Postmodern Ties to the Western Messianic Ideal

In observing the thematics that seem to arise in personality types in America, one type that I keep coming back to is that of the Western world's man of power. That's a vague definition, but it is linked to the Western idea of the singular hero, which I blogged about earlier. The cultural value in this type of character is likely founded historically in religious traditions; the Christ, a Messiah; a singular hero.

This value in the singular hero has likely caused people to connect with that ideal and gain a sort of personality type with strengths in individual, heroic-like ability. This has been particularly interesting as of late, because it seems that the accepted form of this singular hero has shifted. The contrast I see, has been from a type that was highly valued since probably around the late 19th century, to another type that began emerging at the turn of the 21st. This has been intriguing to watch because it seems that there is great conflict within the culture as to whether this new hero model is right or not; some even claiming that the old ideal was wrong and the new ideal, though still a hero, is right.

The singular hero of Western culture that existed from at least the late 19th century, was a man of knowledge and understanding. Most people attribute this to modernity, and they are mostly right. The more the man understood, knew, and sought to know by reason, the more the man was seen as powerful and right. Using the technology of the time to understand his world, man would delve long hours and time into books of great intellectual depth and abstractions. A common family expression of this value was that the evening hours, a time set apart for reading, was the most valued period of the day.

Turning to more contemporary times, since around the turn of the 21st century, there has been much debate in the culture about whether the reason and knowledge-based system is really something to continue. Much of this is subversive; people don't even realize it is happening. The essential argument of the new type of singular hero, is that he is not primarily a man of infinite knowledge and truth, but of infinite relational connections. Now, not everyone accepts this model; it is still an expression of the singular hero ideal that is in contention against the older, all-knowing ideal. In any case, it has risen to greater prominence and the signs have been around the culture everywhere, mostly in the avant-garde groups of the culture: the youth and emerging adult. Expressions of this can be seen ranging from the greater desire to be all-connected through Internet portals such as Facebook, Instant Messaging, Cell Phones, to the largely meaningless (except the communal aspect) of Online-orchestrated Flash Mobs. Again, be sure to note this: much of the community that young groups are seeking, have little to no value in discerning the reason they are coming together, they seek community first, and from that usually truth emerges, but not as consciously at the older heroic model.

To me, both expressions indicate each a differing set of values; one on knowledge and one on relationships. However, they are commonly fueled in their beliefs that this is done by individuals striving to pursue the same ideal of heroic-esque glory. So when someone criticizes the older way of doing things, of seeking to be all-knowing, it is difficult to see reason for that criticism when they hold up a new ideal to strive for: relationships. Both seek the infinite, both seek to be God in a new way; whether that is a good or bad thing.

American Pragmatism: The Silent Generation

The first article in the series on American pragmatism beyond the historical foundation laying, will analyze the socio-historic group known as the Silent Generation. The Silent Generation were understood to be those that were born between 1925 and 1942, and hence reached adulthood sometime around the 60's. As such, this article will focus on possible reasons the counter-cultural movements of that time period took place in respect to those who were the main instigators of it: the Silent Generation.

Now, it has already been laid out that the culture of the United States was imprinted with pragmatic beliefs due to its history, these causing high cultural value in the pursuits of exploratory progressiveness, scientific-inventive progressiveness, and societal progressiveness. This is the main hingepoint for interpreting the actions of the Silent Generation.

Born in the midst and on the cusp of wartime, the Silent Generation has been understood as having strong resilience in matters of using resources efficiently, working hard, and having good analytical skills; traits that allow people to survive optimally in a difficult situation. Pragmatically, they were very good at understanding how to do things; they likely explored better ways to sustain what they had and work with what they were given.

And yet, the American pragmatic would not allow them to stay this way once the opportunities flourished in a post-war environment. Since there is high value in exploring progressively, inventing progressively, and going forward as a society progressively, the Silent Generation arguably was probably a bit lopsided. Most of their development had been spent figuring out how to work with materials; impersonal objects and resources; they were probably not well experienced in social matters. And so, it is possible that this drive, this cultural ethic to always be progressing as a people, drove the Silent Generation to consider that which was style enigmatic. For them, social relationships would certainly be one, while inventive and work-related pursuits would seem dull and already extinguished of any enigmatic qualities.

And so, the action to progress societal understanding in dark areas began with the movement into exploring by experimentation the possible family, social, and sexual-relational structures of the day. Thereby, the so-called "Postmodern Experiment" was born.

American Pragmatism: Historical Foundations

This article will be the start of a series I am attempting to do that seeks to analyze recent history's generational / socio-historic categories under the topic of American pragmatism. The reason for this is due to wanting to know better whether the emerging postmodern movement is truly set on a path away from the traditional American pragmatic view on life; whether they truly believe and have an identity based on being and not on doing.

The first article will bring to focus the origins and therefore definition of American pragmatism. Since the definition is historically-based, this will mostly be a historically-reflective analysis. American culture began placing roots as soon as the first Europeans attempted to colonize what would be the United States. Historically, this arrival to colonize North America was a novel event; the rest of the globe had been reached by civilized and / or European men in the past. From this new situation, then came the need to explore and understand that which was mysterious; a very European ethic. For the time, we are completely ignoring the existing Native American populations, culture, and civilizations, since the culture present now is largely devoid of their influences. This drive to understand what was unknown spurred a people of pioneers and homesteaders.

As the pioneers explored the unseen lands before them, the homesteaders and town crafters attempted to wrangle with the yet untamed land about them in order to create order out of what was viewed as disorder. This grafting of human order upon that which had little before, spurred forth inventive scientific and inventive social minds; finding ways to create novel human order and novel social structures, the novelty coming out of it being a historically novel event. Evidences are present from the early beginnings of American scientificism and the early attempts at creating social utopias.

After many years of creating order by exploring the mysterious wilderness and by establishing human environs out of untamed land, the American pragmatic ethic had been established. In this analysis, three pragmatic beliefs have been identified: exploratory progressiveness, scientific-inventive progressiveness, and societal progressiveness. These beliefs, once established, created cultural values that everyone agreed upon; that the American people should always be progressing as a society in the following ways together and individually: exploring the mysterious unknown and uncharted, creating and determining by science new ways to create human order out of unordered nature, and exploring better ways to organize and define human society. Together, these formed the American-pragmatic cultural norm of the past and present.

Abstractions and Learning

The Enigma of the Hour
- Giorgio de Chirico, 1910/11

Thinking about how irritating it is to acquire various abstracted perspectives on reality due to our alienating society because of its roots in modernistic-industrial beliefs.

Emerging Video Game Trends, Culture, and the End of the Hero

Since I've been on the topic of how society reacts to modernistic alienation, I came to think of some emerging trends in the medium of video games to be of interest to this discussion. An old model that has been used in video games for the past many years; likely since it became popular, has been to place an individual hero type against impossible odds. Most games, especially action games, tend to use this model where the power to save humanity is found in the one, singular hero.

With the coming rejection of modernity and its alienation therein, as well as with the events of 9/11 which arguably humbled the nation and changed its culture to seeing the real relevance of the dangers of a service-based economy that relied upon other cultures and nations, people have had to struggle with the structures that modernity has left. So, even though the postmodernists largely reject the previous culture for those reasons and the modernist choices that created the service economy, they still must confront the structures that have been left in their wake.

Confronting these alienating and proven dangerous structures (ala 9/11), video games merge into this with some of the emerging trends we're seeing now. As stated, the modernistic video game structure tended to focus on the power of the individual. A more postmodern view then tends to put more focus on the power of society, for the reasons just stated. An example of this is the game, Left 4 Dead. The game isn't quite the postmodern social game ideal in that it confronts these problems, but it is a step in the right direction. The game can be described as a zombie horror multi-player game. The relevance is that the symbols of human civilization; the unaffected humans themselves, are fighting a human, but unhuman force that is both confusing to understand and powerful. Both of these can be applied to having to confront a force that one is alienated towards because of a lack of understanding, and hence deals with the current cultural discussion.

