I know I dangled an enticement on the last blog, but I’m going to delay that a bit because of something that suddenly came up. It came from watching the Netflix series, “Manhunt,” which is about finding the Unabomber who, in the 1980’s and ‘90’s sent bombs in the mail to university professors and some people who worked in tech companies, airlines (the “a” in Unabomber) and government offices. I have something of a connection with this, as one of his bombs went off at the U of Michigan just a few months after I had left Ann Arbor. But really, my special connection with Ted Kaczynski, the man who was finally identified as the bomber, is a bit more controversial. For those reading newspapers in the ‘90’s, you will recall that he sent a long and weary “manifesto” to several publications, which was then published in the Washington Post, in which he condemns modern industrial society. At that time, I was still an academic, and I, too, condemned (in writing and in thought) modern industrial society, like just about everyone else in my profession. In a way I suppose I still do, but with an exception: in the same stroke, I share a similar distrust of all hierarchical societies, which includes most people from the past several thousand years, and just about everyone today. For instance, Rome was not dominated by tech as we understand it, but I would be a fool to say that it was a better, kinder and freer place than America is today. Far from it. Neither did we find an open, tolerant, and free society in the far less powerful and more primitive region of Palestine. In retrospect, it isn’t tech that causes us to give up our autonomy to The Man. Ted, the Harvard man and PhD in mathematics – the bona fide genius – was wrong. But where might we find the mechanism in society that restricts our thoughts and behaviors, turning us into what Ted described as machine-like automatons?
It is, for one, something that is inside all of us. Later in the series, we get a more sympathetic look at Ted. We are led through his childhood and early adulthood as his genius personality excludes him from the regular social world. He has difficulty making friends. We find that, at 53, he is still a virgin. He is a social incompetent, and that made him angry. He was a genius for God’s sake! The world would pay for not recognizing his genius – for not, essentially, loving him. In total, at least as the series has it, he killed for recognition; he killed because he was ostracized from the pack. Which means he killed from the basic human need to bond and be accepted socially. In the small family units of primitives, this wouldn’t have been a problem for most, but in larger societies, this is huge. In larger societies, Humans are at a surplus, and certain ones can be and are rejected. Most of these crumble and fail and slink through life, but a few strike back. Thus, Ted.
It was difficult to watch and reminded me of the times during my youth – and even today - when I was (and am) rejected. The memories are still painful. This need to be accepted is an extremely powerful emotion, and it is this which causes us to conform to societal rules. We might even say that this is social Darwinism – that is, that humans survive and thrive because we live in groups, and it is this psychological need to belong that makes us conform so that groups might exist.
It is this, then, not technology that causes us to be “automatons,” but rather our need to belong to the pack. The evidence is everywhere, but I bring up ancient Rome and Palestine for a reason. At the time of Christ, about a third of Rome was comprised of slaves (if I remember correctly. It was unbelievable high in any case). They were not feeling the freedom. But almost as bad, both average and upper-class Romans were compelled to act for “the family.” For instance, if a male member brought dishonor to the family, he was literally expected to fall on his sword. To kill himself. If a woman did so – and most woman had no power at all outside the family – she was killed by the family. A man could kill his wife and children legally – they were his chattel. And all were expected to bow before the emperor and pay homage to the state-approved gods. Keeping up with the neighbors was an obsession, and family crypts were kept to show to the world just how important the family was. Even in death, then, Romans were tools of society.
In Jesus’s Jerusalem, keeping up with the Jones’s meant literally being holier than thou. Being rich meant power as well, but for the average Jew, it was the religious leaders – the Pharisees – whom one looked up to. These guys were necessary just to keep everyone up on all the religious purity and sacrificial rules. Breaking them often meant death, but keeping them gave people such as the Pharisees their right to shine. Everyone was controlled by rules, and the more one followed the rules, the holier, and thus higher up the status rungs, one was.
Back then, if one was a social outcaste or loser, one became a servant or slave, or a bandit. In the age of the computer, people like Ted Kaczynski – although exceptionally bright – became back-bench research workers, or back-room postal workers, or food-stamp survivors or …serial killers. Which is a shame, because for both then and now, Jesus – much like the Buddha – dismissed the social hierarchy, absolutely. In general, everyone knows that Jesus favored the outcastes, even the whores and highway men (bandits), both because no one else cared for them, and because he understood their position in society. They could not conform, and that was not only OK, but actually superior in many ways. In particular, Jesus spoke many times of the hypocrites who performed for others to maintain their social position. In Matthew chapter 5, for instance, he goes on and on about giving alms in secret, or of fasting in secret, so as to do what is right before God, not before man. Of family, in Mathew chapter 8, a man begs leave to go bury his father, whereby Jesus replies, “Follow me and let the dead bury their dead.” (8:22) Of country, he tells the Pharisees to “give to Caesar what is Caesar’s, but give to God what is God’s” (22:21). That is, give to the government what is the government’s – its laws and money – but give your soul only to God.
