Necessary Myths?

[Chimera]

Myth's pervade society. It is natural to embellish and exaggerate in our story telling for dramatic effect, to separate out the white and black from the shades of gray, and clarify the moral. We look back on past events, not with the fullness of which they occurred, but on the important points and lessons derived. I think this is generally positive, as truly retelling with all the context is sometimes quite clunky and uneconomical, it makes a bad story.

US civil society today seems to have gone to the other extreme. Things are expressed in the most simplistic terms, with little context or acknowledgment of the history preceding or the whys and hows of a particular event. This too, makes a bad story. It's the Saturday morning cartoon aesthetic, and while appealing when we're six it's a little bit insulting to adults. I don't believe it's totally due to the intelligence level of the American people, as there's plenty of examples of dramatic story telling in literature, movies, and television that is both intelligent and popular.

Where we find this simplicity most strongly is in political writing and in history.


An Example in Recent History

I've been reading about the philosophical foundations of the neocon movement, and their intellectual forebear, Leo Strauss, a political philosopher from Chicago University. He was a great believer in the power of myths to unify a society, the noble lie being better than a deadly truth. The assumed truth in this case being nihilism, that there is no purpose. If you want to explore further, you can go back through Heidegger and Nietzsche, all the way back to Plato.

Despite being seemingly moderate in his public writings, his pupils have not been. The neocons cut their teeth during the cold war, where the bad guy of choice was the Soviet Union. Stalin with his abject tyrrany and later Khrushchev was happy to continue to be the foil with his shoe banging antics. They were cast as pure evil and the United States as their nemesis must by necessity be pure good.

The galvanizing effect of the cold war served as a counterbalance to the individualism of the 60s, a way to unite the country once more in noble purpose. This pattern of alternating sways of nihilism and traditionalism continues to the current day with the most recent cycle being the time after the fall of the Soviet Empire and the subsequent rise of Islamo Fascism.

At least, this is how it is presented.


My Take and Questions

I accept the proposition that myths are a unifying force in society. Most well known in the form of religion but also cast in our stories, our ideologies, and our histories. That without them, society loses its sense of cohesion and shared values. Whether this is good or bad is another argument, but that it has consequences is undeniable.

Many believe, Aristotle being the most famous proponent with his golden mean, that moderation is a virtue. This may also be a myth but it is a useful one. By casting things in such extreme duality, I believe US society has lost its sense of moderation. We live in the age of the false choice, where one is either an isolationist appeaser or a psychopathic warmonger. If the purpose of the neoconservatives was truly to fight the moral decay of society, they may have created a problem worse than the one they attempted to solve.

We may be heading towards another swing back in this cycle, as there seems to be a current forming against this mode of politics.

So where is the balance? Do you agree/disagree that myths fulfill an important role in society? Do you agree/disagree that the manner in which myths are propagated (and something I didn't touch on much, the content of those myths) can have significant effects on society?

If you recognize something as a myth, and the truth is destructive, are you better off accepting the myth at least superficially? If you thought the truth would lead to the destruction of mankind, would you still profess it?

[immortalmack]

I understand what you are saying.I recognize many things as being Necassary Myths religion being the most obvious. I recognize in society patterns that the originators of a myth is not understood well by the inheritors of that myth, namely in social relations. I remember HG Wells on Socates. Socrates fault was removing societal myths without replacing them with something thereby undermining the youths morality and ending with a worse product than we he first engage them.I think that one thing worse than the myth itself is to take it away ubruptly and replace it with nothing.Here you have the total man being made up in a certain structure and you decide to remove something from it's original design. Well it may be in later times understandable that many ideas,barriers,societal norms become obsolete,however the original design has not the capacity to function with the new understanding therefore it should be (imo) left alone.In removing something to the makeup of the original design, you will have neither the completeness of the new or old, but something very much undefinable and many times unstable. However, the only time in which this seems to differ is when a person goes and seeks for themselves a things truth. They take in as much truth in a day as is possible for them. When they've digested is properly and accept the new found truth then they take in more. However I find it hard to tell people a certain facet of their religion is outdated because I have nothing to replace it with. That is a great evil in itself.

Hopefully I make sense.

[demagogic_schizoid]

http://forums.intpcentral.com/showthread.php?t=19771

excellent post, I love this subject, and wrote about it before...I haven't got time to say anything on this thread now...but I'd like to talk about it some more later.