Now, Left 4 Dead could be an important and used piece of media to discuss these cultural issues, and it may do it better than zombie multi-player attempts of the past. I'm not saying that past attempts were invalid, its just that Left 4 Dead may be getting significantly closer to the goal. The reason for this is that the opposing force, that which the players are alienated against, can be controlled not by humans, but by a computer. This is important because a computer can follow pre-described purposes and action relentlessly; just the way that these forces genuinely appear to do so in our current society. Human-based opposition is much less powerful because it can be seen that humans, even in the MMORPG world, have little sense of purpose and duty; they are listless and cannot focus strongly enough on much of anything enough to resemble something close to actual purposed pursuits.

And so, the emerging trend in the medium of interactive media (video games), seems to be that of putting together a group of players communally and pit them against a force that they are alienated against and that is relentless in its pursuit to destroy them. If you can't wait for Left 4 Dead, a game that may work similarly, is the Half-Life 2 mod, Synergy, where one can play as a team through the entire Half-Life 2 game, where of course, there is also a zombie-like force present; the Combine.

The Industrial Age of Government and Economic Systems

After watching a recent episode of South Park, in fact the latest one as of this date, I came to think about how it might be that a fear based on a distant, alienated understanding of some aspect of life, might come to be within the areas of economic and governmental systems. That is, how it might be that one can be frightened by an force of some kind because of a lack of understanding of that force. A good example would be say, people's natural phobia of aliens, if they came among us. As such, an force in which we have alienated understanding of, is frightening, and even more dangerous then is such a force that is malevolent. All these relations can be seen if one looks at the latest episode in how it comments on the recent economic meltdown, the nature of the United States' economic system being service-based, 9/11, and more details than I can think of.

Now, after considering how this alienation of understanding and subsequent real threat is tied to governmental and economic systems, I came to see that the Industrial Revolution not only applied to the sciences and production methodologies, but also to governmental and economic systems in America. The idea of modernistic alienation is an impression in the United States that existed after the Industrial Revolution took place. Typically in my exposure, this has been shown to have been applied to material goods and the sciences; the alienation is caused essentially by making the production of goods and progress in science dependent upon machines rather than actual humans. One cannot see as easily that which came from a human (production of goods) or can comprehend with the human senses (atomic sciences) that which is before them; it appears to be from machines.

The same impression of alienation exists in the United States' economic and governmental systems because the process of industrialization was applied also to them. For government, the leaders structured it such that it became highly reliant upon a system that allowed greater number of people to be governed using less actual people. A couple of illustrations that reveal how this was expressed is, first the increase in internal structures of organization in how government was handled (bureaucracy), second the increase in importance of citizens of following laws. These two expressions caused man to follow dutifully the intricacies of detailed organizational procedures and caused the populace to not be as governed by actual people, but by laws.

The industrialization of economic systems followed the same mentality of streamlining how a nation approached economics such that making profit, liking making products for the factory sector, was streamlined using highly mathematical systems. The need to keep progressing (a value strengthened greatly by the Industrial Revolution) is now so intrinsic within the United States' view of economics that it isn't acceptable to have a level market; but rather one that is always increasing. And so, of course, it is a crisis that a market would turn in an opposite direction, as it is now.

An important extension to the industrialization of economic systems that one should note, is that it led to the creation of the service economy we now have. This is due to the fact that people were already comfortable with an alienating system; a system that becomes more reliant upon people far away is less daunting. Of course, that sneaky alienating force that is built within such a service will make some people frightened, and rightly so, for we are reliant upon others who could easily destroy our way of life because we are so strongly tied to them; a modern Republican-esque belief. This extended idea could really be gone into more fully in a separate posting all together.

Cultural Foundations of Truth: Comparing Western Europe to Central Europe

I recently began to think more about some of the friendships I've had in the past and the characteristics of the various people I knew. Something that's been on the back of my mind for a while has been the idea that White people, or those of European descent, are more predisposed to enjoy and gain friendship with those that share the region in Europe their family came from. Previously, I had considered most White Americans to be fairly similar, but over time this question has crept into my mind as a possibility in explaining some of the strange differences and causes of tension that I couldn't put my finger on.

Recently, I had some thoughts as a result of reading some partly unrelated literature that seemed to confirm greatly that this does in fact exist more than I previously gave credit. In reflecting, I was able to see at least one regional distinction with people of European descent. This was the division between those that have heritage in areas of Western Europe that at least include England and Ireland, and those that have heritage in areas of Central Europe that at least include Germany, Italy, and probably France. This distinction was addressed in my mind primarily by each group's tendency towards how they acquire truth.

The following are the distinctions I noticed, each bullet generally is paired in idea with another on the other list according to order:

Central European (German, Italian, perhaps French)

• Will to Power
  
• Determination yields results
  
• Right person in the right place can make all the difference
  
• Materialistic reality is full of tools for taking action

Western European (England, Ireland)

• Phenomenal Enlightenment
  
• Sudden awareness gives ability for power
  
• Correct combination of various, random facts brings creative power
  
• Materialistic reality is fuel / entropy for this "enlightenment fire"

Each of these pairings should be explained and given example in order to understand more fully.

The Will to Power idea can be understood such that truth is known by the person who has taken the action to resolve the issue in question. It isn't the idea that comes first to solve the problem, but the action in progress or completed successfully that reveals the answer and hence the truth. Phenomenal Enlightenment differs from Will to Power in that the truth is known based on what emerges from a collective pool of many concepts. Once a pattern rises almost by no direct provocation, the answer is known and hence the truth.

The next category can be understood as a comparison of how each sees power. Central Europeans tend to think that power comes from having a determined spirit; a person who seeks by direct action or experimentation of possible solutions, is seen as likely powerful. Western Europeans tend to think that once one has become enlightened almost by phenomenon with the answer to the problem, that they have then great power to take action successfully.

The next category covers the environment in which each group tends to see truth come from. The Central European is highly existential in that they tend to believe that the right person in the right situation can produce great results. As such, if the person is not "right" or of a determining demeanor, or if the situation does not contain the necessary material tool base, truth will tend to not be found. The Western European sees a truth-bearing environment as one that is surrounded with many ideas; many not related to the problem at hand perhaps at all. Out of this seemingly chaotic environment tends to emerge the truth that the person is seeking. And so, one must typically expose oneself to numerous sources, potentially unrelated, before one will be able to see the solution to the problem at hand.

The last category covers each regions view towards materialistic reality and culture. The Central European sees material reality as a place of potential tools to solve problems and discover truth, as they tend to use the objects around them to resolve what works and what doesn't. They tend to see the material culture that builds up in society as only the outpourings of what comes from man's actions in using the tools he has. Power is in the person and determination. Modern Science was born from Central Europe and as such, it has many traits attributed to the culture that created it. The Western European sees material reality as a great source for gaining enlightenment; the entropy that feeds an "enlightenment fire." They tend to see the material culture that builds up in society as not just tools. They see a tool-based mentality towards material reality as sterile and a wrong way of using one's material surroundings. Materialistic reality tends to be powerful in itself in that it is "culture."

Historical and Symbolic Thinking, with Deconstructionism

After going through a week of difficulty due to my old apartment catching on fire, I was able to return to where I left off in my thinking. Recently, I've reading through a book which looks at the Western mindset and society in regards to its views on history. It has been one of the most interesting pieces of work I've read lately, though I'm not done with it, so I'm not sure if I would recommend it yet to anyone. Anyways, reading and thinking, I came to see an association between the physical nature of man and the necessity of being able to think historically and symbolically. Recently, I have tied to this modern history's views on deconstructionism and how that has had implications on modern man's ability to think in these ways.