In other words, and to be very clear, do NOT be concerned with what society, family, or government thinks of you, whether personally or societally. Live free of this mentality to live free. Give your all to truth, that which you know from deep inside, not to the vagaries and insecurities of human social structure. And more: this can be done in the sure knowledge that all are equal before God; that in heaven, no soul is accounted great by a person’s fame, glory or wealth. These things are insignificant.
Think if Ted had read and taken to heart the Gospels. He had to make up this entire manifesto to justify his anger at being an eternal outsider, when he didn’t need to do it at all. Whatever thought and effort and “genius” went into his treatise was entirely unnecessary. The revolution that he had wanted to create had already been started, and the blueprint was already there. The Gospels, though, are not what smart people believe now. They are not even read by the elite. They are not the path to personal glory. But, just as with the Romans, even our elites are burdened with keeping facades and appearances and the right panache. They are forever worried that they might slip, and they still wake in the middle of the night wondering just what the hell it’s all about. All while they, too, have already been taken care of. Their cure has already been presented. It just has to be followed.
The “superman” philosopher Friedrich Nietzsche famously wrote that Christianity was the religion of slaves, with a slave mentality. It was for losers only. But he did not understand, or would not understand, that in the social hierarchy game, all of us are losers. There is only one guy at the top, and even he gets sick and dies; even he fears the dark. Imagine if you didn’t give a damn about social standing, not out of anger, but because you realized it for the shallowness that it is; imagine if instead of bitterness or competitiveness, you saw others as yourself, no more nor less, all a part of the same whole under heaven; and imagine if you could love them and yourself and never fear being ostracized or lonely or lost. All of this is at our fingertips, and all so easy it’s hard. However difficult it might be, however, it is still far easier than living in the tortured ego of a humiliated social misfit who can only feel alive when a bomb is ripping apart others he believes have it so much better than himself.
I know I dangled an enticement on the last blog, but I’m going to delay that a bit because of something that suddenly came up. It came from watching the Netflix series, “Manhunt,” which is about finding the Unabomber who, in the 1980’s and ‘90’s sent bombs in the mail to university professors and some people who worked in tech companies, airlines (the “a” in Unabomber) and government offices. I have something of a connection with this, as one of his bombs went off at the U of Michigan just a few months after I had left Ann Arbor. But really, my special connection with Ted Kaczynski, the man who was finally identified as the bomber, is a bit more controversial. For those reading newspapers in the ‘90’s, you will recall that he sent a long and weary “manifesto” to several publications, which was then published in the Washington Post, in which he condemns modern industrial society. At that time, I was still an academic, and I, too, condemned (in writing and in thought) modern industrial society, like just about everyone else in my profession. In a way I suppose I still do, but with an exception: in the same stroke, I share a similar distrust of all hierarchical societies, which includes most people from the past several thousand years, and just about everyone today. For instance, Rome was not dominated by tech as we understand it, but I would be a fool to say that it was a better, kinder and freer place than America is today. Far from it. Neither did we find an open, tolerant, and free society in the far less powerful and more primitive region of Palestine. In retrospect, it isn’t tech that causes us to give up our autonomy to The Man. Ted, the Harvard man and PhD in mathematics – the bona fide genius – was wrong. But where might we find the mechanism in society that restricts our thoughts and behaviors, turning us into what Ted described as machine-like automatons?
It is, for one, something that is inside all of us. Later in the series, we get a more sympathetic look at Ted. We are led through his childhood and early adulthood as his genius personality excludes him from the regular social world. He has difficulty making friends. We find that, at 53, he is still a virgin. He is a social incompetent, and that made him angry. He was a genius for God’s sake! The world would pay for not recognizing his genius – for not, essentially, loving him. In total, at least as the series has it, he killed for recognition; he killed because he was ostracized from the pack. Which means he killed from the basic human need to bond and be accepted socially. In the small family units of primitives, this wouldn’t have been a problem for most, but in larger societies, this is huge. In larger societies, Humans are at a surplus, and certain ones can be and are rejected. Most of these crumble and fail and slink through life, but a few strike back. Thus, Ted.
