>...a social mass endlessly exposed to messy,
>contentious, insecure, and arbitrary changes of the
>political economy, will more than likely choose what
>promises to smooth over the mess, reassure the
endless >doubt, and supply some modicum identification
with >others.
Now we're into some very deep waters whose depths may never be completely explored. I cannot help but agree that there are much larger forces at work than can be effectively countered through the sorts of one on one situations I described.
Indeed, while our society is exhibiting its own particular delusions and pathologies, the root problems may come (as I think you suggested) from tendencies of the human mind itself.
Chomsky will, from time to time, spice up political lectures with intriguing references from his scientific work. Years ago as I recall, he stated, as part of a too brief riff on the continued value of (misundertood) cartesian thought, that we had to face the very real possibility that nature - including our own brains and behaviors - might possess a level of complexity in excess of our capacity to understand. This is not certain, he stressed, but something that must be considered.
The preference for fantasy over reality that Arendt describes, which I've certainly witnessed, even a preference for ideology over one's own experience, may be a limiting factor for any lasting human freedom from manipulation by demogogues and slides into totalitarianism. If this is a true and consistent part of 'human nature', it may be one of the aspects of nature that exceeds our cognitive ability to understand and manage.
Reading the Arendt quote (thanks for that by the way, very interesting) and your comments Chuck, and taking into account my observations I find myself seeing the challenge as much greater than I originally imagined.
Even so, we should, I think, choose to be pessimistic optimists if I may use such a clumsy phrase.
The alternative is to be alienated and disgruntled...no way to live.
DRM
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