First off, history is relevant to man because on a physical level, man cannot escape his memory, past experiences, and past knowledge. By the very way his brain is wired, man tends to think in these manners. As such, having an ability to think historically is valuable for it builds upon the physical nature of man.

Second, symbolism is relevant to man because if man is to know any sizable number of things and will be able to retrieve these things quickly, the brain must build cross-idea associations which create symbolic intuition.

The opposite of this; a perspective that eliminates one's ability to think historically and symbolically has repercussions that one must be aware of. As a note, since we're speaking of the ability to think based on physical reality, I'm assuming that man is able to have a brain constructed in such a way that limits it to be used in ways highly contrary to its construction. Taken this way, a way of thinking that doesn't allow historical and symbolic processing tends to cause man to be unable to progress in building tendencies. Non-historical thinking means that man has built his mind such that he is a stateless machine; he can process pieces of data at any time regardless of context. Non-symbolic thinking means that man has built his mind such that data is stored in his brain so that either there are repetitive data (ideas, even though they share sub-concepts, must be compartmentalized / isolated) or retrieval of isolated ideas takes a long time because one must filter off associated ideas that don't belong to the idea being sought after. Assuming that the brain has a limited capacity by its limited number of neurons, both a-historical and a-symbolic ways of thinking may cause man to be unable to delve deeply into ideas without foregoing being able to go deeply into other ideas; historical and symbolic thinking are more efficient in storing ideas, but they do not hold the benefits of being able to think more freely.

Deconstructionism comes into this because it is a way of thinking that seeks to eliminate historical and symbolic thinking for the sake of freedom from tendencies. Since this is freedom from tendencies, any attempt at making assumptions is fought against. As such, if a society stays in deconstructionism, it and his mankind will not progress, but will only continue to spin on its shallow mess of assumptionless thinking. To anyone who knows of deconstructionism, it is a historical movement that began some time in the mid 20th century as an attempt by Western society to free itself of what it saw as mass injustices it was predisposed towards. Since as we've seen, a-historical and a-symbolic thinking keep man from building tendencies and foundations of sorts, it seems to be a way of thinking that accomplishes this, and could arguably be one of the reasons Western society has been in the process of deconstructing itself for the past few decades.

So if man is to build any foundation, he must at least approach thinking more historically and symbolically; to not do so continues a cycle of deconstruction and arguably antifoundationalism. Emerging thought seems to be that this past of deconstructionism shouldn't be continued much longer; that reconstruction should begin. Why this change has occurred is for another article, but the fact of its existence is the reason this article is relevant.

Male Gender Roles in Leadership, Then and Now

The other day, I was thinking about the period of the 60's and 70's and the topic of gender roles. It seemed interesting because of the potential reasons why the sexual revolution of that period took place. The specific aspect I'm going to focus on, is the period's stance towards gender roles, and why perhaps the roles in gender shifted from previous years. Flashing forward, I'm going to also try and address the impact this is having on current generations and why that's interesting.

From what material I have exposure to, it seems that during the 60's and 70's, for one reason or another, it tended to be that male leadership in the home was weak, whereas female leadership was strong. Now, this state of leadership didn't appear to exist prior to this period; the 60's and 70's were a transitional period where male leadership had been strong before, but now was becoming weak. Why exactly male leadership weakened, is a topic that won't be broached here, but it is certainly important. Now, following this transitional period, women began to take on more responsibility over the home; for the men were becoming less. For some reason or another, it doesn't seem like the society of that age criticized men that much, even though many of them were giving up the degree of responsibility they once held. Some could argue that the reason criticism was held back was because people had accepted that females were to be given more power over the home; more delegated, egalitarian power structures. Based on what I've seen, there were people who understood and accepted the change, but there were also many who didn't understand and were confused by what was going on around them; some even men themselves who were following society though confused as to why things were falling apart for them. Perhaps it is because the period was such a flux point in the culture, and so this caused inability to discern whether men were in the wrong for foregoing responsibility (whether they accepted feminism or not).

I contrast this response to lessened male responsibility with that of today's culture. There has been in popular thought, for the past 3-4 years at least, the idea that the typical modern male's sense of responsibility is lower than it should be, and therefore it is wrong. This is seen in that men are portrayed in the national media as being weak, irresponsible, impractical, too emotional, and baby-like. An excellent portrayal of this is in the film Knocked Up. Before, it seems as if men who held these qualities weren't seen as in the wrong, whereas now, it seems all over the national media, that men like this need to change. Not that I don't disagree, I tend to lean towards being more responsible, but why exactly this is happening now, is the question.

A few reasons that I can think up now could shed light in future thoughts: first, that the 60's and 70's were so tumultuous that no one really knew what was going on and whether it was right or wrong, thereby correcting the mistakes of the past. Second, that criticism now has only come from the Gen-Y crowd because they have been brought up to believe in the gender roles that existed before the 60's and 70's. Third, that the Gen-X crowd is trying to correct Gen-Y's veering towards such male gender roles because Gen-X doesn't see any real reason for Gen-Y's adoption of such cultural ideas other than men likely indulging in truly wrongful irresponsibility. In other words, they haven't sought these roles out of necessity, but out of selfish gluttony.

The Kingdom of God and History

Oftentimes, I am compelled to consider the future path of civilization. From my thoughts about "essentialism," I began to consider the future projections for a society that follows such a way of thinking. Most conclusions that I've been reading about and thinking about, lead to a societal decay on a large scale to some degree or measure. When I considered what this decay could look like, I began to see many ideas come together to form a couple of potential outcomes. By many ideas coming together, I mean that a new idea was entering my thoughts that largely depended on other ideas pre-existing, which seems seems like a good cognitive method to begin to see relations between ideas that may actually exist, but not recognized before.

Back to the point. The importance of coming up with these two resulting outcomes that entered my mind was that they hinged on whether a certain belief in my mind was one way or another. And this is important because one's stance on this belief is likely due to what time of history one is ascribing the stance in. Particularly, one stance is from the early 20th century, and one stance is much more recent.

The generated outcomes of "essentialism" and all the issues within that historical progression were the following. The first is that Western society will undergo a cycle of first falling apart, then rebirth where the new society will take what truths the last society discovered, but will throw away much of the culture and false truths that existed. This occurs in a cycle and each society as it rebirths, builds upon societies prior; thereby increasing societal stability with each passing age. The second outcome that came to my mind was that Western culture will be accepted throughout the Earth as a unifying culture for all mankind. However, when this society falls apart, there somehow isn't as much availability for rebirth. It is similar to the Tower of Babel event, where all of mankind was divided. However, this time, this may not be the outcome, it could something else.

Both of these ideas hinged in my mind on some of my Christian beliefs. This makes all good sense, because I am a Christian and my mind should hinge on my beliefs. The particular belief it hinged on was what my view was on the future of the "Kingdom of God," which is discussed often in the Bible. One popular viewpoint is that the Kingdom of God will come in a dramatic, earth-shattering (so to speak) event. Followers of this idea could commonly be referred to as believers in the "New Earth, New Kingdom" dynamic. A second popular viewpoint is that the Kingdom of God will come when society on Earth progresses to that point, at which Jesus will come back to Earth and rightly become King. Followers of this idea could commonly be referred to as believers in a "Progressive Kingdom." Believers in the "New Earth, New Kingdom" dynamic would likely interpret the future of Western society in a fashion that will bring the dramatic event that changes the world quickly. Believers in the "Progressive Kingdom" dynamic would believe that Western society will indeed fall apart, but that a new society that is better than all the last will be built upon the ashes.

