The Only Cure For Bad Myths Is Good Myths

I found, as I often do, some very interesting information over at Miniver Cheevy:

"Hallman also reports that a survery revealed that the American population of Christians fell 9% from 1990 to 2001. Can that really be true? Well, yeah. USA Today reports on this, revealing also that spiritual-but-not-religious and not-religious are coming on strong. (While we're on the subject, Digby has some sharp-edged commentary on the political implications of these figures.)" Head on over there for all the links.

Miniver Cheevy touches obliquely here on something I've been knocking around in my thick old skull for some time. A recent post of Anne Johnson's has had me thinking about it, as has A Short History of Myth by Karen Armstrong, which I've been reading in bits and pieces over the past few months, getting angry over, putting down, coming back to, etc.

People need meaning in their lives. People need to feel, at least many people need to feel, that they are part of something larger than themselves. I think one of the reasons that Democrats have had difficulty winning decisive -- key word, decisive -- victories lately is tied up in this.

In the comments sections over at Eschaton, we're often struck by the way that conservative commenters seem to view world events and politics as a sport -- they've picked "their" team and they want it to "win" no matter what the cost. They seem, inexplicably to many liberal commenters, to be willing to lie, believe clear falsehoods, and to take positions directly contradictory to those that they took the day before if it will help their "team" to "win." We puzzle over it, but never really get to the "why" of it.

But Anne Johnson's recent post on rock concerts got me thinking about at least part of the "why" of it. Anne Johnson was complaining about the way teenagers acted at a rock concert to which she'd taken her daughter. (Pace, young people. You will, I swear, be old yourself some day!) And I got to thinking about why the behavior that she describes occurs. I think it occurs becausee all humans are "wired" to need ecstasy. Our culture provides almost no outlet -- thanks Puritans, thanks Max Weber! -- for that need and we certainly don't initiate young people into ecstasy or teach them how to handle such experiences. So they have very few outlets: sex, sports, and rock concerts, and no idea of how to behave, except for "out of control." And no guided experience of how to handle, sustain, or deal with feelings of ecstasy. And I think for our Eschaton trolls, identifying with a winning political "team" provides some of the same sort of "I belong to something, I'm part of something, I have a larger purpose than simply eating and shitting" experience that they'd get at a rock concert where they know all the words to all the songs, or at the Superbowl, or at a WWF match.

I think megachurches, with their flashing light shows, huge choirs, rock-star preachers, and crowd-induced hysteria provide something similar for those too old or too timid to go to rock shows. They provide it for less than the cost of a sporting event or a rock concert and they provide it once a week -- people can become as addicted to that fix as they do to heroin. Which makes it interesting that people who identify as "spiritual but not religious" are growing in number while people who identify as "religious" are declining in number. The statistic is counter-intuitive because, to listen ot or read the MSM, you'd think that xian church attendance and self-identification was way up, just as their political influence is growing. But it makes sense when you realize that people need meaning but, for a growning number at least, find it outside of an established church.

So what does all of this have to do with what Democrats can do? I disagree with lots that Karen Armstrong says and think that lots of what she says is racist, sexist, and culturalist. But there are certain points that she makes that I believe are very worthwhile. Here are a few:

"[W]e have not advanced spiritually beyond the Axial Age: because of our suppression of mythos we may even have regressed. We stilll long to 'get beyond' our immediate circumstances, and to enter a 'full time,' a more intense, fulfilling existence. We try to enter this dimension by means of art, rock music, drugs, or by entering the larger-than-life perspective of film. We still seek heroes. Elvis Presley and Princess Diana were both made into instant mythological beings, even objects of religious cult. But there is something unbalanced about this adulation. The myth of the hero was not intended to provide us with icons to admire, but was designed to tap into the vein of heroism within ourselves. Myth must lead to imitation or participation, not passive contemplation. We no longer know how to manage our mythical lives in a way that is spiritually challenging and transformative."

and

"We are myth-making creatures and, during the twentieth century, we saw some very destructive modern myths, which have ended in massacre and genocide. These myths have failed because they do not meet the criteria of the Axial Age. They have not been infused with the spirit of compassion, respect for the sacredness of all life, or with what Confucius called 'learning.' . . . We cannot counter these bad myths with reason alone, because undiluted logos cannot deal with such deep-rooted, unexorcised fears, desires, and neuroses. That is the role of an ethically and spiritually informed mythology."

