The Circular Ideological Spectrum

In theory, ideological positions fall along a spectrum.  In practice, it is more a loop. The more extreme, the more a mirror of the opposition. This is intuitive for anyone aware of history, or detached enough from the current Right/Left dichotomy in the West at least to grasp. The historical example is how much Nazism Stalinism, although mortally opposed, were in practice merely different shades of the same brutal, totalitarianism, attempting to build utopia out of a mountain of skulls, and failing at the cost of tens of millions of lives.

In terms of the current Right/Left dichotomy, there is little to practically separate an actual "Alt Right" White Supremacist from an actual violent Anarcho Communist. Both espouse violence in favor of debate, forgo personal responsibility in all areas of life except in the practice of extreme ideology, and squarely place the blame for perceived ills on others, not to mention both are fundamentally detached from reality. 

Any addiction, including to ideology is unhealthy. It substitutes fantasy for truth, and destroys the agency of its victim. In the case of ideology, it is the beam in the eye of one trying to remove a speck from the opposition, or in this case the black hood on the one trying to remove the white bed sheet from the other.  Fortunately, vocal minorities in both directions do not generally speak for the majority of people simply more concerned with their day to day lives than media sophistry and rhetorical noise. The ratings though do seem to benefit. 

On the other hand, the hidden deception, far more banal because it passes as virtuous, possesses those claiming a position of faith in opposition to one of the two extremes. In the West, this often means Christians who may perceive themselves as boldly opposing injustice when they decry the rise of Fascism, Communism, Islamism, whatever happens to be readily and obviously worth opposing. Evil must indeed be opposed by the person of faith. It must be named, defined, its victims protected, if need by at the greatest risk to the person of faith. We rightly remember those from the past who have done this as heroes. However, just as ideological extremes mirror each other the farther apart they become, so too does moral outrage become moral panic the more fashionable the object of that initial outrage. 

Both extremism, and moral panic are fundamentally disconnected from the complexity of the world. Both grossly oversimplify day to day existence. Both are evil manipulations of the human tendency for availability bias, and both are far more in keeping with mob behavior than heroic courage. Furthermore, both are fundamentally lacking in introspection. 

For the person of faith, the beam to be removed is the deception that the methods of the City of Man can bring the outcomes of the City of God. It is possible to work to good effect in the City of Man, but using its methods to further the latter will turn in into the former far more surely than the alternative.  Evil must be opposed, and preferably by rules it does not play and cannot beat. Leftist and Rightist extremism are both ridiculous at best and abhorrently sinister at worst. However, using one to combat the other, focusing on one while ignoring the other, or allying with the methods of one to confront the other, no matter how noble on the surface, is nothing short of moral prostitution, and idolatry. We do not look to win the game, but to destroy it. It is not that such idealism seeks too much, but rather too little. 

The methods of the City of God are faith, hope, and love. Forgiveness, reconciliation, compassion, mercy. It is ridiculous to expect these virtues from the City of Man, neither is it its place to exhibit them. The best it can do is equality before its laws. To think otherwise ignores history. The methods of the City of God though are firmly the responsibility, and unique capability of the individual and community of faith. Even in a totalitarian regime, the most important problems to fix are often right next door in the form of those needing shelter.  

In general, if it's easy to condemn, it isn't the deeper problem. Moral courage generally means taking a stand that actually assumes risk. Both ideological extremism and moral panic are hubris fueled mass self deceptions. The real extremism is to put childish utopianism behind us, and seek to change what we have the opportunity to. Perhaps with faith in these smaller works, greater ones will be opened. The homeless alcoholic, teen mother, depressed family member, etc need your help as much as the nebulous masses.  You will sooner see results with such skin in the game.          

Changing Seasons

It is nearing the end of the year. The season has shifted, and with it, life has made itself more scarce. Whether it be the trees barren of leaves, the grass dead in the frost, animals in hibernation, the birds flying over the horizon, or simply the sun lower in the sky in the interludes between long cold nights. The whole world dies to one degree or another and each element in it's own way. And then, it comes back to life more forcefully than before.

Eons of experience points to the seasons eventually changing, life returning, and the cycle continuing. It is the natural order of things, and a process we have long come to expect and take for granted. Those who went before from the majority of cultures found spiritual significance in the changing patterns. Some spoke of thin spaces as the seasons changed. The natural and the super natural getting closer as we were driven closer to each other to avoid the cold. Death always brings near the other. Some saw the need to placate the gods with blood sacrifices when they sensed them approaching in these times of shifts to darkness. 

Newer faiths capitalized on the older customs and adapted them to convey new messages. Whether Christianity, Islam, or consumerism, the innate urge to commune with the other is a powerful force, and one for which we still sacrifice greatly for the chance to turn what is into what be wish it could be. 

Some would see the rampant consumption and mass placating of social anxieties to be noise confusing us from the signal  for the "reason for the season". I see it as something coming from our deepest being. We wish more than anything else to be connected, and most of all to the Divine Other. Whether we recognize it or not, it is as fundamental as breath. Nearly as fundamental is our notion that to get something, you must give something. Thus the sacrifice.

As with everything though, there is a deeper pattern. Something over the horizon. A longer trajectory. 

All things die. However when death passes, life reemerges more forcefully than before, as surely as the grass after the thaw, and cherry blossoms in spring. It is such on more than the obvious level. We sense the thin spaces. Our traditions originated from fundamental ideas about the world. Even if the original meanings have long since been covered in noise, we still sense it. 