The historical importance of these two views, is that the "New Earth, New Kingdom" concept has existed at least since the early 20th century. Popular allusions to this idea can be seen in some of the art of the day, such as in the film of Metropolis. The "Progressive Kingdom" concept is an idea of at least the past ten years. Noticing this difference that is based largely on which belief one holds that is from which era is important as it signifies more as to who one is compared to who one thinks one is, and that is the relevance for it to me. As far as to why the "Progressive Kingdom" idea has been gaining a lot steam lately, that is for another posting.

The Blog That Won't Die

Greetings to any of you who haven't read this blog in a while, or read it at all before. The above title isn't meant to be arrogant or boastful, but something I hope to keep based on what I've learned in the past about keeping a blog going. Originally, this blog died off during the college years due to a number of aspects I have tried to address.

Now, I say tried, because this blog in its current incarnation is not new; I've been blogging for about two months. I did this so as to not make any promises that I couldn't keep.

When I first started this blog in college, I did it mostly as a way to express thoughts through writing to the public. There were two large problems with this. First, my motivation to keep going was highly dependent upon people reading the blog. Blogging, as well as Facebook, are applications where people can perform actions without being noticed by anyone. As such, it seems that most people, even if they did read, didn't do anything to mark their passage. Since I was dependent on knowing that people actually valued what I did, the blog shut down. Now, I've tried to make this blog with less dependence upon needing others to read it; I write because I need to, and because I feel that it would be good to have it available to the public although I'm not dependent upon that factor very much. The second main problem with the original blog, was that I didn't have much free time in college outside of what I already had commitments to. Now, especially since I'm living far from most of everyone I know from college and early life, I feel that keeping such a portal of deep thoughts is important.

Now that this blog is going, and I hope it go on for a long time, I'm excited for what's coming up. Aside from content, which is mostly centered on cultural, sociological, and identity analysis, I've been working through some thoughts about how to better keep track and thereby understand the ideas I write about. One has been through keeping visual maps of what ideas I consistently think about. These maps would essentially link different articles to articles by association of what the articles talk about, so that I can form a visual representation of where my thoughts are going and what the different facets appear to be. The creation of these "idea maps" will allow me to review and reflect upon what I've thought about before; very useful if somehow I've gotten off track or forgotten some of my central purposes. To anyone who has tried to keep journals, it should make rummaging through them to remember what they were about substantially easier.

So that's where things are going. Again, I encourage you, if you are going to read this blog consistently, to comment with your own thoughts or drop me a line; it should help each of us to understand each other better, and I look forward to any furthering of that.

A Culture of Essentials

Considering our place in history the other day, I came to realize further that today's current generation (and by that, I mean the generation that is around adulthood: 20 - 30), and possibly upcoming generations, sees what is important in life out a perspective I'd like to call, essentialism. I believe essentialism has its root in what can be labeled since the early 20th century and now, as a crisis of culture of sorts. This "crisis of culture" can be seen as the wearing down of cultural-historic norms to put in its place ahistorical norms. An expression of this could be seen in how value has been lessened towards relationships of one's heritage while value has been increased towards the concept of money. Money in comparison, is very fluid, temporal in nature, and not stable. A better comparison could be between money and wealth, where wealth clearly has enduring qualities to its worth.

Now, some argue that one can stave off this cultural erosion, by putting considerable bulwarks in one's home that stand in contrast to these norms. This indeed, may be possible. However, the children will likely reveal the true effectiveness of this effort. I argue that because the majority of children, even children coming from these types of homes, have adopted essentialism, that these efforts are not as effective as the parents think. Further, the parents themselves involved in these efforts likely don't even believe strongly what they're making efforts to stand for.

The way that essentialism reveals how ill these efforts are, and how parents may not be properly handling their stances, is due to how the children view these factors growing up. If children saw that these norms to fight off the "crisis of culture" were good, then they would follow them themselves. However, essentialism doesn't contain much of the norms held by these stances, but more of the norms that make up the "crisis of culture." Essentialism is defined to be a way of seeing reality such that only essentials are valued. What then are these essentials? Based on my observations, I've been able to pin down at least the following:

Tenants of Essentialism

• Community
  
• Identity in Oneself
  
• Survival of Oneself
  
• Material Practicality above Immaterial Idea-ism
  
• Emotions above Reason

Another good way to phrase Essentialism is by calling it "Survivalism," valuing only what it takes to survive, which the above list describes. The truth is, most of the expressions of these values listed above I have seen, have been less in the area of durable actions, but temporal, ahistoric nature. Sure, community could be something that builds up culture, but the way the value is expressed is typically in how a group of people can cohesively, in the moment, have times of gratifying emotion. Typically this involves discussion that builds towards how absurd life is, rather than building towards an enduring purpose. This then causes community to be used in a way that is not cultural-historic, but ahistorical and acultural.

Now, the way I see that people have adopted this essentialism mentality, is because in their childhood homes that have stood against the "crisis of culture," the parents didn't hold strong enough value in their stances. The result is not that the children intellectualized about whether their parents really believed in what they said, but that they simply saw that the people weren't following much of anything (remember, degradation of values is part of the crisis), and so gravitated towards whatever was consistent and gravitated away from what was spoken of, but not practiced, thereby forming the values of essentialism. The problem with this, is that by the process of forming these values, the children had to adopt acultural and ahistorical views, which are exactly what the parents were striving to fight against; the values found in the "crisis of culture." This cycle is very ironic.

If the current generation is to truly stand against the crisis, it must stand against its current expressions of values, values which only in appearances resemble something better, and must take up cultural-historical views towards the values it professes, so as to express them in ways beneficial to the purpose.

Characteristics, Limitations, and Heritage in the Political Leader

I've been thinking some about how might a person become a political leader. This has been on my mind due in large part to trying to further understand my tendency towards holding a dynamic that balances strong leadership and strong deep relationships. These two, in my mind, tend to be at odds with one another. If one is to be a political leader, it seems by necessity that their relationships must be less deep than that of a person who desires not political leadership. This is justified by the fact that a leader really must understand the people they are leading. If the person is leading millions, such as with a senator or president, then they need to know what the people are thinking. This task is impossible without using representatives that give the leader insight into what the people think.

Now, one could say that deep relationships could then exist with the representatives, but that seems unlikely if the representatives main role is to relay accurate information. Sure, this could be done in a manner respective to one's humanity in that it would be more than simply information relay, but the relationship between the leader and the representative would not be of the form of what could be between a non-leader citizen and his fellow non-leader citizen friends, where the relationship would be defined by sharing what is more individually-personal with one another. The representative and the leader would have a relationship based on talking about and understanding the populace they are representing; individually-personal information would be rarely spoken of.

And so, I seem to define "deep relationships" as being those in which two people share their individually-personal thoughts with one another; thoughts that do not hinge on others, but entirely on themselves.

Many balk towards leading politically if it necessitates an absence of such "deep relationships," but that topic, which involves the origins of emotions, is for another time.

Now that a basic understanding of the relational dynamics of political leaders has been set in place, I will go back to the original question: how might a person become a political leader? Well, in my thoughts, I believe that it takes at least a couple of things. The first, is one's mindset. Leaders tend to have mindsets in the following ways: strong awareness towards systems, unemotional (in the pop-culture sense of the word), analytical leanings toward broadly-arching patterns. The second seems to be from one's heritage. It is very difficult for one to differ from the way one was brought up. Children tend to reflect their parents, and so if they are of political leaders, then they are prone to have qualities that predispose them also towards political leadership in the future.

I've thought a lot about mindsets in the past, so it is little news to me about what my mindsets are. Considering heritage, I decided to come back to what could be seen as strengths for future pursuits.

