A Separate Peace
by Jason GodeskyPeggy Noonan’s editorial in the Wall Street Journal is very disturbing, indeed; not because she reveals anything new, but the fact that this is Peggy Noonan, writing in the editorial pages of the Wall Street Journal. In the piece, we see Noonan trying desperately to grasp intuitively towards the very same point that Tainter drives home so precisely in The Collapse of Complex Societies. Noonan’s seeing that investments in complexity simply aren’t yielding the same results they used to, and that the world has become so complex it’s unmanageable.
Noonan is part of the elite. She was a speechwriter for Reagan and Bush, Sr. She put into Bush’s mouth such memorable phrases as, “a kinder, gentler naton,” the horrifying vision of “a thousand points of light,” and the most classic quote from the original Bush administration, “Read my lips: no new taxes.” When she writes about elites in the pages of the Wall Street Journal, she is writing about her own, to her own. She comes to the conclusion that even the elites see the end coming. She relates this tale of Ted Kennedy at home with the family:
Everyone was laughing. Then, writes Mr. Lawford, Teddy “took a long, slow gulp of his vodka and tonic, thought for a moment, and changed tack. ‘I’m glad I’m not going to be around when you guys are my age.’ I asked him why, and he said, ‘Because when you guys are my age, the whole thing is going to fall apart.’ “
…
And–forgive me–I thought: If even Teddy knows…
In Tainter’s theory, a civilization collapses when its elites begin to understand the nature of their nvestments in complexity. They see that their investments are no longer making good returns. And so, they stop making those investments. As the marginal returns decrease, that point becomes inevitable, no matter how much investment the elites are willing to make without any hope of return. Such heroic behavior is simply not sustainable. However, that can certainly be accelerated once the elites come to understand the losing proposition they face. If they decide to withdraw those investments, and instead look towards simply surviving collapse themselves, then collapse will follow.
Peggy Noonan and Ted Kennedy could not be further apart on the political spectrum, but both see those diminishing returns leering over us. George Bush’s ranch in Crawford is an environmentalist’s dream of sustainability. The neoconservatives are lobbying for more research in sustainable, alternative energy.
The elites can see the writing on the wall–and that in itself means that the writing is, indeed, on the wall.
We could pool our money
Comment by Jeff Vail — 28 October 2005 @ 5:34 PM
I like where you’re going with this, Jeff. So–is it too early to start taking out loans on the expectation that the banking system won’t be around much longer to do any collecting?
Comment by Jason Godesky — 28 October 2005 @ 5:38 PM
Hey –
Soooo… 56 Hectartes… in my vernacular, I make that, what? 138 acres. So, maybe a population of 30, that’s 20K each… where do I (we) sign up?
Janene
Comment by Janene — 28 October 2005 @ 6:11 PM
I don’t like coconut, though. *frowns*
Comment by Devin — 28 October 2005 @ 6:22 PM
this a topic for which i think more attention needs to be drawn because, if the elites know and have come to terms with what is befalling civilization, which this article clearly points out, the what i think is the relevent question of; so what are they going to do next, or more specifically, what are they going to do to us?
Comment by anarcho-feralist — 28 October 2005 @ 6:32 PM
I could scrape together 20 grand. Not even a problem, come to think of it. Who needs a college fund when you’re going to be surrounded by some of the world’s brightest people?
- Chuck
Comment by Chuck — 28 October 2005 @ 7:15 PM
I love coconut. I also love fish (another major source of food when you’re living on an island). You know what I don’t like? Earthquakes. And tsunamis.
Comment by Giulianna Lamanna — 28 October 2005 @ 10:18 PM
Neither of which are very big problems if you’re a nomadic forager!
Comment by Jason Godesky — 28 October 2005 @ 10:23 PM
I can’t remember where I heard this (hell, it may have been from here) but I remember reading about a group of tribal foragers who lived on one of the Malaysian Islands that was hit by the recent tsunami. They had myths and legends that basically told them that when the sea dipped low, they’d better grab their gear and get to high ground, because the spirits of the ocean were pissed.
The “advanced” humans, on the other hand, never stopped once to think about why the sea level suddenly dropped 200 feet, and ran out to look at all the cool exposed seafloor.
Score one for the primitives!
- Chuck
Comment by Chuck — 28 October 2005 @ 11:12 PM
Maybe here?
