If we respond to the abundance of media options by choosing those that appeal to our baser selves --spending our time with the most sensationalistic and coarse of cultural expressions-- we train ourselves to yield to our lower impulses. We fail to embody the ideal of what we could be.
Accordingly, it is possible to track a change over the past two generations in the moral structures of everyday American consciousness by looking at the movement in our major theaters of cultural expression --television, films, popular music-- toward the glorification and satisfaction of some of humankinds darker and least desirable inclinations.
The children and grandchildren of people for whom striving toward an ideal occupied a major aspect of their consciousness about the meaning of human life have trained themselves --and have been trained by the culture-- to imagine that the satisfaction of appetite and impulse is life's most fundamental purpose.
If we use our discretionary income to buy ourselves things that titillate but do not elevate, that we choose out of impulse rather than need, that are only about comfort and not about growth, then we diminish ourselves.
And so we see middle class Americans swimming in "stuff," turning to "shopping" as one of life's central activities, piling up possessions without finding any deep fulfillment in all these "choices" the marketplace gives them.
People have turned with increasing fervor, over this period, to traditional religions. But in the teachings of those traditi0ns one cannot find adequate guidance for how to make such choices. Thus the attempt to turn back the clock of human consciousness has not solved the problem of our moral chaos. But neither has America solved it by moving forward into a fuller vision of moral order.
And so, in America, the capacity of moral structures to channel human choices has weakened.
And thus now America has moved into a time of moral darkness. For the transformations of consciousness brought on by a lifetime of unguided choices ultimately impact also the wider world.
The habit of self-indulgence --of answering the question "What do I want?" in terms that make no distinction between "right desire" and "wrong desire"-- cannot stop at the borders of the realm of the purely individual. It inevitably erodes also that other realm, the realm in which the tradition worked for centuries to discipline people to consider their responsibilities to others and to the good itself.
The ethic of self-indulgence enables people to saddle their descendants with their own debt, running up huge deficits in the national accounts. The habit of yielding to baser impulses makes it easier to support baser policies in the collective realm-- wielding great national power without being constrained by a sense of obligation to provide reasoned justification, or to obey the accepted rules of conduct among nations. The failure to distinguish between those desires that are worthy of being satisfied and those that should be held in check by moral discipline can lead to a pervasive cynicism in society, a belief that human beings can never amount to anything anyway, thus opening the door still further to mere selfishness.
And now moral anarchy has opened the door to evil. The general weakening of moral structures has loosed the wolf from its cage. America slides toward fascism, in which the darkest impulses of greed and the lust for power, thinly disguised under a false righteousness, govern from the nation's highest places.
Hence it is an urgent matter for us, as a society, to combine our affluence --with its wealth of choices-- with an ethic that helps us know which wants we are wise to follow and which to deny as unworthy.
Teachers Good and Bad
In our quest for an ethic of wise choice, we don't have to start completely from scratch. For one thing, there have been other people before us who have faced the opportunities and challenges of affluence: the aristocrats of earlier eras, sitting atop societies in which the impoverished masses labored to serve them. These people, too, confronted the challenge of finding the wisdom to elevate themselves above the decadence of self-indulgence. And indeed, that distinction between "right desire" and "wrong desire" is the intellectual and moral fruit of the aristocracy of ancient Greece.
And so some of the ancient philosophers --like Aristotle-- might have something to offer us affluent Americans, at least a starting place for thinking about what kind of person we might wish to become, and what kind of choices we should make to craft ourselves into the best of our potential.
At present, though, the most powerful educational influence now operating in America has no such goals, and no such effects. I am talking about that mighty teacher-- advertising.
Andrew Bard Schmookler's website www.nonesoblind.org is devoted to understanding the roots of America's present moral crisis and the means by which the urgent challenge of this dangerous moment can be met. Dr. Schmookler is also the author of such books as The Parable of the Tribes: The Problem of Power in Social Evolution (SUNY Press) and Debating the Good Society: A Quest to Bridge America's Moral Divide (M.I.T. Press). He also conducts regular talk-radio conversations in both red and blue states.
Duty and Sacrifice? How about Hiroshima? Ideal? How about Jim Crow? Ethics? How about Rosenbergs and McCarthy? Aristotle? How about killing, killing and killing ih his name? Affluence? How about Vietnam? The aflluent people launched counterculture? Ever heard of affluent black people in the 60s? Obesity because of self- indulgence? Ever heard of deliberate sugar- filling of sodas, bad food, McDonald's and offices, offices, offices...
Fascism is a tool. It is being used when the ruling elite feels scared. It was scared by the rising tide of socilizaiton, by the new young, by the power of the people going up. And it has nothing to do with all those pseudophilosophical self- indulgences of Mr. Schmookler. In fact that is exactly it: seems like Andy is drunk from his own wording-so long and boring the writing is.
I am retiring to my self- indulgence and my counterculture TV. And I do not feel guilty at all.