Ancestral Traits / Dynamics:

• Dynamic: Reason and Emotion
  
  • Strong in depth of reason
  • Weak in depth of emotion
• Strong System Awareness
  
  • Strong general understanding of groups of at least ~100 people\
  • Strong analytical ability of organizational matters / issues
• Political Intelligence
  
  • Ability to represent groups of at least ~100 people
  • Ability to track political dynamics of small groups
• Dynamic: Above the People (impersonal) and With the People (personal)
  
  • Strong in being above the people
  • Moderate in being with the people
    
    

After considering these, I came to realize that what inhibits me from being able to lead greater numbers of people, is likely the desire to maintain the dynamic of being above the people I am leading, while with them at the same time. Human brain capacity can only hold so much. Time is also not eternal. Increasing the number of people one is personal with will only lead to noticing generalities, and time will limit the number of people one can get to know on a personal level. This will all be very important in understanding potentials for future pursuits.

More on the 60's and Gen-X

Television shows can sometimes be a good source of introductory information into a new topic. Usually there isn't much depth to them, and as such, they qualify as mostly entertainment. Looking online for recent shows, I came across Swingtown, which is still a television show in its simplicity, and yet seems a good source of introductory information about why the events of the 60's and 70's took place, and what impact they had on Generation X.

The show also has full episodes online, which are helpful just to get a feel for the content, which surprisingly, isn't all that scandalous:

http://www.cbs.com/primetime/swingtown/

Historical Identity and Generation's X's Creation of a Politically Correct Culture

Often, when thinking about the topic of identity and how it is formed, I choose to focus on historical factors that have led a person to being a certain which way. This partly tends to look at pre-existing influences, or factors that follow fate, and decisions chosen early, or factors that follow choice, both of which seem to lead to hardened, determined characteristics of identity later in life. Looking at the method of analysis, two methods lean towards a fatalistic perspective (early pre-existing influences and determined character by early influences in general), and one method leans toward a free will perspective (choices made earlier in life). So the lean of this analysis is likely to be more fatalistic than free will, simply because the basis of analysis is laid out as such.

Now that the method of analysis is understood, the topic can be broached, which involves largely, the origins of PC, or Politically Correct, culture that became popular in the 90's, the reasons the generation titled Gen-X gained such an identity, why Gen-X brought great influence to create PC culture, and what one can learn more broadly about identity based on developmental history and choice through Gen-X's pre-existing influences and their choices early on, respectively. In order to understand these topics, my impressions from three signifying periods in Gen-X's history will be laid out.

According to what seems as sociological opinion, Gen-X went through its young-adult stage from around 1980 to the early 90's. Young-adult would be in my book, from age 15 to around 20. It seems to me that popular culture often reflects this age group across recent generations simply because this age group is struggling to understand the world and define their identity, and as such, it is typically one of the most creative periods in a generation's life-span. Hence, popular culture is affected greatly by these strongly sought-after goals. Back to the point. Observing the culture of the 80's and early 90's, one can observe that this is a definitive cultural period compared to that which came before and that which came after. Therefore, it can be looked to as a time in which Gen-X was struggling to understand the world and define its identity.

Now that the period can be defined as unique and therefore attributed to Gen-X, I will briefly comment on what made up that period. The culture of the 80's and early 90's can be agreed upon by most as a very non-conservative, almost chaotic in historical terms, expression of life. The culture seemed to be in rebellion to most of the culture of history through the artistic and philosophical expressions of the time. Artistically, many venues seemed to focus thematically on randomness and chaos. In music, one can see the emergence of high experimentation and a focus on what would be considered the darker side of culture in thematics of death and fatalistic thinking: death metal, grunge, and other emergent musical styles that commonly hold the noted cultural traits. Philosophically, existential and anti-foundational nihilism seemed to be prevalent as can be seen through the artistic expressions of the day. It is important to note that existentialistic nihilism was popular before the 80's and early 90's, but that anti-foundationalism seemed to be emerging during this time.

The next signifying period in history for Gen-X, is their development during childhood years. If the young-adult period is slated from the 1980 to the early 90's, then the childhood developmental period would range from 1965 to around the late 1970's. Cultural observations will note that this time period in history can also be defined because it was rather unique in recent history. The consensus to this is that this period enveloped the social revolutions caused by the counterculture movements popular at the time. Part of the movements that are recognized historically are the anti-war movement, the sexual revolution, and the resurgence of feminism. The relevance of these movements were that they involved what are considered those that brought up Gen-X in their childhood developmental years; their parents. Since parents impress themselves into their children during childhood development, this period is analyzed because it aligns with the idea that historical pre-existing influences are part of determining later identity.

The last signifying period in history for Gen-X, is their first entrance into their adulthood period, which occurs in the time period generally of the 90's. This seems significant as a period of time because it can be uniquely described as the period where PC culture emerged. Now, PC culture wasn't pop culture, as that which in the 80's Gen-X formed, but rather was the accepted culture by the greater populace. This is a significant period for it shows the emergence of a new culture formation that was broadly accepted. It is significant to Gen-X because, again, it was the time where the generation had entered adulthood.

Now that the three signifying periods have been laid out, the arguments pertaining to the topics can be made. The topics again, are as follows: the origins of PC, or Politically Correct, culture that became popular in the 90's, the reasons the generation titled Gen-X gained such an identity, why Gen-X brought great influence to create PC culture, and what one can learn more broadly about identity based on developmental history and choice through Gen-X's pre-existing influences and their choices early on, respectively.

It seems that the origins of the broadly accepted PC culture is in large result of Gen-X's assertions to culture as they had just entered into the adult world in the 90's. The time period's culture that was accepted broadly is recognizable as asserting the need to have a strong separation between personal and work life. Often this can be seen in how companies seemed adamant about "work / life balance." This philosophy carried itself into not just business, but nearly all public events such as extra-familial interactions, where to use politically correct language that was accepted as neutral was seen as good, whereas language associated with one's personal opinion should only be shared in closer / personal circles. The acceptance of this culture resulted due to what Gen-X asserted once it had entered the adult world (This necessarily includes the belief that adults that enter the adult world often affect the greater culture compared to the smaller pop culture which they affected in their young-adult stage). The reasons Gen-X held to such a broadly-accepted belief / culture / identity will be explained after first looking at Gen-X's internal identity and why their were labeled as such.

Gen-X gained its identity largely through historical influences of pre-existing nature as well as through early made choices. The pre-existing influences can be ascribed to that of their childhood developmental period, which, as stated, occurred in the period between 1965 and the late 70's. The early made choices also occurred in this time period and its young adult period, bringing about the resulting expressions of identity in its young adult period and first experience in the adult world. The pre-existing influences of Gen-X's childhood developmental period can be ascribed to their parental influences. As noted, the period of Gen-X's childhood developed occurred during a time where the adult world was undergoing many social revolutions. These produced a measure of inconsistency in the lives of the Gen-X's parents as they struggled for and against the forces of the various movements. Many of these movements had strong reaches into the family unit, as they challenged definitions of one's commitment to married partners in sexual life through the sexual revolution, challenged definitions of a household's authority by gender through the resurgence of feminism, and challenged allegiances to society through the anti-war movement. This created much inconsistency and lack of strong identity itself in the parents of Gen-Xers. Since children tend to follow that which is consistent around them and therefore a source of solidarity, the developing Gen-Xers were affected by pre-existing influences such that they could not use the lives of their own parents as a guide for growth. Through this, they had no choice but to embrace that which was consistent. The result of this caused Gen-X identity to be determined in many ways: it caused them to gain a more individualized identity, to attempt to enter adulthood faster than previous generations, and to embrace the chaos of childhood as an emotional grounding to identity. Aside from pre-existing influences, the choices in the developmental childhood period were likely similar and therefore mixed with the determined actions that were in fatalistically in response to parental influence.

