1/18/21
I read recently and with dismay about an elder Republican lawmaker who died of the virus, after hosting a large dinner party. Most attendees wore no masks. Apparently at this point five lawmakers, all Republicans, have died of the virus. It appears the party of personal responsibility is actually the party of selfishness, and this is why the party, and that way of thinking, must and will die out.
Either that or we all will. It’s clear the great theme of the 21st century is Connectedness. The Internet is the visible example of this, but examples surround us: globalization; the environmental crisis; social media. Every facet of our lives, from how we live and work to how we love, live, and die, expresses at every moment the insight that we are all connected. Walking around in separate bags of skin is an illusion; in fact, as the virus is continuing to teach us, we literally are breathing each other in and out with every breath.
The problem with Republicanism as it’s presently constituted is that it preaches selfishness: Trump supporters who otherwise are kind people vote for that dinosaur because he will keep their personal taxes low. Refusing mask wearing, refusing to accept the results of the election are refusals to submit themselves to what the rest of us would call reality.
But life means submitting ourselves to everything that is greater than us, starting with biology and chemistry. Trump supporters and Republicans seem to favor Christianity. But Jesus himself, as Matthew 26:39 states, submitted himself to something bigger than his desire. He tried to resist fate and God but had to say: Thy will be done. Time to be Christians, Republicans!
If you refuse to submit, you’re living in the old world, in which it was believed the individual was the center of the universe and could somehow control everything. It’s not, it doesn’t, as John Donne hundreds of years ago taught us that any man’s death diminishes me.
Let’s walk ourselves through an analysis of how everything being connected works with taxes. If the US spends zillions on war and death, there’s no money for peace and life—no money for education, health care, the environment, and so on. If you vote for Trump (or anyone) because he or she will keep your taxes low, here’s how that will play out: In the short term you will pay lower taxes. That will increase your wealth. But by definition, increasing your wealth diminishes someone else’s wealth. Fewer people with money means fewer people for the state to tax, to get the money to keep government (street lights, trash pickup, schools) funded. Money for war means no money for peace, or just to run things. Fewer sources of tax income means taxes must rise on those who do have the income. Result: Your taxes increase. It’s inevitable and unavoidable.
The great evil of our time is, of course, capitalism, and that’s because capitalism (as Marx taught us) has from the start contained the seeds of its own destruction: It’s selfish. I profit at your loss. Marx predicted a revolution as the necessary outcome of the evolution of capitalism.
The revolution is here and now: a revolution in how we think. We either survive as a species all together, or we all die. Decide!
2 thoughts on “The Grand Reality”
Comments are closed.
I read this post about an hour before Biden’s inauguration. Biden used the word “unity” multiple times in his address, understandably, but “connectedness” is better, more accurate. Unity says we’re all one, which commonsense tells us isn’t true (except at the taxonomic level). Connectedness says we’re many but interdependent, which we are, undeniably.
Maybe the problem isn’t with capitalism but with the American approach to capitalism, the fact that we’ve taken the enlightenment out of “enlightened self-interest,” which my dictionary defines as “behavior based on awareness that what is in the public interest is eventually in the interest of all individuals and groups.” Sounds kind of socialistic, actually, but it used to be a guiding principle not only of American capitalism but of American individualism. Somewhere along the way, we forgot that we’re all in this together.
Maybe the problem is just that Americans are the loneliest people on earth, and lonely people tend to think they’re alone, even in a crowded room.
Thanks, Harold! I agree–the split only widened between ER and Romanticism–that is, the self and society. Rugged individualism has produced indeed, a nation of lonely people. But we were not always thus.
It’s another question as to whether capitalism itself, which I would say is the great evil of our time, is instead just practiced in a particularly vicious way in our country…