It was difficult to watch and reminded me of the times during my youth – and even today - when I was (and am) rejected. The memories are still painful. This need to be accepted is an extremely powerful emotion, and it is this which causes us to conform to societal rules. We might even say that this is social Darwinism – that is, that humans survive and thrive because we live in groups, and it is this psychological need to belong that makes us conform so that groups might exist.
It is this, then, not technology that causes us to be “automatons,” but rather our need to belong to the pack. The evidence is everywhere, but I bring up ancient Rome and Palestine for a reason. At the time of Christ, about a third of Rome was comprised of slaves (if I remember correctly. It was unbelievable high in any case). They were not feeling the freedom. But almost as bad, both average and upper-class Romans were compelled to act for “the family.” For instance, if a male member brought dishonor to the family, he was literally expected to fall on his sword. To kill himself. If a woman did so – and most woman had no power at all outside the family – she was killed by the family. A man could kill his wife and children legally – they were his chattel. And all were expected to bow before the emperor and pay homage to the state-approved gods. Keeping up with the neighbors was an obsession, and family crypts were kept to show to the world just how important the family was. Even in death, then, Romans were tools of society.
In Jesus’s Jerusalem, keeping up with the Jones’s meant literally being holier than thou. Being rich meant power as well, but for the average Jew, it was the religious leaders – the Pharisees – whom one looked up to. These guys were necessary just to keep everyone up on all the religious purity and sacrificial rules. Breaking them often meant death, but keeping them gave people such as the Pharisees their right to shine. Everyone was controlled by rules, and the more one followed the rules, the holier, and thus higher up the status rungs, one was.
Back then, if one was a social outcaste or loser, one became a servant or slave, or a bandit. In the age of the computer, people like Ted Kaczynski – although exceptionally bright – became back-bench research workers, or back-room postal workers, or food-stamp survivors or …serial killers. Which is a shame, because for both then and now, Jesus – much like the Buddha – dismissed the social hierarchy, absolutely. In general, everyone knows that Jesus favored the outcastes, even the whores and highway men (bandits), both because no one else cared for them, and because he understood their position in society. They could not conform, and that was not only OK, but actually superior in many ways. In particular, Jesus spoke many times of the hypocrites who performed for others to maintain their social position. In Matthew chapter 5, for instance, he goes on and on about giving alms in secret, or of fasting in secret, so as to do what is right before God, not before man. Of family, in Mathew chapter 8, a man begs leave to go bury his father, whereby Jesus replies, “Follow me and let the dead bury their dead.” (8:22) Of country, he tells the Pharisees to “give to Caesar what is Caesar’s, but give to God what is God’s” (22:21). That is, give to the government what is the government’s – its laws and money – but give your soul only to God.
In other words, and to be very clear, do NOT be concerned with what society, family, or government thinks of you, whether personally or societally. Live free of this mentality to live free. Give your all to truth, that which you know from deep inside, not to the vagaries and insecurities of human social structure. And more: this can be done in the sure knowledge that all are equal before God; that in heaven, no soul is accounted great by a person’s fame, glory or wealth. These things are insignificant.
Think if Ted had read and taken to heart the Gospels. He had to make up this entire manifesto to justify his anger at being an eternal outsider, when he didn’t need to do it at all. Whatever thought and effort and “genius” went into his treatise was entirely unnecessary. The revolution that he had wanted to create had already been started, and the blueprint was already there. The Gospels, though, are not what smart people believe now. They are not even read by the elite. They are not the path to personal glory. But, just as with the Romans, even our elites are burdened with keeping facades and appearances and the right panache. They are forever worried that they might slip, and they still wake in the middle of the night wondering just what the hell it’s all about. All while they, too, have already been taken care of. Their cure has already been presented. It just has to be followed.
The “superman” philosopher Friedrich Nietzsche famously wrote that Christianity was the religion of slaves, with a slave mentality. It was for losers only. But he did not understand, or would not understand, that in the social hierarchy game, all of us are losers. There is only one guy at the top, and even he gets sick and dies; even he fears the dark. Imagine if you didn’t give a damn about social standing, not out of anger, but because you realized it for the shallowness that it is; imagine if instead of bitterness or competitiveness, you saw others as yourself, no more nor less, all a part of the same whole under heaven; and imagine if you could love them and yourself and never fear being ostracized or lonely or lost. All of this is at our fingertips, and all so easy it’s hard. However difficult it might be, however, it is still far easier than living in the tortured ego of a humiliated social misfit who can only feel alive when a bomb is ripping apart others he believes have it so much better than himself.
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