Coming to the young-adult period of Gen-X's life, identity was affected by choice and pre-existing influences that came from their childhood developmental period. The young-adult period in recent history involves a sense of determined seeking of understanding the world and of understanding one's identity. Since this is a struggle with one's history, it is also an emotional struggle. As such, the expressions of identity in this struggle to understand it, have strong links back to the childhood developmental period, which had largely chaotic parental figures and required Gen-X to quickly mature. As noted, the 80's and early 90's for Gen-X had strong cultural thematics of chaos, death, and an overly high rejection of parental culture compared to previous generations. Because of this rejection, as the generation moved into the adult world, they sought broad cultural changes that then brought about the emergence of PC culture.

The next topic, that of which why Gen-X created the PC culture, and what the aspects of PC culture represents as it is an expression of Gen-X's identity, will be shown. Gen-X's reasons to create PC culture centers on two intentions: to protect the definition of family that existed before their generation, and to allow themselves to have a more free environment in which to reclaim their lost childhood. In order to protect the definition of family from becoming like that which Gen-X experienced, Gen-X sought to put explicit norms in place such that public life would not influence private life. In their experience, the public life coming into the private life had brought about the chaos and destruction of normality in the family unit. In order to protect, against further incursions and because the previous generation had stepped out of bounds, public life had to be redefined and neutralized. In order to allow Gen-X to reclaim their lost childhood, the construction of the barrier between private and public life allowed for more individually-determined private lifestyles. The idea was that one could act according to private aspirations in one's private life and have little to no influence upon public aspirations in one's public life. Thus, the reclamation of Gen-X's childhood could safely begin. It is important to note for future thought that this created an impression of a dualistic nature to other non-Gen-Xer's, but which will not be addressed here.

The next topic, then, is what one can learn more broadly about identity based on developmental history and choice through Gen-X's pre-existing influences and their choices early on, respectively. Note that this is in retrospect to the topics that have already been discussed, that of, the origins of PC culture in the 90's, the identity of Gen-X and the reasons they gained such an identity, and why Gen-X created PC culture. It would then seem that taken more broadly, identity is affected greatly by one's pre-existing influences, at least in one's childhood developmental period, which may or may not determine choices made there and in the future. Regardless of choice, again, it seems that the presence of and action by parents in this period determine an arguably great portion of one's identity. The history of Gen-X's development also seems to have implications about the nature of human psychology and that children will attach to that which is consistent versus that which is not, even if it means attaching to a theme of inconsistency (a theme in life created by consistent chaos). I won't consider the logical implications of consistency created out of chaos, or the value judgments made for those that accept this consistent chaos as a good thing, for those can be addressed later.

And so, the origins of Politically Correct culture seems to be in Gen-X's response to culture after having entered adulthood. Generation X's identity seems to have come about based largely on their upbringing which occurred in a period in history in which their parents were unable to hold back public issues into private life, and hence this caused mass rejection of their parent's culture later in life. This is what brought about the aspects of PC culture, so that the family unit would be protected in its privacy from being influenced by what public issues ensued. And finally, this creation of PC culture by Gen-X for the specified reasons give insight into the nature identity from a historical perspective towards pre-existing influences and choice; fate and free will.

Difficulties in Objectivity

So, the other night, I had a hankering for looking further into a series of related topics that I tend to find interesting: globalization, and whether the United States' use of labor from other countries could be modern-day slavery (globalization of labor). This topic seems of paramount importance, simply because the majority of items that the majority of the citizens from the U.S. buy, are from other countries. The scale on which this is done today is likely greater than in any other time in history due to the United States having cheap enough technology and oil to ship imports at low cost. This novelty in history is important, for it bodes the potential to reshape the paradigm of international economics as the United States moves from being an industrial nation, to one that relies on other nations to provide services (a service-based economy). This does not mean that what is occurring is bad, but as in all things novel, care should be taken to watch out for misuse, and potential problems.

However good my intentions were, they did not prevail in bringing a comfortable new level of understanding to the topics. This inability to produce a new level of understanding is very important; for I came to realize two things. The first is of the need at times, to re-adjust one's source of authority; one's source of discernment about the happenings in the world. The second is of modernistic alienation.

When researching online, I generally am able to make new ground in topics because I believe I know how to discern good material from bad material (that which has a good foundation in the pursuit of objectivity; a method I attempt to employ often). This method of research often involves taking what someone is arguing, and to detach the person from the argument they are making, which then results in having an idea that can be taken and applied to more situations other than that which it was originally presented in; the person's original statements of argument. If someone has not presented their material in a objective, academic style, then I am not likely to even consider their idea.

That's enough of my method of research. What I learned from my experience in looking into globalization, is that I lacked greater understanding of globalization to such a degree that I couldn't read through content online and find myself able to understand the depths of what the people were saying. Based on my experience, it takes a very long time to develop an understanding if a layman attempts to read high-level material. One can realize this in practice: take a topic one is not an expert in, say politics. Even in reading a common newspaper article, if one does not have a decent basis of understanding, one will not be able to conclude the importance of why something is written. For example, if I don't understand the history of two countries, then news of them beginning a new trade agreement will not seem important to me because I lack the knowledge to know why it is important. These deeper threads can only be discerned the more one is aware of a topic.

And so, my traditional pursuit of facts can not proceed; I can't thresh out what I want because I don't have a basis to work from to gain the facts that I want. Perhaps that seems impatient, and perhaps it is, but what this has caused, is to realize that in order to, by my practical measures, to come to knowledge, I must change my source authority in my research. I can't seek to go through further mountains of information; it is arguably much more worth it to find a faster way. The change in authority that I found myself moving towards, was that of an existing expert that was willing to provide ample information so that a layman can come to understand the topic well.

Of course, any objective-style-loving person will observe that such a turn to another source of authority allows one to be impregnated with volatile opinion. This is true in many ways; one cannot easily separate the wheat from the weeds until one can see the weeds for what they are. However, such is the necessity of human life. What one can do is two things: observe how much the author submits to writing in an objective style, and then through that assume that what minor opinion exists, will not become too great a future inhibition to seeing the truth behind the opinion. Second, trust standards of authority; there really is no choice here if knowledge is to be gained in a timely manner. I have found myself leaning towards finding an author of a detailed, simplistic, and likely somewhat opinionated work. Essentially, this means a necessity in the greater trust of fellow humans; not something easy for an objectivist pursuit. Yet, I find myself turning this way more and more often. Whether this is is for good, or due to the winds of the culture, it is hard to say.

The second realization that I came to in attempting to research about globalization and labor, was the inherent feeling of an unnaturally high obstacle in trying to understand the nature of the problem. This feeling can be attributed to the concept of modernistic alienation, and it applies here well. The nature of an outsourcing market as the U.S. is having, produces alienation because more and more, the items being constructed are more and more often not coming from local sources, but far away countries. Understanding the validity of this economic system is far more hairy than talking directly to the salesman. One has no easy way to speak to someone who has complete understanding of that which was involved in the trade that resulted in bringing something as simple as a plastic doll over from China. The number of hands involved in its construction and the number of business agreements made to bring such a simple item across the sea is enumerable in appearance, nearly mind-boggling. And so, completely understanding the topic is woefully impossible in today's age of the U.S. being a consumer of global sources.

This causes great inhibition to even beginning to look into the topic; no doubt it stops dead multitudes more simply by its appearance. This causes me to bring to question a few ways to resolve this issue of alienation: begin relying upon something one hasn't before (assume something / rely upon something new as a truth) so that understanding can be grasped, spend much greater time learning the intricacies of the process so that complete understanding might be gained, conclude that the system is bad by its very nature. These three responses likely don't encompass everything, but they seem the most realistic to me.

