Demonization as a Political Process

The Salem Witch Trials are a lesson in history under reenactment.  What essentially was an attempt to discredit and remove rival interests led to the atrocity of unbridled accusation and slander easily accepted as truth.  Fear drives such engines, and the power to promote such trifling with reputations is unlimited in its uncritical acceptance by the masses.

The ploy of demonization is a tool that succeeds only when credibility is not sought out.  In the case of the witch trials, twenty lives were lost on the simple fact that an authority assumed too much, that it was inerrant in its pursuit of truth.  Today, anything that opposes progressivism is no longer the "loyal opposition," but an ulcer in need of removal.  And the removal process begins with the premise that such views are not worth holding, that they are antiquated not so much as they are hate-driven, monstrous, enslaving, degenerative, and debased in thinking.

We have made it a logical short circuit to credit the other side with the shades of despicable.  It is the course of politics to criticize the President.  It becomes racism if that president is black, sexism is that president is a woman, homophobic if the president is or supports the gay agenda.  The facts of the matter need not be discussed if this blockade to honest exchange is utilized.

The first thing that matters is to address the root cause, as it would have been in Salem centuries ago.  Fear.  We fear the defeat of progressivism and all the promises it advances, and all the lofty goals towards which it strives.  But we stifle an equally important fear, the fear of unwelcome progress, of dangerous progress, of progress in which more is lost than gained.  But the idea is not to demonize the whole of progressivism, but to offer second opinions of where we wish to go, or even where we wish to stay.

It is the issue of the path, the passage, the travel, the destinations, the stays, that must be given due consideration.  All of the trappings of safe, sane travel planning.  The passengers need to offer their insights and input, and disagreements on the flow of the trip must be expected.

Labeling one a churl for disagreeing on the most recent turn of the wheel belittles the trip, and makes for strained traveling.  People encased in moving vehicles would know of this tension as most unpleasant.  This is the tension we must cope with, and name-calling is this hallmark of immaturity.  And who wishes to travel with the immature?

The Quest for Centrism and its Cure

Some time ago, a letter to the editor in the Watertown Daily-Times denounced a trend to view the news outlets Fox News and MSNBC as polarizing effects, and sought a solution, the moderate outlets as NBC.  This was a sincere effort to key on the "coming together" at a compromised position featured as the default understanding of the American culture.  It is an acceptable approach only if it is a legitimate method at ascertaining truth.

Unfortunately, it is not.  It fights polarization with a blind surrender to a position that is hybrid, not an authentic arrival at a suitable solution.  It closes down the arena of ideas for pseudo-thought.

In analyzing this notion of finding the central point acceptable to both, I am heavily influenced by Hegelian thought of historical shifts and the forces that motivate them.  The essence of this philosophical view is the friction of  thesis and antithesis, resolving into a middle position called synthesis.  Graphically seen we have:

I. THESIS -----------------------------> SYNTHESIS <--------------------------------- ANTITHESIS

Centrism holds that this is a necessary historic flow of thinking and the cultures and political systems that develop from such shifts.  Accepting this tenet removed the idea of intellectual fairness that once instructed informed individuals to subscribe to two newspapers, one liberal and one conservative, and to pursue a wide range of reading from all points of the spectrum of ideas.  Acceptance of this premise fails in the one respect of a continuation of this dynamic, expanding itself beyond a second level, like thus.

II. THESIS -----------------------------> SYNTHESIS' <-------------------------------- ANTITHESIS


THESIS' ---> SYNTHESIS" <---- SYNTHESIS'

Note the drift of the original idea towards the original thesis.  In the view of the antithesis, such drift alienates the original proposition of the antithesis.  This could lead to a triple level of historic-cultural shift:

III. THESIS ------------------------------> SYNTHESIS' <------------------------------- ANTITHESIS

THESIS' ---> SYNTHESIS" <----  SYNTHESIS'

                       SYNTHESIS" -----------------------> SYNTHESIS"' <------------ ANTITHESIS'

In these variations to the original Hegelian scheme (I.), I would call II. Remodification and III. Retrofication.  In the drama of history, these would be the components of revolution and counter-revolution.  I hold American culture as whipping wildly between rapid shifts of II and III.

The key to taking a pragmatical application to what could become more complicated is in the view of Fox News as THESIS, MSNBC as ANTITHESIS.  This would make NBC (or any "mainstream" outlets) as SYNTHESIS.  The objection that soon arises is the perception that NBC is merely a reduplication of the same journalistic tone as ANTITHESIS.  This would then be seen as concession, presented as:

THESIS ----------------------------------------------------------------------> SYNTHESIS=ANTITHESIS

Thus we have a closing of mind, the acceptance of a default view, all others to be "debunked" dogmatically.

The solution is standing ones ground, to demand the proof needed to accept a synthesized position.  Centrism may lead to the semblance of contentment, but it would be the contentment of sheep.

The Apocalyptic Motif

It was not all that long ago that images of the unshaven hippie-type bearing the banner "The End is Near" would have left us with the compulsion to snicker.

The "Left Behind" series has been put off as low theater of the Christian variety.

The imagery of Revelation is often seen as unsettling, and reduced to the level of propaganda presented to get the uncritical masses to get into line and join the Church.

But recently, science has chimed in on the same theme.  Global warming alarmists are bent on positing a date for irreparable damage, 2054 if I'm not mistaken.  The latest episode of Cosmos warns us that the environment is a fragile thing that would rage against its inhabitants given the proper circumstances.  From time to time, we are alerted of million-mile misses of space objects that would have impacted negatively life as we know it.  And, while there is in science voices of calm and assurance, there is an undercurrent that simply "carrying on" will imply necessary life-style changes, a secular form of repent or perish.

I have often wondered if there isn't some form of earth-weariness that society slips into from time to time.  Uncertainty in economic factors and political progress leaves one spent and zealous to be done with it all.  The end of the world (or Western civilization as we know it) seems to groan and sigh with the surge of advances and reversals in history's little march to somewhere.

If we could be assured this is not a Bataan Death March, we could endure.  Unbridled optimism seems to be a slim cure, and sometimes more poison than medicine.  We are hell-bent to make the world a better place, but in making strides we fail to move forward.  For all our progress, we still would like to know our destination well before hand, and making progress to make more progress later seems like so much wheels spinning in the mud.

Perhaps "The End is Near" is just a hankering for a destination, after all.