There seem to be many people who feel that 2016 was the beginning of the end. Some celebrities died, and Donald Trump was elected the new President of the United States of America and while the death of any person is a tragedy in its own right, we seem to have a fascination as a culture with people who are "famous" as if their lives are so important we must know everything they do all the time. While the homeless veteran who died on the street is not as important as the man who stole a baby in "The Labyrinth" or perhaps just not as exciting. However, the icing on the apocalyptic cake that was 2016 is that Hillary Clinton who was the party leader for the "intellectually superior" political party did not win the election in a landslide as was expected. In fact, she lost. And not only did she lose but she lost in a way that was almost embarrassing. Now I have very little care for the politics of America. In fact I find the whole thing rather boring and just another excuse for the rich man to pick the poor man's pocket. But I will admit that I too thought Mrs. Clinton was going to beat out her competitor for the White House and was a bit shocked, albeit in a good way, when she lost. With all of these "terrible" things happening so close to the end of 2016 I thought it would be a good idea to reflect a little bit on why these things happened and why people are so internally distraught by them. In the conversations I have had with friends and family there are these phrases or platitudes that have come up and it is my belief that these thoughts are what have resulted in this so called "apocalypse" of 2016. Now I do not mean to sound unsympathetic towards those who have legitimate concerns about the next four years of the Trump presidency as well as those who had close personal relationships to those celebrities who have died this past year. But for the vast majority of people "deeply affected" by the loss of pop-culture icons there is a reality which makes people a bit uncomfortable (and in today's culture feeling uncomfortable is tantamount to being brutally attacked) we are all going to die. And to those of you who are calling for blood because your candidate didn't win, I would urge you to look at the philosophy by which you live your life and see why so many people could not get on board with your politics.
It is my firm belief, that a persons politics is a result of their personal philosophy and principles. And while politicians are supposed to reflect the will of the people, more often than not once they get into their seat of power their politics are geared more towards personal gain instead of the good of the people. There may be a few good politicians but I have yet to see them. When looking into the popular philosophies of today's culture it comes as no surprise that we can become so upset to the point of hysteria by such things as a distant pop icon passing or a candidate losing an election. After all if you are standing on shifting sand you are at some point doomed to fall. And in the following few phrases or platitudes that I have come across in conversations I want to point out the danger of such belief systems and why I believe these are a few of the causes of why people have reacted the way have to these events and why people feel hopeless.
1. "You do you, and I'll do me."
This first phrase is a result of moral relativism. The belief that it doesn't really matter what you believe, as long as you think it is true and it makes you happy then it is OK. In other words what is true for you isn't true for me and thus doesn't really affect me. So just "You do you, and I'll do me". The first problem with this belief is that to make the statement "What's true for you isn't true for me" is a self contradictory statement and thus a logical fallacy. You are essentially saying that the only true thing is that nothing is true which then begs the question "well if nothing is true then is that really true?" It is easy to keep arguing in circles with such a statement. The second problem is that you are essentially saying that you don't really care what a person does or how they act as long as it makes them happy. Which breaks the bonds that help make a society great. Without challenging one another to be better and to come closer together, we run the risk of running into isolationism or hyper-individualism. It is possible to challenge a belief system or personal principle without hurting the person who holds those particular beliefs. However, in the conversations I have had they generally end with the next phrase...
2. "Whatever, I'm Done"
While it is true that you don't owe anybody an explanation, a person's personal beliefs shape the course of society and where we go. The above phrase usually comes across when you have asked a person a question about what they believe and why and they themselves don't really know. Or you have made a reasonable argument in a charitable manner against something they said and they are too prideful to admit they are wrong. When a person's belief is challenged or under examination it tends to make a person uncomfortable and like I stated earlier, feeling uncomfortable is equal to being attacked. But what people fail to realize is that the feeling of being uncomfortable is a GOOD thing. It is in that feeling that we are prompted to look deeper and really examine ourselves as individuals and see if it we need to make a change somewhere. People tend to shy away from being challenged because they are comfortable in their complacency. And everybody can improve some aspect of their life, nobody is perfect. If we don't challenge each other or ourselves philosophically we will stagnate intellectually, socially and, culturally. Just like the tide of the ocean moves with the current, so to is the tide of society and culture moved by the current thought.
3. "You're just to closed minded to understand me."
4. "You can't be religious and believe science"
It is very interesting to me, that at some point in our history somebody decided that science and religion are mutually exclusive to one another. What people fail to understand is that if it weren't for religion there would be no science. To believe that science has all of the answers and we simply need to trust in science is in itself at the very least a philosophic statement, if not a religious one. To put our trust in science is ipso-facto an act of faith. While science is wonderful and helps us better understand the mechanics of the world and that which exists in it, it cannot help us answer the greatest of questions. Why is there something rather than nothing? If science is ordered properly then it does not exist to disprove God but rather magnifies the grandeur of God and his creation.
Now more than ever does our society and our culture need to start re-examining ourselves individually. We have become complacent in our hunger for Truth and have settled instead for self-satisfaction. "In a world overwhelmed with knowledge we are starving for wisdom". We have taken the great intellectual traditions of those who have come before us and tossed them aside in exchange for mind numbing platitudes that comfort us instead of challenge us. We no longer seek the intelligible but rather seek to know what lipstick Kim Kardashian uses. We are so involved in the lives of those who are distant to us precisely because they are distant and it is easier to examine those who are distant than to turn the mirror on ourselves and start working towards building a better version of ourselves and to create better culture for future generations. Intellectually we have set ourselves up in high castles of sand and unless we find the courage and strength to deconstruct those shifting castles and replace them with castles of stone I fear we will only continue to see the fall of a great nation. This is the whisper that T.S. Elliot cautioned us about, if we do not start to change we will become 'The Hollow Men" empty of reason and thought so open that we exist as nothing. But if we dig up and dust off those old tomes that are rich in thought and ideas, if we look at ourselves in light of what we could be and not just how we are, we can start to build a better future. Challenge yourselves and challenge each other. And as St. Paul wrote "Test everything; retain what is good" (I Thessalonians 5:22). There is good and there is evil there is no middle ground. Let us move forward into this new year with the goodwill of all man at the forefront of our minds and remember our culture becomes a reflection of how we think.
Now more than ever does our society and our culture need to start re-examining ourselves individually. We have become complacent in our hunger for Truth and have settled instead for self-satisfaction. "In a world overwhelmed with knowledge we are starving for wisdom". We have taken the great intellectual traditions of those who have come before us and tossed them aside in exchange for mind numbing platitudes that comfort us instead of challenge us. We no longer seek the intelligible but rather seek to know what lipstick Kim Kardashian uses. We are so involved in the lives of those who are distant to us precisely because they are distant and it is easier to examine those who are distant than to turn the mirror on ourselves and start working towards building a better version of ourselves and to create better culture for future generations. Intellectually we have set ourselves up in high castles of sand and unless we find the courage and strength to deconstruct those shifting castles and replace them with castles of stone I fear we will only continue to see the fall of a great nation. This is the whisper that T.S. Elliot cautioned us about, if we do not start to change we will become 'The Hollow Men" empty of reason and thought so open that we exist as nothing. But if we dig up and dust off those old tomes that are rich in thought and ideas, if we look at ourselves in light of what we could be and not just how we are, we can start to build a better future. Challenge yourselves and challenge each other. And as St. Paul wrote "Test everything; retain what is good" (I Thessalonians 5:22). There is good and there is evil there is no middle ground. Let us move forward into this new year with the goodwill of all man at the forefront of our minds and remember our culture becomes a reflection of how we think.
