A while ago, I wrote a post about the determined optimists of "the Right" (especially people who still, falsely, believe there is such a thing as "the Right") - who busily build their optimism from "fake straws" they have clutched from the maelstrom of a collapsing civilization.
Following the US election results, I can hardly believe the extent to which people are using fake straws to build grandiose but wholly imaginary castle in the air; that are supposed to represent their hopes of the kind of society that they want.
(Straw castles are bad enough, daydream castles are bad enough - but to daydream a castle made of fake straws! Well...)
Meanwhile... nothing has happened except words and emotions and speculations; and, by now, we ought to realize that (as of 2024) these do not amount to any good thing. nothing is cheaper than "words" in the West, in 2024 - being the most untruthful/ anti-truthful society in the history of the world.
It should, however, be remembered that thoughts are real, even air castles made of straw - but not necessarily real in the ways intended; and certainly not necessarily real in A Good Way.
What is apparently real, is that (perhaps) surprisingly large numbers of those who purport to oppose the totalitarian Leftist project; apparently believe (and are saying it) that decades of cumulative civilizational decline can be stopped and reversed by a mainstream election, leading to a new selection of mainstream political figures, being put in charge of an unchanged bureaucracy and media...!
They are saying that! (Although maybe they don't really believe it.)
What is also apparently real, is the thoroughgoing mundane materialism of what such people want: they want so very, very little - just these politicians instead of those, these laws instead of those... just common sense instead of institutionalized insanity.
The fake-straw optimists are therefore eminently reasonable - hence they cannot possibly succeed; because if almost-everything stays the same, then we will have the same, or worse.
They accept geopolitics, but want a different arrangement of nations and distribution of power. They want "business as usual" - but without the weird excesses of the post-millennial era. They want people to be sensible - and "sensible" in a normal, mainstream, hard-headed context.
They merely want, in other words; a different flavour of Leftism*.
And Leftism is oppositional and necessarily destructive, because Leftism is fundamentally a-theistic and a-spiritual.
"The art of the possible" is in actuality asserting the im-possible.
It will never happen, it can never happen. It ignores and suppresses the need for motivation, and that motivation requires purpose, and that purpose requires the context of a purposive creation.
And for creation to motivate us, requires that creation be of-God; and for God to motivate us we must have a relationship with God.
And for our relationship with God to have implications of truth, virtue and beauty; that relationship must be one of Love.
If we don't have that - we have no positive purpose, and insufficient motivation to do anything Good.
Which is exactly our situation.
And election enthusiasm is not merely irrelevant, but actively and powerfully hostile to what is absolutely necessary.
*Note: there is a Left, but no "Right"; because Leftism is oppositional to religion-in-general, Christianity in particular - and the spiritual and next-worldly nature of Christianity, to be exact (Christianity - not churches, who are all of-the-Left). The only valid options in the West are therefore various flavours of Leftism - or Christianity.
"The only valid options in the West are therefore various flavours of Leftism - or Christianity."
ReplyDeleteAre you saying that people like me are Christians without knowing it, because we want what Christ offers (eternal participation in infinite loving creation of beauty with other people while continuing to be a distinct and aware being), and will accept it when we understand that he is offering it?
@Hagel - Yes.
ReplyDeleteI see the u.s. political system as a ginormous orc that shambles along on two legs called democrat and republican. As it moves it sways back and forth, “left” and “right.” One year it’s all mass immigration and trannies and the next year it’s war and “standing up to evil dictators.” (Religion is the middle toe on the beast’s right foot.) It always clumps along in the same direction leaving a wake of dead children and shattered nations. Do you want peace? Then you must take cultural perversion with it. Sick of perversion? Then you must swallow a big helping of militarism with your “return to normalcy.”
ReplyDeleteCo-Congregant: I heard he’s going to give everyone back their job who lost it for refusing the peck!
ReplyDeleteMe: Seems the least he could do since he “invented” the peck himself. Though I wonder how helpful it would be to get your job back 5 years later.
CC: Mm, yeah…
Even in materialist terms, I am underwhelmed by the promises, even if they weren’t clearly empty!
Everything you have said is correct, nevertheless it is gratifying to see so many people saying no to the "New Normal Order" planned dystopia in some form or another. It's too bad that Trump failed in whatever possibility it seemed he was meant to pursue, but that business with the bullet is almost miraculous. I wish I knew what it all meant and what he truly represents.
ReplyDeleteThey’re just saying no to perceived death and suffering! There’s no fundamental moral improvement there.
ReplyDelete