Think about the myth that Rove and Bush created to explain 9/11 to America. There were any number of explanations for what happened, but the one they seized upon and pushed with relentless consistency was TERROR! BROWN PEOPLE ARE COMING TO HURT US! WE MUST FIGHT THEM OVER THERE SO THAT THEY CAN'T ATTACK US AGAIN OVER HERE! BUSH IS A RESOLUTE FATHER-FIGURE WHO WILL PROTECT YOU FROM THE EVIL, COMPLETELY IRRATIONAL, BROWN TERRORISTS! GIVE UP YOUR FREEDOM AND HE WILL FREE YOU FROM THE FEAR HE HIMSELF CREATED!

This is the very sort of "bad myth" that Armstrong is talking about. One that lacks compassion, respect for the sacredness of life, and learning. But she's also correct that mere logos -- wordy logic -- won't counter this bad myth. Only a better myth will counter Bush's bad myth. And we need to come up with one that appeals to emotion at as deep or deeper a level as does Bush's bad myth.

I keep remembering the Republican ad with wolves that we as liberals thought was the dumbest thing we'd ever seen but that Rove swore was their most effective ad, ever. We thought it was dumb because we hadn't bought into Bush's bad myth. But for those who had bought into the myth, even a little bit, the ad was very effective at pushing their emotional buttons. Where was the Kerry ad that pushed emotional buttons? There wasn't one. In fact, his ads were primarly made up of news headlines being flashed at you. I would tear my hair out every time i saw one of those. If you were trying to make a boring, logos-heavy ad, that's exactly what you'd do. His campaign failed to offer a counter-myth to replace Bush's bad myth. He offered lots of good policy and carefully-reasoned analysis. But if Armstrong is right, and I believe that she is (about this), logos alone isn't enough.

Is an effective good myth possible? Of course. Throughout history people have been inspired by the mythos of making the world a better place, saving the world for their children, giving of themselves in order to help others, rising to a higher level of learning and organization in order to be part of a larger whole. Soldiers die every day because they believe that they are making a sacrifice for the good of the whole. They merely need to be shown a different way to give of themselves.

Someone who didn't learn everything they know from Bob Schrum or Donna Brazille needs to develop a stronger myth. A myth that offers people an opportunity to feel a part of something larger than themselves, that allows them to experience ecstasy in a non-harmful way, that touches their emotions as deeply as does Bush's bad myth. A myth that engages them in saving the planet, healing the sick, educating our young (and old!) people, in finding new ways to think about work and family and commerce and community. Then, they need to distill the myth to a few short declarative sentences, just as Rove distilled Bush's bad myth of terror=war=father figure=give-up-freedom. If you build it, they will come.

I don't have that myth articulated, so perhaps I'm as bad as the Obamas and Bidens who keep saying what Democrats should do, but I do know that our good myth must be strong and inspiring and heartfelt. Which is why playing Republican Lite will never, ever work. If people want Republicans, they can vote for Republicans. We need a myth that inspires people to work for peace and justice, that makes them passionate about healing the Earth, that people can identify with at a core level -- a heroic myth that inspires, not worship, but participation. And we need it now.


****************

In comments, eli questions the use of the word "myth" here. Armstrong uses it to mean fundamental ways to explain basic concepts. The way that she uses it, a "myth" is always true -- on some level -- and that's true of both good and bad myths. eli asks if the term "narrative" works as well, and I don't think so. Narrative is too much of a logos/logic/left-brained kind of thing. What's needed here, IMHO, is something deeper, something that touches people at a deeper level, at a more emotional level, than does a narrative.