*ot* Ed, well, it's true that one of the hallmarks of a sociopath is that he is convincing (for awhile) because he believes his own story,
or in this case believes in his own "conscientiousness". But I have always been troubled by his body language and shallow sentimentality attempting to substitute for the real thing - a true connection to
self and others. One thing that occurred to me after I wrote yesterday
was that our culture lacks grownups and adult virtue/sensibility because we have abandoned both respect for age and its attendant wisdoms and social containers and rituals that provided adult initiation - this is particularly true for males, I'm sorry to say. The children of the 60's and 70's rejected authority (as it also rejected them), and gained important social change, but in the bargain lost the connection to authority that might have offered those
qualities (like perspective, humility, service, self-reflection, inner fortitude) that authority could have offered. Now these children have
their own children, but cannot transmit to them qualities they never themselves developed. Sounds gloomy, but I do think these things come
in great cycles, perhaps larger than we have perspective to grasp. I had a professor, a psychohistorian who called this narcissistic cycle the "Antinomian Personality", and suggested that this issue occurs with a surprising regularity, perhaps every forty or fifty years: just going back a ways, there was a youthful rebellion in the 1830's/40's (slavery, Industrial Revolution), culminating in civil war in the 1860's and a lot of change, then the 1880's (particularly in Europe, e.g., disturbing changes in painting styles reflect it), and of course
how can we forget the 1920's and the "flappers", bobbing hair and singing "anything goes"? These shifts are always followed by a reconciliation of the generations and a reconsolidation of values. Maybe this national shame will make personal responsibility and virtue more attractive. Well, one can only hope! |