But, of course…
Comment by Jason Godesky — 28 October 2005 @ 11:17 PM
I just noticed that it was slightly ironic that the title of the piece is A Separate Peace… and here we are discussing the merits of buying an island. Hmm.
“We got ours.”
Comment by Anonymous — 29 October 2005 @ 12:04 AM
Hm. That was me.
Comment by Devin — 29 October 2005 @ 12:19 AM
Wow. I would put my nose directly to the grindstone to get 20K ASAP if this is serious (or 40K for me and my wife). Tell me it is and I will sell everything I own and work until I have it. Probably take a year or two.
Comment by Cory — 29 October 2005 @ 1:09 AM
This is my first post here. I found this site through a chain of searches about Daniel Quinn at Wikipedia. I have read a few articles and I like what I see.
A couple thoughts. Why discuss money and buying land. I live in Utah currently. There is a great huge desert that is 99.99999% empty. Have you ever priced livestock? Compared to iPods, tanks of gas, and cable modem bills a horse, goat or even camel is an outrageous value. Nader Khalili can teach you have to build a house out of dirt for about $1000.00 USD.
If you are considering borrowing money to buy land then why not consider squatting first? You might even be able to make money in your new life.
Could you imagine giving guided camel riding tours in the American Southwest? Could you charge $100 per person for a night of feasting, storytelling and lodging in an earthen dome? Easily.
That is just one example, but I am sure there are many possibilities. I hope we can get some ideas going.
Comment by McKinley — 29 October 2005 @ 2:26 AM
Cory — hey. If we were going to actually buy land, I think we’d be looking somewhere cheaper than that! 20K per person is on the high end of things, if I know what I’m talking about. Which there is the possibility that I don’t. Janene? Care to back me up on this?
McKinley — yeah. I think the idea of buying an island was tongue-in-cheek, at least in part. The idea of buying land has been thrown around before, though. More at IshCon rather than here, but still. You make a good point about finding free land, I think. I recall the insight about intentional communities that they were most successful when the land was bought after the community/vision was already formed. I think we’re still in the forming stages, to say the least. Most of us aren’t sure what exactly we’re going to pursue, how we’re going to pursue it, and who we’re pursuing it with yet.
However, $1000 for a house is pretty expensive when you can build them for free. Learn indigenous construction methods and you can build your own house out of wood, which might be a tad easier than building it out of dirt.
Anyway, welcome to the website! Take some time to explore — this site is, in my opinion, one of the best places to go if you’re interested in the ideas of Daniel Quinn. Jason has done quite a bit of work laying out all the arguments for us, it’s been quite pleasant to watch him write it all out for the rest of us.
Comment by Devin — 29 October 2005 @ 4:28 AM
Boy, you snooze you lose, and Devin says everything you were gunna say before you even wake up.
But, err, yeah. Hey there, McKinley, welcome aboard!
Comment by Jason Godesky — 29 October 2005 @ 10:19 AM
Hey –
Devin… the island is clocking in at about $5000. an acre. For comparison, bulk land in Hawaii (big island, non-tourist/ranch land) runs anywhere from 10K to 100K and up. Tennessee land tends to the $1000/acre range. Illinois farm land runs $3500, non farm/non urban IL sits around $2500… scrub and desert in the US southwest can clock in between $200 and $750 an acre.
So there you have it
Janene
Comment by Janene — 29 October 2005 @ 11:08 AM
:::softly singing::: Country roads, take me home… to the place… I belong… WEST VIRGINIA…
Comment by Giulianna Lamanna — 29 October 2005 @ 11:38 AM
Hey –
West Virginia… about the same as Tennessee
Janene
Comment by Janene — 29 October 2005 @ 11:58 AM
Bob Harrison says:
anarcho-feralist : this a topic for which i think more attention needs to be drawn because, if the elites know and have come to terms with what is befalling civilization, which this article clearly points out, the what i think is the relevent question of; so what are they going to do next, or more specifically, what are they going to do to us?
I think this is a very relevent question. An oligarchy which is aware of the problem and which could gain control of the proper WMD could solve the problem for a small population by causing a massive kill-off before the die-off. They could morally justify this to themsselves and their posterity because they would be saving civilization and preventing the extinction of humanity.
Comment by Bob Harrison — 29 October 2005 @ 12:21 PM
I think I like the cover version better. Maybe that’s my problem. Anyway, the suggestion to “buy an island” was definitely tongue-in-cheek. Sort-of.