Interestingly, but perhaps as a side-note for future topics, is that in college, many people seemed to claim apathy towards politics for how woefully complex and alienating the system was. Whether this really means that the system is too complex or that these were immature responses to problems that require time and discipline to solve, is another topic, but important to relate, for its relevancy.

Anyways, the complexities of pursuing a topic that is new as well as massively imposing by the nature of its function, is intriguing to me, and provides important insight into the nature of understanding things of novelty and complex nature.

Origins of Genuine Emotion

Last night, my brain was very busy pondering the nature of emotion and what differentiates artificial emotion from real emotion. This thinking has come up before out of my impression from seeing fellow men who fake their emotions and are fine with it. Looking at such an act, I used to be comfortable with it, as it used to be the way that I saw that emotions could be expressed; by forcing what wasn't there and so to somehow create an emotional base out of nothing. But it seems according to my recent thoughts and impressions from seeing so many other people do it, that it doesn't work and that over the long term, it is still not genuine.

To try and communicate the impression I've been receiving, I'll give some examples. Usually when I'm in a crowd of people that are younger than me and who are engaged in something most of them attribute to high emotion, this impression is received. The only situation I've seen much of this occur in has been in faith settings, where fellow believers are trying with all their emotional heart to reach to God. In some congregations, the people seem genuine in their emotions, in many others; particularly Gen-Y groups, the people seem to be trying to force something that doesn't exist. In those settings, the impression is strongest.

Anyways, not to dwell on impressions that much; there's plenty of rational arguments as to nature of the problem I've described other than my personal experiential impression (but that is important). One idea that I'm becoming more convinced in, is the idea that emotions attributed to certain actions / places / people are created after having long-term experience with those actions / places / people. If this is true, then genuine emotions cannot come from experiences that are temporal. This of course seems incorrect because dramatic experiences clearly emotionally imprint everyone, but to me that seems because dramatic experiences are typically dwelt upon. Another supporting reason to this concept of emotion is that for the most part, emotions have their biological origins in being little more than strong neural pathways in the brain. Positive and negative emotions come from either going with or going against these hardened paths to some degrees. Other expressions that have mixed emotions could be a combination of going both with and against (or having some other kind of way of associating good and bad value to the emotions; I'm not sure, I'm not a cognitive scientist).

And so, the less experience one has with certain actions / places / people, but with a variety of actions / places / people, the less that person is likely to have genuine emotions. The more that one focuses one's time, thoughts, and energy into these actions / places / people, the more one will gain emotional attribution to them, and hence emotion will come forth while putting further time, thoughts, and energy into these actions / places / people (now, I've only defined emotions that are experiential; its quite possible there are other forms, but they are the ones I've been able to identify most easily).

So, in order to facilitate the creation of emotions, one must not look to take action in "being emotional;" that is, to say to oneself: "It is time to act in the emotion of happiness, so as to practice it, so that it will be genuine some day." To believe that emotions can be done, just like tasks can accomplished, is a misunderstanding of the very nature of emotions. To be emotional, one must put time, experience, and energy into what one desires to grow emotional in; and then emotions will grow from that. Again, emotions cannot be the focus of one's actions, otherwise they will not truly grow (if anything, the artificial concept of what one thinks emotions are will grow, but not truly the emotions themselves).

So, in order to promote the creation of emotion, one must give experience, time, and energy to certain pursuits over other. Neither a jack of all trades, nor a task-centric perspective will bring about the change desired.

Cheapened Notions of Relationship

Modern technology and its use in society often fascinates me. Its use, like other technologies of the past that have gained acceptance, has transformed our culture in ways we couldn't easily predict. I also think a lot about relationships and group dynamics; those also fascinate me.

One issue of the current generation that often strikes me but I forget to write down, is the lack of personal accountability. Now, the fact that its personal, likely makes it an issue that has existed for a while now, since the United States has a strong leaning toward individualism. So perhaps it is more the reshaping, or new image, that this issue has taken in the current generation, but somehow I think it has worsened, and mostly because of the misuse of modern technology.

It seems to me that upon entering the adult world, the value of engaging in relational activity that involves detailed personal information exchange, belief sharing, and other facets that we'd like to believe help each other become better people, has been cheapened through our society's misuse of technology. I believe that I can say just about anything to anybody in our current age, and the action in response will not be a challenge, but an avoidance of direct conflict. Now, this ties strongly into the well-known fact that people-pleasing and conflict-avoidance behavior has been an accepted aspect of interpersonal relationships for a while now (starting sometime in the 90s I think). I believe that fact is tied in to some degree to the misuse of technology, but today's issue seems more than mutually accepted Politically Correctness; it seems to occur even among anti-Politically Correct crowds.

The essential nature of the issue that involves this misuse of technology, centers on the convenience that technology affords us. Now, technology by its own nature, causes mankind to separate; to distance himself from his fellow man. The written word has done it, electricity has done it, even clothing has done it if you take this idea to extremes. In another way of saying it, technology causes man to become less dependent upon man, but more upon the technology. I'm not arguing the goods or evils of such a fact, I only seek to lay that bare for primary issue: that aspects that made relationships worthwhile have been cheapened through use of technology by the current generation.

Going back to the point, technology gives us great opportunities for conveniences. One convenience that is related to its nature, is that of the distancing affect it has between humans. The primary issue then is that humans in avoiding personal accountability from each other, have misused technology to keep themselves isolated and safe with none of the accountability woes. What this means, is that the current generation is so used to the distancing aspect and use of this aspect in technology, that it almost unconsciously uses it in these cases in order to avoid uncomfortable situations. It has become so automatic that indeed, I can say anything to anyone and experience no consequences, for they as well as I follow the credo that we can both distance ourselves from one another before these very real words can do anything significant.

Now, this is a very important trait of our society to recognize, for it allows one to interpret what I think is an age-old idea only given a new image. However, I'd like to extend this principle to see where then people consider to be off-limits, or highly protected: that which is never talked about or rarely because of its results being so fast that it could warrant actual danger. If anything, according to what has just been discussed, the source that causes such non-accountability would be such an idea. Technology, physical existence, and mobility, if take deeply in the right vein, can produce startling results in thought. These factors don't directly confront about the avoidance of accountability (those are respectable pursuits too, but a different topic), but they are important for they not only may cause change, but more importantly, genuine thought about what is currently fundamental forces in many people's lives they don't even realize.

Another approach, like mentioned, would be to directly confront people with how they lack and run away from being personally accountable to others. However, while both parties would likely come to accept this as an issue with themselves, they would have no intuition on how to put an end to it, which is more found in the unseen, unconsciously-aware actions they take in misusing technology to do that very thing.

Cross-Country Gen-Xers

Something I was thinking about recently, that occasionally pops into my mind, is why it is that Gen-Xers seem similar, even across country lines. Maybe this is too hasty, but the examples I have seen, show that there are common traits between American Gen-Xers and people from the same age group that live in either England or Australia. It may be simpler than I thought, since the three countries share a lot of culture, but also because during the 80's (part of the developmental time of Gen-Xers), a sense of world-wide culture was beginning to take off with the advent of more technology being integrated into people's lives.

That is not to say that the Internet was widely used then, it certainly was not, since it didn't really exist for civilian use, but they didn't call Gen-X the MTV generation without a reason.

Between God and Truth

I cannot think of as much to write in this post as the last one. Fear not, this isn't because I'm getting used to the blog; it's because for the past week, I've been with my family here, which has a way of unsettling one's discipline and focus of mind. So now, I return to write again with regularity.