We have a problem. We have to solve it. This problem is Bush. And the last thing we need is Andy Schmookler to tell us that all of that happened because we have self-indulgent culture. Come to think of it, who said it before? Ah, yes, Pat Robertson.
by
Mark Sashine (42 articles, 19 quicklinks, 227 diaries, 3220 comments)
on Wednesday, March 15, 2006 at 2:11:42 PM
It would be nice were the world as simple and as black and white as Panurg urges us to believe. All we must do then is defeat Bush and the forces of darkness that elected him and the world becomes an Eden. I rather doubt it.
The seeds of what we now find on our world stage were sown long ago, and that they ripen now has little to do with George W. and a lot to do with things like market forces, emerging third world nations and the increasing demands on our dwindling resources by these new industrialising former colonies.
The self indugence and disinterest of our electorate is certainly a factor in the election and re-election of such as George to be certain. People are just not political, they have little time for such depressing subjects and the turnouts for even hotly contested races have less to do with the moral decay of our society than they do with human nature, in my opinion.
Events like 9/11 certainly energise folks but for a short period of time, they respond like Pavlov's dogs to calls for patriotism and flag waving, they curse the enemy, made cartoonish as it is easier to accept atrocities when performed upon such rather than thinking about killing real people, moms and dads and kids and such. Then, for the most part, they simply go back to sleep politically speaking trusting in those they have been manipulated into electing. Sad but true.
by
ardee D. (6 articles, 4 quicklinks, 1 diaries, 2388 comments)
on Wednesday, March 15, 2006 at 6:05:08 PM
In the last paragraph Andy specifies that first thing is first and we have to get rid of fascism. And as Sncalir Lewis put in his book, in the US the facism comes with '$5000 per person' promise. Now it is not $5000, it is a promise of false security to shelter us from the world.
I would agree: our affluence disease sheltered us from the world for a long time until the world booted the door out on 9/11. Now the wind is blowing and we are afraid and mean. But no matter how mean we are, the worst ones are in the White House and they are the the source of the disease, the overall poison. We will prevail if we do the first thing first and boot that garbage out by addressing ALL the people ( culture, counterculture alike) about the danger od DEATH for them and their children if we do not prevail.
by
Mark Sashine (42 articles, 19 quicklinks, 227 diaries, 3220 comments)
on Thursday, March 16, 2006 at 8:07:48 AM
For me, this has been the best piece of writing I have read in a long time and is verified by the acrimonious responses posted thus far because he's touching some nervous truths. I've never posted a comment on the internet before now. Below is an edited copy of a comment that I sent to the author.
Sir,
Thank you for publishing your piece, "The Challenge of Affluence: A Root of Our Moral Crisis?" This will help settle a long-standing argument that I have had with my husband.
Before I tell you about my own situation, there is only one issue that I have with what you wrote about obesity as a reflection of self-indulgence. It is a bit more complex than that, as reflected by an article published in the May 15, 2006 issue of JAMA, titled "Status Syndrome: A Challenge to Medicine," by M.G. Marmot. Obesity can lead to a condition called metabolic syndrome, previously known as Syndrome X, or pre-diabetes, characterized by obesity, insulin resistance and hypertension. In his article, the author asserts that stress, which leads to endocrine system changes, often leads to metabolic syndrome. In addition, he also asserts that low social position, by virtue of having lesser control over one's life, can lead to poorer health.
This does not excuse personal responsibility for one’s choices though. One can choose to turn off the TV and choose to become educated regarding the influence of advertisers over food choices.
My husband is 50 years old and Scottish. Years ago, he worked for a major oil company in England. His job, and I am not making this up, was to entertain clients all around the world and have contracts signed. He did this for some years and was quite good at it. But then, how hard could it be to have a bottomless expense account and dine in the finest restaurants all around the world? He was approached to transfer to Houston, Texas which was great he thought, because in America, one can live much more extravagantly on far less money. And so he came. But so did the oil crisis of the 70's and of course his job was probably at the very top of the list of eliminations. He has done many jobs since, and is relatively successful, but he still has a very strong sense of indulgence, even though he was not raised that way. You can imagine the credit card debt that he has, for example. When he and I met some three years ago, I was a second year medical student and a single mom. Ten years prior, I inadvertently married a real, "Catch Me if You Can" con-artist and was married just long enough to leave me penniless, without a job, a car and none of my worldly possessions, plus a new baby. So when I started college at age 28, it was because I had always wanted to, but my parents made too much money for me to qualify for financial aid, yet not being educated themselves, spent their lives just getting by. In college, I worked as if my life depended on it, because it did. I used every Federal Aid program available to me (Food Stamps, WIC, Medicaid for my daughter, Pell Grants, Federal Subsidized and Unsubsidized loans) with the exception of cash assistance because there were too many strings attached. But what really made the difference between being able to pull it all off living alone without my having a paying job while studying my butt off and caring for my family were two things: The $354 from the Veteran's Administration because my father was "totally and permanently disabled" due to PTSD from working as a cryptographer in Vietnam, and the state funded childcare program in West Virginia. By and by I realized, with the help of my chemistry professor, that I was indeed not only smart enough to become a doctor, but that I also had more than enough compassion for patients, having been a patient myself years prior. When I got to medical school, I had learned to live on miniscule amounts of money. For example, when my son was a baby and in diapers, I used to sell plasma twice a week for diapers and to pay for gas for the car. And we were mostly happy because indeed, the best things in life are "free," like reading books from the library and playing in public parks.