Yes, I think myths are necessary and shoul;d not be sneered at...people who "see through them" and think they are "enlightened" are often the dumbest of all, because they miss the real message...a myth is a metaphor, a way to make a truth comprehensible

[Hermione]

Sadly for us, the most rampant and vapid myth "the axis of evil" is where we are sitting for the moment. The myth that says "it's them, you, not me, they are our enemy, you are the enemy". Hoping I live for the next cycle and it will again be the 60's/70's "age of aquarius", or if not, then some type of enlightenment era. No political intelligence is apparent right now, so I have indeed required myself to abandon the political wasteland for the most part.

[Chimera]

I understand what you are saying.I recognize many things as being Necassary Myths religion being the most obvious. I recognize in society patterns that the originators of a myth is not understood well by the inheritors of that myth, namely in social relations. I remember HG Wells on Socates. Socrates fault was removing societal myths without replacing them with something thereby undermining the youths morality and ending with a worse product than we he first engage them.I think that one thing worse than the myth itself is to take it away ubruptly and replace it with nothing.Here you have the total man being made up in a certain structure and you decide to remove something from it's original design. Well it may be in later times understandable that many ideas,barriers,societal norms become obsolete,however the original design has not the capacity to function with the new understanding therefore it should be (imo) left alone.In removing something to the makeup of the original design, you will have neither the completeness of the new or old, but something very much undefinable and many times unstable. However, the only time in which this seems to differ is when a person goes and seeks for themselves a things truth. They take in as much truth in a day as is possible for them. When they've digested is properly and accept the new found truth then they take in more. However I find it hard to tell people a certain facet of their religion is outdated because I have nothing to replace it with. That is a great evil in itself.

Hopefully I make sense.



That made a lot of sense, thank you for the reply.

Your point about Socrates is a very good example, and one I hadn't considered in this context. When I first read about Socrates I was dumbfounded on why the society was executing him. I suppose I can at least understand their motivations and accusations even if I still don't agree with them.

It seems a delicate balance. If you go too far towards nihilism you destroy the fabric of society, whereas if you go too far towards traditionalism the society becomes immobile and unable to change under environmental and ideological pressures. Neither is necessarily healthy.

I agree with your point on religion as well. I don't try to convert people, for the reasons you mentioned, and for an additional one that may seem somewhat trivial. It's the same reason I consider myself agnostic rather than atheist. I have not had, and can never fully understand, the subjective experiences of another person. I would never presume that those experiences have no value because I cannot verify them.

[Chimera]

http://forums.intpcentral.com/showthread.php?t=19771

excellent post, I love this subject, and wrote about it before...I haven't got time to say anything on this thread now...but I'd like to talk about it some more later.

Yes, I think myths are necessary and shoul;d not be sneered at...people who "see through them" and think they are "enlightened" are often the dumbest of all, because they miss the real message...a myth is a metaphor, a way to make a truth comprehensible

I missed that thread the first time around, I'll look over it tonight.

You seem to take a slightly traditionalist perspective but what about the converse, that a myth can be given so much prominence and removed so far from reality that it becomes destructive as well. Are the rigidly conservative also missing the real message?

And finally one more general point not directed at your response, but it triggered the thought. You can recognize this aspect of societal structure, and rather than simply using it for understanding, it can be cynically manipulated. You can probably guess I think this is what the neocons have done. Though they call themselves conservatives, it strikes me as an inherently nihilistic perspective.

[demagogic_schizoid]

I missed that thread the first time around, I'll look over it tonight.

You seem to take a slightly traditionalist perspective but what about the converse, that a myth can be given so much prominence and removed so far from reality that it becomes destructive as well. Are the rigidly conservative also missing the real message?

And finally one more general point not directed at your response, but it triggered the thought. You can recognize this aspect of societal structure, and rather than simply using it for understanding, it can be cynically manipulated. You can probably guess I think this is what the neocons have done. Though they call themselves conservatives, it strikes me as an inherently nihilistic perspective.

I don't know about "neo-cons"...is this really an ideology or does it just describe a foreign policy approach shared by various disparate groups...for example Paul Wolfowitz, a top "neo-con" is a zionist Jew in a relationship with an Arab feminist...is he really part of the same ideology as Christian fundamentalists? I think the term "neo-con" is a myth in itself, or at least it's a term which is often misused.

It's true that conservatism in general is often tied to specific myths such as that of the US flag...again, we can see that "fetishizing" a flag is very useful in a young, multicultural country made up of immigrants of different faiths...national symbols are very important to keep such a society together...would we rather they were constantly at each others throats?