Hakim Bey does a good job explaining why an “island” is necessary to evade perception by the state–something which I think will be more important than ever as the state is actually going through the throes of collapse (this is also the #1 mistake that the “rich” are making as they set up their own “islands”). I’d add that an “island” is also usefull from a power perspective, and that it places a geographic constraint on intensification (not an end-all, but certainly a help). Of course, “island” is just a metaphor. Or is it a simile? Damn…
So did I intentionally reference a cover by “Me First and the Gimme Gimmes” when talking about fleeing to a tropical island paradise? It does seem a bit selfish. But what’s selfish when 75%+ of the population needs to be reduced in the next century, anyway? I think of it as being a little bit like the monasteries of Western Europe that existed (in a manner) as islands of classical knowledge, ready to infuse the surrounding countryside with their seed when conditions had improved (not that I agree with their goals–it is their methods that serve as an example). Or, if you give any credence to Graham Hancock (whom I list in the “interesting theory” pile), the pyramids represent the very same concept: symbolic “islands” of knowledge. A collapse will necessarily engender a period of transition–how long and how destructive we honestly don’t know. Wouldn’t it be a shame if knowledge of the past was lost to those who are charged with navigating the future?
I think that Herodotus some choice words for that kind of ignorance: those who cannot remember the past are condemned to repeat it. If nothing else, that seems like a charge–both for this group and for an “island.” Which is something that I was referencing–if obliquely–in the title of a past post: “Defending Pala“
Comment by Jeff Vail — 29 October 2005 @ 12:31 PM
Bob,
What you’re talking about sounds just like the plot to most James Bond movies. Synchronicity: That is exactly why I changed the title graphic on my site to a picture of the ruined city of Palmyra–which is also the name of the hideout of the Bond-Villain “Largo” in “Thunderball.”
Interesting, from an anthropology standpoint: The mythical theme of the phoenix, destroying civilization so that civilization can rise again in a better form, seems to pop up right about the time that a civilization is going to fall. But (based on my limited knowledge) past phoenix myths didn’t involve the instigation of the collapse that leads to resurection–this seems to be a distinctly modern mutation of the classical myth. Is this our ego out of control? Is James Bond a mythical precursor of collapse?
Comment by Jeff Vail — 29 October 2005 @ 12:38 PM
Well yes, but how many songs are there about Tennessee?
Comment by Giulianna Lamanna — 29 October 2005 @ 1:20 PM
I just figured lots of water surrounding your home is a pretty darn good defense, as well as being outside any state borders. Squatting in the forest preserves of West Virginia seems like it could lead to trouble with the state, and we all know tribes can’t stand up to civilization when they have us in their crosshairs.
That said, I did some calculations, and it would actually take the two of us 3.5-4.5 years to earn $20K each, and that’s if we are diligent and don’t get distracted…
…So where in West VIrginia, exactly?
Comment by Cory — 29 October 2005 @ 2:25 PM
Pocahontas County is the one of the least population-dense county on the entire East Coast, and is adjacent to two other similarly sparse counties: Highland County and Bath County, Virginia. It’s a good place to buy some land while civilization still exists, and when civilization collapses, we’ll have some room to spread into.
http://www.bus.wisc.edu/realestate/images/resources/us_density.gif
Comment by Giulianna Lamanna — 29 October 2005 @ 3:18 PM
I homesteaded in Summers County WV for five years in the early 80’s. Land was very cheap there. I sold 100 acres mostly woods with 25 acres of fields for $20.000 at the end of the 80’s. The biggest problem there was to become accepted by the locals. If you were accepted, hunting and foraging as long as you stay away from peoples homes was considered a right. I knew locals who built shelters from dump yard gleanings. Survived from food stamps, ginseng gathering, scrounging and trading. Some kept cattle on land owned by non-residents. Ground hogs, deer, and even bobcats were hunted for food. They are aware of edible plants and useful herbs.
I don’t really think it would be necessary to purchase land for this purpose. After the collapse deeds will be meaningless. If the idea is to practice hunting and gathering in the meantime, it might be a good idea to just purchase or rent a trailer or small place there. Get to know the locals and just do it. I would look to be near large tracts of land owned by absentee speculators or corporations. Avoiding the owners and state enforcement agencies would be good practice.
Comment by Bob Harrison — 29 October 2005 @ 5:32 PM
Hey –
Oh, well, I was trying to oblige, by including West Virginia in the mix
But since you ask….