Thus, in light of your writings, it is easy to see why my husband and I argue nearly incessantly over how money is spent in our household and why I get so angry when he indulges my son in excessive amounts of clothes, candy and junk food. So much that even HE recognizes it and he is only 11 years old. I recognize that the lifestyle that he is being taught to expect will just perpetuate the attitude of entitlement. I get angry with him for buying me expensive jewelry for special occasions when we have so much debt that we don't even own a house. He is clueless as to why I get so angry and does not "get it."
Even though I may be book smart, when it comes to relationships, obviously, I could use a tutor. Although I love my husband because he is also kind and he takes care of the household when I have ungodly hours because I am a medical student, I do have this nagging feeling that he really married me for the promise of an extravagant lifestyle at the end of his life, even though I keep telling him that in spite of having earned a $25,000 scholarship, I will still be in debt some $200,000 when I graduate from medical school and that if Social Security is around by the time I retire, I'll probably have to use it to pay my student loans, plus I never want to be a slave to my stuff.
Since my son was very small, I have taught him, "We don't buy the cereal because of the toy inside," and that advertisers don't care one iota about his health and what their food products do to him. All they care about is making money by selling foods that just taste good. But I am losing ground every day that he exerts influence over him.
Being relatively un-smart about relationships, I don't know if we will make it over the long haul, but I am going to use your article as a springboard to test the waters as to how deeply ingrained his self indulgence really is.
by
capable1 (0 articles, 0 quicklinks, 0 diaries, 1 comments)
on Thursday, March 16, 2006 at 10:42:51 AM
I would preface my remarks by stating that I believe that you and I are rather close politically and I would not presume to argue that throwing the bums out is a great start.
Panurg:
I would agree: our affluence disease sheltered us from the world for a long time until the world booted the door out on 9/11. Now the wind is blowing and we are afraid and mean. But no matter how mean we are, the worst ones are in the White House and they are the the source of the disease, the overall poison. We will prevail if we do the first thing first and boot that garbage out by addressing ALL the people ( culture, counterculture alike) about the danger od DEATH for them and their children if we do not prevail
Ardee:
As we live in a democratic republic in which our officials are elected (presumably before the onset of paperless voting machines) the ultimate responsibility for the character of those we elect lies with us, the electorate.
That Bush was elected and then re-elected, even should one include the chance of fraud and deceit in the process shows me plainly that there is something seriously wrong with our system or our values, perhaps with both. Judging George W. on his record and his choices should lead to a vast defeat at the polls, one so large as to preclude any possible use of fraudulent means to overcome small differences in numbers. Obviously that did not occur, much to my puzzlement frankly.
Since Plato wise men have noted that we get the kind of government we deserve, so I think that, should one pursue remedies of a political nature, one must, sooner or later, address the sickness of our choices. Simply trying to throw the bums out of office practically guarrantees a new set of bums will arise sooner or later.
by
ardee D. (6 articles, 4 quicklinks, 1 diaries, 2388 comments)
on Friday, March 17, 2006 at 7:19:36 AM
I do not see anything puzzling in 'selection' and then reselection of George. The mechanism was prepared and exercised and any perosn who had noted how much money was thrown into it would understand the stakes and the ' passionate intensity' of those who wanted that to happen. I would also argue that we do not live in the 'democratic republic' or rather that our ' republic' is no different from any other ones except for one thing: we are not a nation and do not have any national idea. We also do not have nay national traditions. All those noises about founding fathers, principles of ethics, etc, are what they are- noises. Tell that to Hef. Only two slogans are in the US: 'honest work for honest pay' and 'I am honest until proven otherwise'. Thus we oscillate between those. And although in general addressing our vices would be a good thing, we better address the current situation: by hook or by crook that junta in Washington has to be gone or we will certainly have no time to discuss those vices anymore. We might on the way find out that we have a lot in common with those crooks anyway. Nobody is perfect. But it is IN OUR VESTED INTEREST NOW to get rid of them once and for all. And hey, if we win, maybe the new 'burns' will be not so fast to come out?
Let me be blunt: the criminals in power spend the least of their time trying to find out if they are wrong in anything or if there is anything wrong with them. We should do the same.
by
Mark Sashine (42 articles, 19 quicklinks, 227 diaries, 3220 comments)
on Friday, March 17, 2006 at 1:04:10 PM
