Don’t be a Wingnut

Don’t be a wingnut.

Instead of the Limbaugh / Olbermann model of debate that incites division, fear, irrationality, and now violence, try instead the “Socratic” method of dialogue. What is painfully dangerous in our American politics today is the lack of a sincere quest for knowledge.

Every now and then I come across an excerpt from a book that produces a moment of “rebirth” in me. These passages of text solidify years of thought into a single moment of clarity. Ideologies that I have been struggling to understand for years suddenly are expressed in a page or two of text that beautifully encapsulates these struggles into a few paragraphs:

“In our society, rational discussion is often aggressive, since participants … are doing their best to demonstrate the invalidity of their opponent’s viewpoint. In a Socratic dialogue … the ‘winner’ did not try to force an unwilling opponent to accept his point of view. It was a joint effort. You expressed yourself clearly as a gift to your partner, whose beautifully expressed argument would, in turn, touch you at a profound level … a successful dialogue should lead to ekstatis: by learning to inhabit each other’s point of view, the conversationalists were taken beyond themselves. Anybody who entered into conversation with Socrates had to be willing to change” (Karen Armstrong, The Case for God).

And this occurence is not just happening on the Right. The Left is equally guilty. There is no difference between Limbaugh and Olbermann if you measure them not by their politic leanings, but by their level of adherence to the Socratic model of debate.

In their disregard for truth, understanding, and context, they are further dividing the country that they so vehemently claim to love. I have a feeling that what many of these wingnuts really love is their power, wealth, and celebrity–certainly more than they love the country they are claiming to defend from the so-called Socialists or Capitalists.

But why are we, as political spectators, so eager to pick between Left & Right? Conservative & Liberal? And follow every announcement of the Party without insight, research, or examination?

Humans, you see, are a “religious” being. Before you think I am about to preach the Gospel to you, I am not using the term “religion” to refer to what you may traditionally think of religion (church, mosque, Sunday school, and Bible). I am referring to a systematic thought process that blindly follows a learned human behavior duly reinforced over time, rather than seeking the simple and evident truth in God. Psychologists or sociologists may refer to this as Group Mentality, commonly known as “following the herd”, “acting like sheep”, etc. But to me, no word describes this human phenomenon better than the word, “religion”. Religion in all aspects of our lives, from our understanding of God, politics, family, business, culture, and every other thing “under the sun”.

Our reaction to 24/7 cable newscasts and AM Radio are not exempt from our ability to want to fit in with a group or macroculture that will give us a false sense of belonging and empowerment.

Jesus Christ famously rebuked the religious of his day because their devotion to religion was obstructing their devotion to God. It is the same today. Religion can be found in the complex diarama of our lives and is not restricted to our theological and spiritual views. We must renounce our love affair with religion in order to regain our sacred relationships.

In all aspects of our lives, in order to find truth, morality, and even God, we must constantly examine ourselves. This must be applied not only to our religion, but our patriotism and politics.
Religion gives us temporary stability and peace, because we can shut off our minds from our busy, overburdened lives and just follow. This inevitably adds just another “brick in the wall” in our journey to Orwelian Utopia, i.e. 1984.

Orwell’s brilliant envisioning of a Government take-over of its people’s minds and souls was neither truly Socialist or Fascists — it was not the extreme spectrum of either Left or Right. It was Ambiguous Extremism itself, which could in many ways be identified with neither Left or Right. The true danger was not Liberal politics or Conservative politics, it was not even Socialism or Capitalism per se, but the lack of reason, of judgement, of balance; it was an insatiable desire to control every aspect of life by following the edicts of the “Party”, as espoused by a select few.

What is sometimes overlooked in Orwell’s 1984 is that the reverse Utopia we discover by reading its pages is not a government takeover, but a lack of knowledge and will on its people’s part. A government cannot form into a true state of reverse utopia without the consent of its people, without their willingness to forgoe the Socratic wisdom that is so dear and necessary to a truly free and democratic society. 1984 cannot germinate within a system of government, until its people stop thinking.

I understand, it is tempting to be religious. It may in fact be the original sin. I, too, want to shout at you, “What the fuck are you thinking, America?” But alas, I must restrain myself, in deference to Socrates who I will now go and attempt to learn of.