I commemorates this time in memory of when the Divine stepped through the thin space into the physical, soon to die, and then, to rise. And with this resurrection, the whole world will follow. The ultimate winter, and the ultimate spring to follow. Such is the sacrifice all our attempts only pointed to. Carried on the winds of ultimate compassion, there is a ship large enough to hold all the world. 

Death is still among us and overtakes all things. Belief in that not yet seen requires faith. We are creatures of faith regardless of its object. 

I chose to have faith in the notion that the true height of mastery is not to bring good from good, but to turn that which is broken and dying to even greater good. This is what I see as the nights are long and cold and life retreats. This is what I look forward to when spring comes again. 

Too Big Not To Fail

It has been said a few times before how what goes unseen often matters far more than what is on the surface, and how what you don't know can actually kill you. This becomes increasingly the case the larger a system becomes. The larger as system is, the more difficult it becomes to track what is going on in it. Regardless of our many abilities, the human mind is only able to process so many things at once. It's why we have a parasympathetic nervous system. There is too much going on to be conscious of it all at all times. This does not seem to stop us from deluding ourselves into thinking we are though, and in that fantasy, much risk goes unseen.

The real trouble comes when that risk is hidden in the form of things that seem externally to be good. For example social programs to alleviate poverty that leave poor people more dependent and more poor than they were to begin with. On the other side of the political spectrum, strong pro-life positions that leave the movement looking like a group of bigoted, and completely out of touch hate mongers. the road to collapse and irrelevance is paved with good intentions poorly thought out and atrociously executed. 

At the same time, we continue to make the same mistakes. The reason is, with so much going on beyond the scope of human ability to accurately track, we substitute good feelings about a course of action for measured and accurate judgements. In the current modern world in which it is possible to aggregate so much noise and distraction, emotion speaks the loudest. It always does. However, in times passed, Babylon was a quitter place. One in which thoughts could be collected and judgements more thoroughly measured. None the less, hoping for a return to some passed golden age is as futile as predicting the next one. 

The long range trend of a complex system, which our political/social system is, is to grow more inwardly focused and thus more chaotic in the same way a feedback loop builds to ear piercing shrillness before you move the mike away. Counter intuitively, the larger the system is, the more assured you are of this entropy building. The reason is because large systems become stable and do not need to compete in the same way smaller ones do thus quickening the trend to inward focus and ultimately chaos.

The system becomes too big not to fail. Then again, chaos leads to destruction and recreation. To use the modern term, it breeds innovation.  It is incumbent upon the individual to recognize this and take advantage in such a way that leads to the betterment of that outside him or her self. We cannot keep track of everything, but we can recognize that which is close to us and we can influence it. This is a far more balanced approach than being swayed by the wind of whatever is trending right now, and influencing that close to you is simpler than it may seem. 

Behavioral Issues

There is a lot of talk these days, as there ever was, about radical change. We here about the need for it from sources as non-congruous as the Huffington Post and local mega church revival gatherings. The only problem is waiting around for something dramatic generally entails waiting a very long time.

Also, waiting around, however frustrating it may be, is a lot safer than the risks associated with doing what you truly want to do. Think of the member of the opposite sex, or perhaps the same sex who you wish you could have something more with. The wishing becomes its own fortress. Hope becomes its own solitary confinement. The thing with solitary confinement though is that if you can't get out, nothing else can get in, and thus at you. 

Important decisions are always underpinned by emotions more than logic and reason. 

That being said, rather than waiting for that radical change which is beyond prediction, the emotional blocks laid one on top of the other like walls in a fortress underlying that hope can be rearranged to form something, if not quite as dismally safe, much more open and thus much more capable of influencing the real world. 

This doesn't happen by waiting around. It happens by deciding to take control of your thoughts and actions daily, and moment by moment until they change. It comes by deciding to have a conversation with the homeless alcoholic on the street corner rather than ignoring him. It comes from deciding to make eye contact BEFORE leering at that hot girl's back side. See the person before you see an object. It comes from saying thank you when something has happened for which you should say so. It comes from deciding to forgive and saying you forgive until you actually mean it and it actually becomes true.

We talk about bad habits, and all too often forget that good habits can be learned just as well. 

Many small things become big things.

Introductions.

The purpose of this space is to discuss that which is overlooked, and that which is lurking under the surface. This is as much because that which you don't know can indeed kill you, as it is because the stone that the builders refused will become the head corner stone. It is also for that which is too inconvenient to discuss in politically correct modern society. In fact, it will be made clear in successive conversations that the issues most talked about and most contended are far less important than what they are being used to cover for. 

This is because just as dysfunctional families triangulate away their greatest problems, so too do troubled societies substitute that which does not mater for that which does to ease the discomfort. That being said, do not assume there will be any Tea partying going on, and don’t expect to be welcomed if you preach conspiracy theories. 

The leaning here is not Right or Left. Neither is it Libertarian or Anarchist. Rather, what we will discus here is fear and courage, shame and wisdom, chaos and order, and how these influence and underpin all that we do or fail to do in the public world. Despite our claims to rational thinking and behavior, faith is as much a part of the modern secular world as ever it was in more religious times past. Logic is used post facto to rationalize what were always emotional decisions because all that we do is influenced thus. 

This does not mean though that there is not free will. There would be little point in debating what is best if we did not expect we could positively act on it. All action requires will to one extent or the other. The questions then will circulate around to what degree emotion will master us or if we will master them to be the horse we ride upon to a greater good.