Drive a wedge, or build a beacon
Searching for meaning
Two-hundred miles away from where I sit, furious Americans are breaking down doors in the Capitol, enraged by the certification of results from an election they believe was stolen. The days ahead will reveal whether this is a final flash in the pan for Trump’s America, the beginning of something truly dangerous, or the continuation of something far more lethal for America and Americans. I hope that it isn’t, but believe that it is, the latter.
These events (and those that preceded them) are much bigger than politics, and much more deeply rooted than the people for whom we vote. Politics is one frame through which we can attempt to make sense of what has transpired and what is unfolding, but it is not the only frame. Nor is it the best frame. Nevertheless, let’s start with politics. It’s the horse that carried us here.
On a fundamental level, one tribe (the Democrats) got what they wanted and the other tribe (the Republicans) didn’t. The extreme element of the Republican tribe is really, really unhappy with the outcome.
These were once parties, which attempted to synthesize and integrate disparate views into platforms, but they are now most certainly tribes that try to quash new ideas and define themselves by what they are not. The Republican tribe has become so reactionary that it has flirted with populism and national socialism in the election of Donald Trump. The democratic tribe has been frozen by some of the contradictions of postmodernism, the predominant intellectual framework of our time.
Lincoln was right
Politically, we’re essentially playing out a beloved childhood experiment of putting a humidifier and dehumidifier next to each other in the same room. The stakes, however, are a bit higher. Everyone has retreated to their respective safe spaces/echo chambers. These tribes, and their un-elected constituents, no longer have a shared, consensus-based reality. This reality transcends politics. We lack intellectual, spiritual, and empirical consensus. We are nearing a tipping point into perhaps irreconcilable enmity, which is a major problem considering we live in a country with more guns than people. This, of course, doesn’t account for one of these tribes wielding the U.S. Military unlawfully to punish its enemies.
Abraham Lincoln was prophetic. In his Lyceum address, he predicted the first Civil War and the second one -- the one we’re spiraling toward right now.
“Shall we expect some transatlantic military giant to step the ocean and crush us at a blow? Never! All the armies of Europe, Asia, and Africa combined, with all the treasure of the earth (our own excepted) in their military chest, with a Bonaparte for a commander, could not by force take a drink from the Ohio or make a track on the Blue Ridge in a trial of a thousand years. At what point then is the approach of danger to be expected? I answer. If it ever reach us it must spring up amongst us; it cannot come from abroad. If destruction be our lot we must ourselves be its author and finisher. As a nation of freemen we must live through all time or die by suicide.”
Here we are, a nation of free people, dying by suicide because we are overly committed to our tribalistic, political framework. We need a different framework. Possibly a new framework. Certainly multiple frameworks. I wouldn’t count on any politician to give them to us, either.
How did we get here?
The problem is that frameworks often require a consensus-based reality, something that seems increasingly impossible. I believe tribalism is partly to blame, and it’s probably exacerbated by the echo-chamber effect of social media. But I also believe that each of us owns a piece of this unfolding catastrophe.
Some of the problem ties into the idea of the Jungian shadow. Each of us, the psychiatrist Carl Jung theorized, has elements of our personalities that we have disowned and shoved into the darkness. These are the parts of ourselves we hold responsible when we act out of character, and say, “That’s not me.” Our shadow is often an amalgamation of old wounds and traumas, many of which are rooted in shame. We can’t own up to these parts of ourselves because it’s too shameful, so we’re quick to call them out when we see them in others. If we’re a Republican, we blame the antagonistic warring tribe, and vice versa.
Ken Wilber’s All Quadrant All Level Integral Map is a useful tool for understanding the waring Democratic and Republican parties. At far left, you’ll see the Spiral Dynamics column. The present power struggle in America is a struggle between the Orange Multiplistic Individualistic Meme (the modern Republican Party) and the Personalistic-Relativistic Meme (the modern Democratic Party). Source: Integrallife.com.
But our lack of a consensus-based reality isn’t merely a product of subconscious or unconscious forces. As Ken Wilber points out in his Theory of Everything, it’s also a side effect of postmodernism. For clarification on what follows, please refer to the image above.
Postmodernism (represented by the Green meme, Personalistic-Relativistic, above) has done undeniably great things for the world. For example, it’s brought greater equality. But postmodernism has also erred, Wilber says. It embraces a Personalistic-Relativistic worldview—that there is no objective reality because each individual’s definition of objective reality is subject to their social conditioning—to the exclusion of all other ways of knowing. It’s essentially the “who am I to judge?” attitude. Which, in some ways, is great. This is how we absorb different perspectives and build empathy. But it’s paradoxical. There are no universal-truths, but one: that there are no universal truths. From a meaning-making standpoint, this kind of leaves you rudderless and possibly nihilistic.
The other problem with postmodernism is that it rejects everything that comes before it. Its way is the only way. And, to be fair, this isn’t a problem unique to postmodernism, according to Wilber. Every stage of development rejects the stages that have come before it. Modernists (Orange) reject the traditionalists (Blue, Purposeful-Absolutist), and so on.
The issue here, according to Wilber, is that we must pass through each stage of development — in order — to get to the next. We needed our old ways of thinking and meaning-making to arrive at our current ways of thinking and meaning-making. In other words, we need to integrate the useful elements of postmodernism in order to create what comes next. So, what comes next?
Potentially, nothing. The absolutistic, extreme elements of postmodernism, which insist that there is no universal truth (except for the fact that there’s no universal truth) have regressed to tribalism. And the traditionally classically liberal elements of the modern Republican party (individualism, separation of church and state, free-market capitalism) have become absolutistic too, regressing to ethnocentrism and putting Trump at the helm. Where do we go from here?
Building a beacon
Potentially, nowhere. Potentially, the warring tribes destroy each other, democracy, the earth, etc. because they cannot find a consensus-based reality. Jung’s shadow wins. Or, we find a way to start making sense through integration, moving beyond postmodernism.
I don’t think any one person or a small group of people can accomplish this. I think it’s going to take a massive team effort, with each member of that team committed to integrating their shadows, too. We need to incorporate the ideas of postmodernism and use them to build a more conscious and inclusive framework through which we can make meaning of our seemingly chaotic world.
Instead of driving a wedge, it’s time to build a fire. We need to stop calling people out, but call people in from the darkness of the Jungian shadow and into the light of a consensus-based reality. It’s time to talk to each other again. But mostly, it’s time to listen -- to take the best ideas and integrate them into a consensus that we can use to create a truly holistic way or ways of knowing.