Janene
Comment by Janene — 29 October 2005 @ 6:06 PM
To witness such a personal/gut feeling story inside the Wall Street Journal is quite revealing! We are heading towards a major collapse sooner than later that’s quite apparent. Even the captain Greenspan from the ‘Delay the meltdown’ transnational steamship already left the bridge to dig a deep cave hideout somewhere..
Just yesterday I’ve seen on the news that the watershed of the mighty Amazon river is so badly damaged by deforestation (resulting in giant droughts now) that even the scientist on longterm assignment there voiced their concern that they didn’t expect it to happen so soon but rather in 30years time. Yet, the Brazilian government still runs Amazon bound relocation/deforestation programs for its growing population.. As people wanted to hit the brick wall not at 50mph but at 150mph, ouch..
In short, my gut feeling seems to support the anthropik tribe theory based on the similar clues that the fall of global civilization will be most likely nasty, unexpected (for general public) and shockingly fast in progress..
Comment by Mesuge — 31 October 2005 @ 6:57 AM
Everyone here needs to move to the Pacific Northwest. Both Savinar and Ruppert have either made the move already or are in the process of packing. I’d recommend Bellingham, WA (90 minutes north of Seattle). It’s an affluent but very hippie-ish city of 160K where people commute by bicycle and have an interest in sustainable living. It’s wedged right up against the Chuckanut Mountains where one can hike and bike–and forage! That’s why I moved here last July.
Comment by Peter — 31 October 2005 @ 1:31 PM
Which is precisely why, post-collapse, the Pacific Northwest will be one of the most overpopulated, ecologically-stressed bioregions on earth.
To quote Giuli, “West Virginia! No one expects it….”
Comment by Jason Godesky — 31 October 2005 @ 1:49 PM
We’re only 27 miles away from Canuckistan. That’s another plus.
Comment by Peter — 31 October 2005 @ 2:03 PM
Jeff, it would be a metaphor, its only a simile if you use the words “like” or “as.” “We need an island to survive the crash” is a metaphor. “And island is like a castle, protecting us from the death-throes of civilization” is a simile.
Devin, forget wood, now, trust me. Look into adobe, packed earth, and straw bale. Much better for plains regions anyway. And southwest? Adobe, all the way. And you don’t even need to research indigonious peoples. Research what people built with 150 years ago. Before the industrial revolution people built smart. They built for cheap, local, and efficently comfortable. They didn’t have air conditioners, steel, and wood from another continent. And in the southwest, and other dry, arid climates they use adobe, packed earth, and the like. I like straw bale for now because it’s current a waste product you can get for dirt cheap and one bale of straw gets you better insulation than brick, until it gets 50 feet thick at least. Wood construction is fire-prone, poorly insulated, and doesn’t tend to assist the mental health of the occupents. Adobe, staw, packed earth, etc feels better, it’s less stressing to the occupents.
Comment by Benjamin Shender — 31 October 2005 @ 5:50 PM
Trust you? Are you kidding? lol…
Wigwams? Bark lodges? Longhouses? Tipis? Thatched huts? All use wood…
Comment by Devin — 31 October 2005 @ 9:32 PM
Hey guys, just stumbled onto your website….
Don’t forget water, clean potable water, water available without electricity, water available year round.
Giorgio
Comment by giorgio — 1 November 2005 @ 11:13 PM
Yes, it’s a joke I made up.
None in the way that civilization currently does. And none with the density and open interior construction that makes such buildings kindling. Your house’s walls are hollow, all the way to the foundation. That means that a fire can easily jump levels. And I believe that with the possible exception of longhouses, none of the structures you’ve listed use wood as anything but a structural component. The insolation and walls are other materials. A tipi uses wooden poles to hold up the canvas. A wigwam and a bark lodge (I believe) use saplings to form the structure and pieces of bark for insolation. Thatched huts use staw…I like straw. Although once civilization collapses it’s big advantage of being over-produced and never used goes away. When I said “don’t use wood” I meant “use wood smart or don’t use wood.” Personally I find it easier to just avoid using materials that you need to be careful with. Same reason I don’t advocate using depleted uranium as a building material despite it’s advatages. It’s the lingering death I don’t like. My point stands: there are better materials to use than wood, stone, or brick. And most of the those materials are easier to work with, make more asethtically pleasing structures, and dirt is as common as…well…dirt.
