jones calls deracination, the glue or connective tissue among
narratives may deteriorate, and a kind of centrifugal force may make
Americans (but not only them) increasingly isolated and, one might
almost say, autistic in their own unique narratives. This may be the
thing that, once and for all, exposes “E pluribus unum” as a
myth.