A prominent thought on my mind of late, has been of purpose. That sounds general, so to narrow it down, it could be said that I've been thinking about what God has for me here. His direct purpose for me is something I strongly desire. However, this is not pursued easily because right now it is competing with a desire to know God personally. These two conflict because purpose is typically associated with knowing a truth or fact; something one can take and run with without looking back. Relationship is associated with not being independent of God in any circumstance. This example of relationship seems a bit in the wrong however, as it seems that God wants some level of independence. Yet, in something so important as one's purpose, I would imagine that being independent of God in that would be wrong. And so the issue remains: I desire purpose, but my definition of purpose is a truth that allows oneself act towards that truth without ties to the original source of that truth.

Existentialistic thought is very prominent throughout popular Western culture, and I am no exception. This is not to say that all of the individualistic traits of existentialism are wrong, but they do create this point of tension; especially in light of how I have lived and thought according to mindsets that support a view of existence that allows and even holds up (indirectly) a separation between God and man. This indirect allowance and holding up is perhaps what keeps parts of the church so tied to the issues that stem from this perspective.

Mostly, the indirect force seems to come from the belief that God is Truth, that man has been separated from God, and that this Truth should be pursued above all else. The issue with this is that Truth is almost always associated with Concept / Idea and not Being. Concept and Ideas are objects that exist in the Western mindset as something within the mind of an individual and therefore isolated. Therefore, it's not easy to stretch that internal construct to another being via a relationship. Furthermore, ideas according to this mindset are often ruled by logic and reason, which according to Western thought are also void of external connections.

And so, I wage war between these concepts; to find God hopefully along the way.

This Place...Like Any Place

As I've been down in San Antonio, I have been thinking over the experience of transitioning from the Midwest to the Southwest. Cultural homogeneity has been on my mind for a good portion of the time as I've noticed that there hasn't been much of any culture shock. I expected there to be at least some, and the absence of it has me wondering whether that has been a good thing.

Cynically, I can argue that the similarity in culture is due to the eroding of culture being defined geographically with the advent of a nationalized American culture due partly to the influence of this age's technology. There is likely some truth in this, but lately I've been wary of analyzing too strongly on the basis of technology; something some would argue I could be very biased in, since I have more experience with technology than most.

On the other hand, I can see a lack of sensitivity due to what has been lately, emotional inertness. I wouldn't admit this to anyone I don't know, since being in touch with emotions is all the rage right now. Still, the concept of being detached emotionally from one's surroundings seems highly plausible to me right now. With that, I believe it has been creating inner stress as I know most of my day I cannot use emotions too freely lest I start to lose productivity at work. And I do love my work, but I also love culture and being sensitive one's environs, so this creates some inner arguments.

Regardless, the concept of one place being like any place intrigues me because of its broader linkages. Most of these deal with the strong philosophical undercurrents in our culture of existentialism: individualism, love of free will, isolation. If you want creative exposure to the topic:

- Book: The Sheltering Sky
- Visual: Cowboy Bebop

Research Night - Energy Use Online and Offline

I originally started looking around tonight with the objective of weighing the ecological costs between electronic and (old fashioned) paper means of creating and keeping personal data. It seemed likely that there were environmental benefits for news and media companies who send paper to thousands, but it seemed more nebulous to discern whether personal activities that have involved paper would yield such benefits. Unfortunately, that will have to wait for another time. What I did find was interesting anyways, and it actually begins to solve half of the original issue.

As I started, the first piece of interest I came over was an article from MIT Technology Review. Mostly, it informs about how all the computer servers in the entire United States us up as much power as the state of Mississippi. Interesting, but not the right information to get into whether there are ecological benefits to using or not using such electronic data stores. Not knowing the amount of paper such servers have eliminated (and thus energy to produce such paper) compared to the cost of running them leaves us without a conclusion to current benefits.

Looking further, I came upon an article focused more on what I was thinking. A blog from the Los Angeles Times compares the energy use of new E-Book readers (iRex Iliad, Amazon Kindle) to that of traditional paper. Although more of a post about how an in-depth scientific analysis should be done, it is a good introduction in the dynamics at play, specifically by promoting that in order to understand the trail modern consumables leave, one must analyze its life cycle.

This didn't really satisfy my original goal, but it did lead me to thinking about half the problem; that of reading paper sources versus electronic. It wasn't hard then to find a detailed life cycle analysis of the said E-book devices and compare them to paper. Not that I ever have read articles from the ACS (American Chemical Society), but they did have what I was looking for. You can read it for yourself. If you're an avid book or newspaper reader, the analysis seems to say that switching over can be a good choice. Although this could apply to me, it doesn't yet. However, I do find myself reading articles online, which the analysis also addressed:

Reading online on a desktop computer for 10 minutes produces the same load on the environment as reading an e-book for half an hour, and reading online for 30 minutes has the same overall effect as reading a print newspaper.

I know I spend at least a couple of hours per day on my computer for personal use, and I know I don't browse through a newspaper's worth of information. For me, this is compelling enough to look into perhaps buying one.

After going over that, I kept searching online; now a bit more interested in how much of a footprint that digital journal sites use in comparison to paper. This is partly back to the main intention of the research, but also not; because online journals such a Blogger and Facebook are mass-distribution outlets, not designed for personal use only. Still, I did find an interesting article that shows a pretty theoretical comaparing of how much energy avatars in Second Life use compared to the average Human Brazilian. If anything, it seems like a good stimulus on the topic of the benefits and cost of the developed world's digital lifestyle. And, if you want something that's a little fun, you can check out this (apparently) cult-classic / historical blog posting about a cheeseburger's footprint.

Music and Mark Morgan

It's kind of bad to become attached to an eclectic artist's style, because one can tend to have a hard time finding other music that fits quite the same way. For me if anything, music is largely meaningless unless it is tied to greater experiences that then cast that music as having more layers than simply the music itself. An artist that I've enjoyed for a while now has been Mark Morgan, and he's been pretty elusive outside of a few productions that I listen to semi-regularly.

Historically, Morgan has worked mostly on computer game soundtracks, but I could really care less. His works that I've been exposed to have been significant because of their nature in the aspect of setting; the way they create an environment out of sound. Now, I know I just told you that I enjoy music not for music itself, but for how they tie to greater experiences. Perhaps indirectly one could argue that this tie-in is through the computer game aspect in which I originally heard them. That could be, but I see his music as creating a multitude of layers because it does more than direct mood or attitude, it places you somewhere, and somehow place ends up being more significant for me than other aspects. I suppose in the end, it is the aspect of place; the permanence of it rather than that of a temporal emotion, that makes the music significant.

But, back to the point. So, I was looking into trying to find more about Morgan online, and apparently he had an interview with a Russian gaming website. While there, he spoke about his background and such, but perhaps more importantly is that he now has an official website in the works and might even be publishing a CD some time soon:

The Interview
http://www.markmorganmusic.com

Hopefully, this will yield creative fruit and less hermitism...

Rhythms in Time

Having a job, an apartment, and living in a new area of the country has had interesting effects on the amount of free time I have. It's funny, I always heard that you find yourself with an incredible amount of time to spend after you graduate college and get a job someplace, in comparison to college of course. If anything, this hasn't been the case as I find myself busy with cooking, working on finances, and other required tasks here in San Antonio.

And so, given a little time to work on my interests, for now I've spent that primarily between three activities: reading (fiction and self-help), analyzing a television show, and slowly playing through a computer game. For the time being, they've been good expenditures of time given my circumstances. I'd like to move back into writing soon if I can, but we'll see how things open up as the novelty of what is required by this life settles down.

In any case, I know that in college I had much more time to do these things. Of course, given that, life has centered more on the job and what goes on there. So far, that's fine because I've been really enjoying what I've been doing, but some days, I begin itching just to have a long stretch to sit down to read and think.