Comment by Benjamin Shender — 2 November 2005 @ 12:00 AM
Ahh, the good ol’ elites. I have a whole different take on what Noonan was up to with this article, and it has nothing to do with the collapse of the world. The elites are doing just peachy as far as I can tell. In fact, this is their hey day!
No, this is Bush protection cloaked in non-partisan global concern. Read more here:
http://thephrog.com/blog/?p=2
d-pep-skep
Comment by dispeptic-skeptic — 23 November 2005 @ 1:16 AM
Obviously, but that’s not the interesting part. There’s what people say, and what they say. Usually, it’s the latter that’s far more interesting.
Also, even the elites aren’t doing so peachy. As people privelaged enough to have internet access, we are the elites. But you’ll note the suicide rate in the top tax bracket is especially high, to say nothing of stress-related disorders. No, even the wealthy can see that all their wealth and power isn’t doing nearly as much for them as they dreamed it would.
I wonder if perhaps Bush isn’t crazy like a fox. What would be the best thing you could do to prolong civilization and prevent collapse? Obfuscate the issue. Bush’s ineptitude in Iraq and Afghanistan set the stage, such that when Katrina eventually came, people thought that the disaster was again because of Bush’s ineptitude. When oil prices sky-rocketed, we blamed it on Iraq. Thus, it’s only a passing thing which will correctly itself shortly, and continued investment in complexity is still worthwhile, with a good long-term return.
But we’re in the midst of collapse, and these are problems that will only become worse. No government–much less any individual–could do any better. As incompetent as Bush is, he’s in an ultimately irrelevant position–but his incompetence can serve to obfuscate that fact, and trick people into investing into this doomed system for a few more years.
Of course, that will make the collapse that much worse when it eventually does happen, and such a gambit–if that’s what it is–can only buy, at most, a few years.
Comment by Jason Godesky — 23 November 2005 @ 1:24 AM
There is another possibility: Bush is just an icon whose job is PR and he’s done a fantastic job until now. Also he is very expendable in this position. It may be that other elites are in control that are aware of the impending collapse. For them the ideal solution is a downsizing of this civilization allowing them and a much smaller population to maintain their lifestyles. To accomplish this they need to create a police state and then cull the excess population.
Comment by Bob Harrison — 23 November 2005 @ 9:53 AM
The elites do tend to be sincere in their beliefs. The people manipulating Bush believe they’re saving the world. I misspoke above: I don’t think Bush personally is smart enough to hatch such a scheme, but his handlers surely are. But “culling the excess population”? That’s an evil even Leo Strauss couldn’t countenance. Roman-style imperial domination, absolutely. Machiavellian lying and scheming to get that, obviously. But active genocide is beyond the pale even for them.
Comment by Jason Godesky — 23 November 2005 @ 11:37 AM
Hmmm, I’d already taken action to pull all my money out of my 401K penalty or no. I have no reason to believe that I’ll have access to that money when I reach “retirement age”. So I’ll invest it in land. Which will allow me a staging area in which to prepare without catching the notice of those who could cause me problems before society goes into full fledged collapse.
Comment by ChandraShakti — 3 April 2006 @ 1:44 AM
Hey –
When you do so — check out the tax structures. Generally you can take 401K money out WITHOUT penalty, if you are using it to ‘buy a home’….
Janene
Comment by Janene — 3 April 2006 @ 9:10 AM
man! First time visitor. You guys are thick, but I’ve got all the consciousness I can stand. I read Noonan thru the lens of the culture wars. She forgot to mention the “peak oil” (alleged) crisis and the STD pandemic, the latter now appearing in Africa and Eurasia. Soon to be appearing in full bloom in America.[See http://www.ajog.org/issues/contents; (March 9, 2004) 191, 1103-12 by Canadians Stephen Genuis M.D.& Shelagh Genuis BScOT]
We beg our teens not to drink, smoke or do drugs. But we wink at them when we preach a mixed message about sexual abstinence with contraception as a back up (which rarely works). And then fill their movies and TV programs with sexual titillation but rare negative consequences, demeaning the dignity of our bodies and the meaning of sexual union. Parents are left to clean up the refuse of the trash Hollywood happily $erve$ up - from teen pregnancy to clammydia and sterlity.
Though I could blame some “elites” for such crises, I deeply believe Roe v Wade DEEPLY wounded our country. All children born since are survivors. The feminism that drives Roe’s existence is a sham - rescuing males from maturity in the name of liberation while colluding with the very roots of the sexism and chavinism such freedom is supposed to neutralize. Now, same sex “marriage” is rubbing salt in that wound. Not to diminish 9-11, but it transformed the growing “110″ anxiety up to “220!”