But I don't see this kind of patriotism as a neo-con myth...perhaps what you call neo-cons have tried to use this kind of patriotism for their ideology, but I don't think they invented it, I don't think it's "their" myth.

We also see "progressive" myths, such as the myth of a common history, and of liberation, for women, for ethnic minorites etc....this is the constructing of an "identity" (or the use of that pre-constructed identity) for a "progressive" end..so I don't think it's just conservatives who do it, I think any organisation which wants to acheive any measure of success must have some "myth", some "way to "simplify the rhyme just to amplify the noise", some way to tell their story simply, some idealised symbol for people to rally round, some demonised past, or enemy, to resist

So yeah, a myth is the only way you can get enough individuals to believe in something greater than themselves, IMO.

[Chimera]

Thanks for the thread link, I read through it and yes many of the same themes were expressed throughout by you and others. It was an interesting read and I wish I caught it the first time around.

Maybe this thread is a bit redundant, or maybe it's even trivial to some people but to me these things aren't obvious, and to accept them takes some effort. Dipping into nihilism is always dangerous ground and creates a definite feeling of unease.


I don't know about "neo-cons"...is this really an ideology or does it just describe a foreign policy approach shared by various disparate groups...for example Paul Wolfowitz, a top "neo-con" is a zionist Jew in a relationship with an Arab feminist...is he really part of the same ideology as Christian fundamentalists? I think the term "neo-con" is a myth in itself, or at least it's a term which is often misused.


Fair point. I think movement was not a good word to use as neocons, as I understand the label, were never a popular movement, but a small group of officials with similar philosophies. I'd include Cheney, Rumsfield, Bolton, Wolfowitz, Perle, and a few others as the core. I would not include the people they rallied the support of as part of this label. Sorry, bit sloppy language on my part.



It's true that conservatism in general is often tied to specific myths such as that of the US flag...again, we can see that "fetishizing" a flag is very useful in a young, multicultural country made up of immigrants of different faiths...national symbols are very important to keep such a society together...would we rather they were constantly at each others throats?

But I don't see this kind of patriotism as a neo-con myth...perhaps what you call neo-cons have tried to use this kind of patriotism for their ideology, but I don't think they invented it, I don't think it's "their" myth.


Right, not saying they invented it, I think myths are important as well , just that they have helped radicalize the current situation either in support or against certain myths (e.g. they hate us because we're free). But I suppose we're getting too caught up in this one issue.



We also see "progressive" myths, such as the myth of a common history, and of liberation, for women, for ethnic minorites etc....this is the constructing of an "identity" (or the use of that pre-constructed identity) for a "progressive" end..so I don't think it's just conservatives who do it, I think any organisation which wants to acheive any measure of success must have some "myth", some "way to "simplify the rhyme just to amplify the noise", some way to tell their story simply, some idealised symbol for people to rally round, some demonised past, or enemy, to resist

So yeah, a myth is the only way you can get enough individuals to believe in something greater than themselves, IMO.

I agree with your last two general points but I'll have to think about some of those examples. It seems like this lens can potentially be overused and lose the distinction between myth and abstraction.

[Chimera]

Sadly for us, the most rampant and vapid myth "the axis of evil" is where we are sitting for the moment. The myth that says "it's them, you, not me, they are our enemy, you are the enemy". Hoping I live for the next cycle and it will again be the 60's/70's "age of aquarius", or if not, then some type of enlightenment era. No political intelligence is apparent right now, so I have indeed required myself to abandon the political wasteland for the most part.

There's an interesting scene in the movie Secondhand Lions concerning these themes where Richard Duval gives his "what every boy needs to know about being a man" speech. I found a clip of it:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=t-aqLUDMTTI

I think this is the context of myth being a positive force for society. These principles, often unexamined, are held not because they are necessarily true, but because subjectively your lives are better if they are true.

Cynically it's self-delusion, but you have to ask what is the alternative? If you make that pragmatic choice, if you choose your belief, is it still delusion? Would some people characterize their belief in religion or in god in this way?

Now of course, there's also the dark side to this as your examples seem to be directed. Most of the myths that we believe are not consciously chosen in this fashion but simply a result of our upbringing. This is fine as long as the societal myths are positive ones. What if the myths are self-destructive?

I'm not sure if I'm making sense anymore, sometimes I suspect I'm just rationalizing getting older and switching more to the traditionalist perspective. :)