Worker Drones of America Unite!

 

We hear from members of the bizarre coterie appointed to implement the schemes of our plutocracy that they have a vision of our future. Our Glorious Union is to be transformed into what it's believed to have been like during the Eisenhower administration, in the sense that the great majority of adults will be employed in factories. Eventually, their children and grandchildren will take their jobs in the same factories. Thus our future will be our past, ideally. And it's believed that the worker drones we'll become will relish our narrow, unvarying lives.

I think only those who never worked in factories could believe that we all should do so--that living our lives as factory workers is what's appropriate for us and what we should desire.  I've worked in factories, if only during summers while a student, and while there's nothing degrading about such work, which is good and honest, it can be dull and predictable, physically demanding and sometimes dirty; sometimes even dangerous.  

What kind of person would think that most of us should be employed in relatively menial jobs and expect that our children and grandchildren will do the same?  Who would maintain that we should hope for nothing more for ourselves and our descendants?

It's a kind of romantic fantasy of the rich.  It's at once condescending and self-serving on their part. Nothing would better serve their interests than to have a nation of drones working on assembly lines manufacturing products for their enjoyment and use.  It must be comforting to imagine that the drones will be better off for their exploitation.

Does the fantasy include more than this, though? I suspect it includes the belief that the drones would be docile, socially and politically.  They would be as characters in the sitcoms popular in the 1950s and early to mid 1960s.  Adults would work hard at their unchanging jobs and live their unchanging lives, without ambition or hope for more. They would have no unsettling expectations.  Kids would be concerned with harmless (and orthodox) sex and sports and food and consumer goods.

This is the American dream of the plutocrats; it's what they dream for us.

Ex Uno Plures (Out of One, Many)

 

Perhaps it's in the nature of humanity's constructions to dissolve over time, as we do ourselves.  Perhaps the proud early slogan of our nation, E Pluribus Unum--Out of Many, One--is antiquated, and is to be replaced in practice at least with its opposite,  Ex Uno Plures.

The United States is exceptional in that it is, more than any other nation I can think of, a construction, an artifice created by a group of men.  Not over time as may be the case with any other nation, but in a few years by a concerted effort of certain more or less like minded individuals with relatively similar interests and desires.  The fundamental structure of that nation was borrowed from others in certain respects (the Roman Republic seems to have been an inspiration), but the form of its government was new, and committed to writing.

It may be such a creation can't stand the test of time.  It nearly fell apart, after all, in part because it was understood by those interested in its dissolution to be a human creation rather than the slow work of years in which custom was molded and people with it to form a distinct identity.  As a human creation voluntarily joined in by the former colonies, the Union could be dissolved.  Or so thought the Confederates.

I think that this perspective may arise once more.  But if the nation does dissolve it may be due, in a perverse way, to a desire for a sameness which no longer exists.  A desire for a sameness of a certain kind, which those who prefer it wish to impose, by exclusion and intolerance.

The sameness sought would seem to be a kind of construction itself, the result of a selection of certain characteristics or traits it's thought once abided throughout the land, and may have obtained in portions of it in the past.  Now it seems a sameness which has taken on the quality of myth.  We all watched too many TV series glorifying that 19th century migrant worker known as the cowboy, perhaps.  Or, perhaps we watched too many of the sitcoms popular in the 1950s.  Many of us have a kind of nostalgia for life as it was lived during the Eisenhower administration.  We pride ourselves in being stout individualists, but the individuals we think we are or wish to be are homogenous.

The so-called Melting Pot America was once said to be may never have existed, in fact.  Even the Irish, Chinese, Italians, Greeks, and various Eastern Europeans have not been accepted fully, and are always suspect in one way or another here in God's favorite country. 

Regardless, what we see taking place is an association of groups or tribes.  Like calls to like; like seeks like in times of stress or trouble.  Like fears and hates unlike in those times. 

As a result, there is a reaction against multiculturalism and diversity taking place here, and also in Europe.  One can sympathize with the desire of a group of people to maintain their own customs and culture and to maintain their own institutions.  One can understand that this desire may result in the resentment of immigrants who seek to maintain their own culture and customs although they leave their own countries to live in others for various reasons.  There is an argument to be made that immigrants should not expect the country they seek to be the country they left, and that they should act accordingly.

But there are too many of us on this planet already, and the simple fact is that the population of this nation and others will change, is changing.  That change can't be stopped for more than a short time.  We can't be what we were, and certainly can't be what it seems our current president and his supporters want us to be. So, it may be we'll no longer want to be one out of many.  But that will mean merely that we won't be one nation, and will be a fragmented one instead, if we are any kind of nation at all. 

Gravitas non Grata

Gravitas, which has been translated variously as dignity, seriousness, weightiness in one's bearing and conduct, was a trait much admired by the Romans, especially in their leaders.  Like pietas (faithfulness, dutifulness) it was considered a distinctly Roman virtue, a characteristic of Romans since ancient times, a part of the mos maiorum, the ways and customs of their sometimes legendary forbears.

It's a familiar enough Latin word, though likely not as familiar as the phrase persona non grata (plural, personae non gratae), meaning an unwelcome person.  And so the title of this post, intended to convey that the virtue of gravitas is unwelcome here in our Great Republic, particularly in our leaders and those who wish to be our leaders.

This is apparent in the tiresome gaggle seeking to preside over these United States, honking platitudes and boasts, fear-mongering, pandering and posturing continually throughout the seemingly endless horror show of the presidential campaign.  But it's apparent even more so among us citizens, because we permit them to do so and even, God help us, encourage them to do so.  Worse yet, we eventually vote for one or the other of them.

Look what we have done to ourselves.  We tolerate circumstances where the highest office in the land is pursued by a rogue's gallery including a snake oil salesman; a blustering, boorish brat; a secretive, artificial person who seems venal and narcissistic; a well-meaning but clueless old man; a right wing demagogue and holy roller.  These are only the more popular of the candidates.

Perhaps I exaggerate.  But I think it accurate to say that not one of them possesses the characteristic of gravitas.  One in particular is even juvenile in demeanor, and this apparently delights his supporters.  It's impossible to think of him as having dignity, or being dignified.  He doesn't seem to aspire to dignity in any case.

To be fair, there are few presidents or candidates in recent years who had gravitas.  Certainly our first president did; it seems to have been his primary characteristic.  This was appropriate given the Founders' evocation of Rome in our institutions and laws.  The fond recollection of the real or not so real Rome of the Republic can be seen in The Federalist Papers, and fondness for it and its traditions was prevalent during the Enlightenment.

Among more recent presidents, one may have to go back to Eisenhower.  He had of course accumulated considerable regard and respect from being Supreme Commander of the Allied Forces in Europe during WWII, and this certainly accorded him great weight as a public figure.  Nixon seems to have struggled to obtain gravitas, but his own personal flaws and the slings and arrows of those he angered kept him from it.  Reagan, I think it's fair to say, appeared to have gravitas on occasion.  But he was an actor (Gore Vidal liked to call him "The Acting President"), and whether he had gravitas or merely was able to act as if he had it on solemn occasions isn't clear.

Sadly, "gravitas" isn't a word that comes to mind with respect to any of the our candidates, or anyone in national office for that matter.   They are all small, petty, venal and nasty climbers and necessarily for sale in our money-driven political system.

This lessens our standing in the world.  Our leaders' lack of dignity results in our country's lack of respect.  This lack of respect baffles some of us, and it seems those baffled think we must be obnoxious in order to regain respect (I suspect that too many of us associate obnoxious conduct with being powerful and respected).  But those people or countries who lack dignity, seriousness, and weight in bearing and conduct are not respected, though they may be hated.