You might want to look into the “societal regression” thinking going on at the Georgetown Center for the Study of the Family. [http://www.thebowencenter.org/pages/conceptsep.html] It is not possible to summarize all that is wrong, much less how to turn this ship around. In his book “How to Win the Culture Wars,” Boston College prof Peter Kreeft says its with “saints and martyrs.” Not a very popular idea in a society preoccupied with amusement, SUVs, consumerism, American Pie trilogy, Desperate Housewives, Hugh Hefner and Howard Stern, Girls Gone Wild, no-fault divorce, self-actualization, “private” morality, fear of (talk of) God in the public square, and political correctness.
Noonan’s was an insightful article. May it lead to more intelligent discussion, and critical soul searching in our homes, communities, religious institutions and government.
Comment by Chuck B — 24 April 2006 @ 11:40 PM
Hey Chuck B,
Seems like you have a laundry list of things you don’t like. The good news for you, is all these perhipheral concerns won’t matter much in the future…Hollywood, abortion, political correctness, and all these other issues you mention are primarily aspects of civlizization, and in particular 1st world nations, alah the “entertainment culture”.
There is No winning the so called “culture war”, that has been amped up in the US in particular. But continues to play out across the globe, as it has in many forms throughout human history.
I suppose God will be Fixing things soon in your opinion?? If so no worries, may as well spend your final years lamenting civilization/US culture. You won’t find many fans of it here, even if many do not share your particular political views.
“Roe Vs. Wade deeply wounded our country” This is neither here nor there, Won’t God just judge us anyway…no need for christian’s to Fill in for the deity. Abortion being the Deep wound to the country seems irrational to me, at best maybe you can add it to the list of Deep wounds. The main one being that no Country that bases its economy on perpetual growth & runs itself on the back of finite resources can hope to survive forever.
You list many symptoms of civilization, but seem to want to blame it on particular groups, rather than realizing itself innately part of the system.
According the bible ‘the whole world is lying in the power of the wicked one’, no truly holy nations left…Republicans have tried to promote America as the Christian nation, but no such thing exits in reality. For a nation that is 80% christian denomination—why is there so many of the ILLS that you mention?? Likely because most of those folks are active participants, and servants to the new RELIGION of ECONOMIC PROSPERITY/WORK vs. the simple life & family & friends over the collection of STUFF.
Comment by Bubba — 25 April 2006 @ 9:21 AM
Yes, Chuck B., you’ve put your finger on the problem. Letting women have control over their own bodies, letting consenting adults marry the people they love, and not excluding religious minorities is EXACTLY what’s wrong with civilization. Damn, why didn’t we think of that before. All this time we’ve been going on and on about “unsustainability” and “war” and “overpopulation” when the answer was right there in front of us: [i]people we don’t like getting it on with other people we don’t like[/i].
Ah! You just reminded me. This might be a good time to e-mail my lesbian minister and tell her about the ideas Jason and I have settled on for our pantheist wedding ceremony. But I think I’ll wait for him to come home to the apartment we’ve shared for almost two years before our legal wedding. Toodles!
Comment by Giulianna Lamanna — 25 April 2006 @ 11:55 AM
OK, if you’re all done flaming the poor guy….
Chuck, I can say this for your response: at least you haven’t eased away the knot in your stomach or just learned to ignore it and accept the way things are as inevitable. That puts you ahead of most of us. For those who still retain their basic intuition that something is wrong here, there’s a basic tactic to derail them and keep them powerless: send them off on tangents.
For liberals, there are tangents like feminism, environmentalism, gay rights, and so forth. For conservatives, the tangents are things like abortion, gay marriage, the “culture wars,” sexual promiscuity and so forth.* All heads on a hyrda. You can whack at them all you like; they are merely the symptoms of a more basic problem.
Though I now disagree with much he’s written, Daniel Quinn’s initial challenge in Ishmael still sticks with me. Our culture is broken; we know it’s broken. We can feel it in our bones. We don’t know how to live. We search in vain for some indication of that knowledge. We always look outside ourselves for it, because we know that we don’t know how to live anymore. We look to gods, and then are dismayed to find other who fail to appreciate the unblemished truth our gods gave to us. We fantasize about aliens that can come and teach us how to live. But what shock would there be, if we found out that there really are people who know how to live, right here on Earth? People who have been living, without our penchant for self-destruction, for a million years and more? That’s precisely what we have here. We intuit that something is wrong, that our culture is broken, precisely because on some level, we know that it wasn’t always like this.
