Er, a moral awakening *is* the answer.
>[PK:] So what's your theory behind that? Theoretically, how would we
>encourage a
>moral awakening? Do we simply wait for it to occur?
Allow me to make myself a laughingstock here and go all misty on you: I honestly think cultivating a sense of transcendental awareness is the ultimate key to social improvement. I think people have to be encouraged to look deep within themselves to hone their sense of social justice -- peering deeply enough to get beyond mere narcissistic preoccupations and recognize, in an empathic way, a connection with all the rest of humanity.
When I strive to do this, it always impresses on me that notions like an "equal opportunity" society are sorely inadequate -- that justice demands that we strive for an equal *results* society, however impossible that task may be. And because I believe this, I feel certain that at some level most of the rest of humanity (psychopaths excepted) feel the same way. I believe that because I agree with a remark (probably Emerson’s most famous) that on the surface seems utterly conceited but is actually one of the optimistic comments ever made about the potential for human interchange: “To believe your own thought, to believe that what is true for you in your private heart is true for all men, – that is genius.”
The idea that most of humanity ultimately shares the same innate notion of justice is vital if a bottom-up transformation of society is to occur. And I think that bottom-up change is the only change that will produce sustainable improvements. Excessive reliance on arcane theories to propel social change will invariably produce top-down solutions that will simply substitute one social elite for another.
All of this can be dismissed as sheer fancy, of course, but it gives me a sense of hope. To cite another favorite from Emerson: "The world lies in night of sin. It hears not the cock crowing: it sees not the grey streak in the East. At the first entering ray of light, society is shaken with fear and anger from side to side. Who opened that shutter? they cry, Wo to him! They belie it, they call it darkness that comes in, affirming that they were in light before.... The sects, the colleges, the church, the statesmen all have forebodings. It now works only in a handful. What does State Street and Wall Street and the Royal Exchange and the Bourse at Paris care for these few thoughts and these few men? Very little; truly; most truly. But the doom of State Street, and Wall Street, of London, and France, of the whole world, is advertised by those thoughts; is in the procession of the Soul which comes after those few thoughts."
Carl
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