Party pooper.
There seems to be a hunger in today's society to expose all the warts of the past, not to let heros sleep in peace, but to degrade them where possible and deny their heroic accomplishments. FDR, Churchill, JFK, Lincoln, Ghandi, among many others. I'm sure Mother Teresa will be investigated soon, and somebody will find out something they can use to try to soil her memory.
Our society today is very muc anti-hero. I can't explain it, but I think it is a loss. As Campbell has pointed out, shared myths are imporant to a healthy culture. Our culture is doing its best to destroy any shared myths we could build on.
The recovered memory movement is part of this -- IMO often creating false memories of failings, abuse, etc. Why is it that all recovered memories seem to be negative, and nobody seems able to recover memories of good times, of happy relationships?
Part of the nostalgia for the past is for the perception (as you point out, usually wrong) that the past was stronger, cleaner, simpler, more honest. I don't necesarily see it as a negative, as long as it stays in its proper place. The dirtier the present world gets, the more we need a vision that something better existed and can exist again just to get through life sane. |