I used to pursue the same tangents you’re on, Chuck. Then I looked up and realized that this isn’t the only culture on the planet–that there are cultures that have been living quite happily and healthily, the way the gods made them (if you believe in that sort of thing–I happen to), for millions of years.
You might find it distressing at first. For instance, they think nothing of aborton; hell, they embrace infanticide. They’re promiscuous, they allow gay marriage, their ideas of kinship and sexuality are often the polar opposites of the attitudes we were raised with. They’re not immediately allies of liberal dreams, either. Liberal or conservative, they’re just hacking at different hydra’s heads, preoccupied with tangents, and left utterly powerless in the face of that nebulous form that leaves that knot in their stomachs and leaves them with that still, small voice in their mind screaming, something is wrong! You might not like them, but I can say this for them: they’re not destroying the world, they’re not destroying themsleves, and they don’t complain about that knot like we do.
* The “moral decay” argument of collapse is one that Tainter doesn’t even dignify with an assessment in Collapse of Complex Societies. He discusses the origins of the idea, but since it’s essentially irrational, he never bothers to address it. Personally, I find it somewhat absurd: what could be more immoral than the origins of any civilization?
Comment by Jason Godesky — 25 April 2006 @ 12:22 PM
Nice tactful reply Jason.
But you did use the word “flaming” in reference to Chuck, that is probably innapropriate.
Remember gays are one of the main destructive forces in civilization…according the Chuck.
They do tend to focus on wordly things such as fashion, and Home remodeling! Rather than wearing ancienct flannels like me, and decorating the home with pictures of barb wire & machine guns…
I wish people would realize its not one group, but the system itself that is inherently corrupt/unworkable for humans to have peace of mind & any real freedom.
Comment by Bubba — 25 April 2006 @ 12:53 PM
Like I said–distracted with tangents. I’m not sure you can really conclude as much about Chuck from his brief message as you have, Bubba. In a way, I don’t think you’re responding to Chuck at all–you seem to be whacking at a tangent of your own, that of the homophobe.
And there’s nothing wrong with some good flannel. I likes me my flannels. But that’s probably just the Scot in me.
Comment by Jason Godesky — 25 April 2006 @ 1:57 PM
It was really my poor attempt at humor, rather than a tangent…
At this point with so many serious issues on the horizon, many “issues” have little meaning to me anymore.
Living my life vigorously, spending more time with my loved ones, and working to simplify my lifestyle, learn new survival skills, and of course throwing a bit of hummor/imagination into the mix to ward off perseverating upon the “change” that will likely occur in my lifetime.
If you saw how I dress when not at work, you may want to send the fashion police after me…I buy stuff if it doesn’t fit right, I self-alter it with scissors to make it bigger, or just cut off the cuffs etc. to have it fit my arms. I’m practicing my seamstress skills, but I use my spyderco for most of the alterations.
Comment by Bubba — 25 April 2006 @ 2:33 PM
You’re a man after my own heart, bubba.
Comment by Jason Godesky — 25 April 2006 @ 2:37 PM
I don’t usually engage in the bandwidth-wasting practice of replying to a post with “wow, that’s really great,” but I’m driven to break that rule here. Jason, although we may differ on details, you express many of my beliefs–even those I’m not aware of yet–with great eloquence and grace, summed up well in the post I quoted. Liberal angst and conservative indignation are indeed, just nibbles at the edges of a much larger problem, and I’m grateful that you can respond to arguments from either side with such equanimity. At heart it is civilization that disconnects us from our primal selves, and we deserve something better.
Comment by Toby Hemenway — 26 April 2006 @ 2:45 PM
Thanks, Toby. Such high praise from someone as knowledgeable as yourself is quite heady. Quibbling over details can be fun, and some day it might even be important, but I have no doubt that we have far more in common, than not.
Comment by Jason Godesky — 26 April 2006 @ 2:56 PM
Peggy’s really starting to get it, but because she’s a conservative hack, I doubt many on the Left will listen, while those on the Right will continue to not get it.
It may not be much, but such glimmerings of an appreciation in the pages of the Wall Street Journal is something worthy of note, nonetheless.
Comment by Jason Godesky — 14 July 2006 @ 12:34 PM