an old letter to a friend

Just going through some old emails I found by accident, and this one struck my fancy. I wrote it to a friend just before flying back to Spain from the States back in November, 04, just after those wonderful elections...in fact, the last time I was in the "homeland"...

Here goes:

As I read over your last musings, I wonder if Viagra, or rather one of those anti-depressants might be the drug of the zeitgeist. (And not just for horrified progressives). I think what we have here is a case of confusion fatigue. Contemporary American life just does not leave most people the time to ingest all that is going on - the complexities of a buzzing and rapid-fire plurality in a sped-up digital world. Not while they have to work 60 plus hours a week to pay for those snazzy cars, health care, and other modern amenities. Most people want things just "simpled down" to coin a phrase. Bizarre re-workings of ancient metaphysical fairy tales, boiled down to appeal to fear/hate/need for belonging to something bigger/self-worth, etc, are just the trick. Rationality is naught but a nagging stimulous to anxiety. Who wants that? That's what fascists of every stripe have always known. That's what cynical power players have always known. That's what Dostoyevsky was writing about when the Grand Inquisitor tells a silent JC that what most people need is Miracle, Mystery and Authority.

Well, that's what so many millions of Americans voted for the other day. And they'll vote for it again.

It makes me wonder how, at certain times, certain leaders are able to gain popular support by appealing to people's sense of decency, hope, compassion, fairness, justice, sincerity, humility...and even their own self-interest. I think that such a thing can only be done with Reason, rationality, neatly and cleanly separated from metaphysical magic. Clearly, Christianity and other religions like to claim the above mentioned elements for their own. Indeed, there are many Christians whose behaviour reflects such "values" (what a dangerous and meaningless word that has suddenly become!). But until the great majority of citizens can connect with these elements through simple experience and common sense (ie., these guys are totally fucking up the economy, and that is going to fuck me, and/or, these guys are clearly leading us into a more violent and unsafe world, or, I cannot afford health care and must think twice before bringing my child to the doctor, etc.)... until people can face up to simple reality without comforting fairy tales inviting them to abandon any form of critical thinking, then religion in general will only serve for what it has generally served for up until now - to cause millions to confuse their own interests with those of their cynical rulers...

Hmmm...three years have passed. I see that things are getting more interesting in the country of my birth. That bizarre right wing coalition of wealthy creeps and deluded fundamentalists just might be breaking apart...ah, hope springs eternal from the human breast...