by slomo » Thu Jan 26, 2012 11:44 pm
Thank you for the outpouring of support, all, but this really isn't a manipulative ploy to get ego strokes (or whatever it is that gets stroked in a virtual community space). It really is a moment of, perhaps, a negative epiphany. Today a confluence of different threads on RI (and maybe in general on the forums and blogs I read) bumped me into a state where I kind of just all of a sudden thought "What the fuck am I doing?"
I've spent a lot of time on RI for the last few weeks - more than I can afford - mostly because a few personal and professional matters have been discouraging. It seemed like a decent refuge for awhile. But, we have these conversations, and does anything change? Do we gain the courage, knowledge, or rhetorical style to educate our real life friends and family members? I don't think so, because most of our real-life loved ones are impenetrable to this kind of information, no matter how it is delivered. And they are probably happier and more effective because of it. People believe what they want to believe, what they can handle, what gets them through the day, and what supports whatever program they've already decided upon. Desire rules. Rationality does not. I recently told a friend that I should have studied mass communications, not epidemiology, because I'd have more influence in the world in the long run.
Not to pick on the Disney thread (well, yes, exactly to pick on it because of the thread's founder's inability to take responsibility for an obvious smear) what good is it to endlessly rehash the misdeeds of Walt Disney, long ago decapitated and fresh-frozen in some cryogenic vault? What are the likely outcomes of such a conversation? That all of a sudden people start realizing that a significant portion of our culture has been founded by psychopaths? If so, what next - what will be done to change that? If not, then what's the point perseverating over it, except to reinforce the moral equivalence gay = pedophile?
I personally think that any kind of mass awakening from rehashing old history (Walt Disney, JFK, 911, whatever) is unlikely, because there is plenty of evidence of cultural dysfunction just by examining our current circumstances, and still very few people seem to question what is obviously staring them in the face. For example, all over again, just like in 2008, people are Believing in Hope and Change, just (as Bruce Dazzling put it), like battered wives. Meanwhile, even here at RI, the same kind of sleazy manipulation occurs, only on a smaller scale: pretend to have a rational conversation about X, but braid it with semiotic poison Y and when you're called out, dissemble and deflect as much as possible.
To be honest with you, there is a lot I like about my job, or at least a lot I don't mind. Notably, I like almost of my colleagues who are lateral to me, as well as my mentors, some of whom are obviously gaming the system and throwing out subtle hints how I should do the same. Of the remaining ones who I don't necessarily like personally - they turn out to be useful to me anyhow. And narcissistic scientific luminaries and the administrators who facilitate their shenanigans? I totally understand how they got to be the way they are. There's only so much stupid you can take before you tell yourself, "yeah I know this game is rigged, it's a steaming pile of shit, but if I cut some corners I can get X grant and Y contract and make enough money to wall myself off from all of the BS, and then I don't have to deal with Stupid anymore except to manage it".
If the sheep are so easily manipulated, then fuck 'em. It's not my problem. If another mimetic crisis is just around the corner, the place you don't want to be is where the contestants happen to be looking for someone to play the role of Scapegoat. Let somebody else play that role.
