A Crisis of Belonging
in an age of cultural imperialism
This week has been something of a dull blur. I've been on painkillers since surgery on Thursday, and have been reluctant to write under the influence.
I've been reading too much of the news—by that I mean reading the “news” rehashed and amplified as click-bait. I’ve been bouncing between despair and pollyannaism, but I believe that somewhere between the two extremes, is a place of responsible citizenship.
When I took driver’s ed in high school, I’d never driven in reverse. When the teacher told me to back around the roundabout, I looked over my shoulder, then closed my eyes before stepping on the gas. When I stopped, he said, “You and I both know that was just luck.”
I get the impression that a lot of people are driving with their eyes closed right now. And betting on luck is a dangerous gamble under the circumstances. And I’m not only talking about political allegiances, but the social fabric of communities that could—not that long ago—tolerate differences with more compassion than they do now. Yes, the far right is surfacing again, but it is much more than that. The far left shows no mercy. I’m not in America, so my point of view is not that of an American, nor am I narrowly focused on America. We live in a global world, if not economically, socially—and we participate in cultural imperialism. Via Netflix. Via social media memes.
It is ironic that, in a time of increasing “identities”, we are leaving more and more people estranged from a compassionate community. Belonging (I don’t care what Maslow claims) is the most powerful of the human needs. I believe that the polarization, and splintering of culture has left us with a crisis of belonging—which draws people towards extremes.
I’ve lived in Norway for 30 years, and in that time the country has moved more toward American culture, than I have toward Norwegian culture. My students speak an American slang I don’t understand. My mother-in-law speaks a local dialect that her own grandchildren don’t understand. Language changes. Culture changes. Where are we headed?
I am not championing reactionary nationalism. We need critical thinking. But when the education system here added critical thinking as a pillar to the national curriculum a few years ago, I wondered then: how can one insert critical thinking into a system that rewards “correct” thinking? It feels oxymoronic. I don’t know what the answer is, although I do understand now the appeal of the 1960s-70s peace & love and “drop out” attitude—and it isn’t just the opiates talking.
I’m not a social scientist. I’m not even a practicing academic. I am a poet. And everything I am working on now, seems so small in some ways. And yet, taking a step back, I see how it reflects more than I would have imagined. I think that implies a universal truth.
A wasp is a kaleidoscope of metaphors. Judged. Shunned. Sweet pollinator, servant of Dionysus. The Baroness approached the world with the curiosity of a child. The scraps, the scatological evidence, the discharges of sickness. She was unafraid. She was terrified. Between the wars, between countries, between obsessions. She died before she would have had to take a stand—in her home country of Germany, or her home in Paris. I’m certain it would have come down to where she felt she belonged.
Neutrality is the ultimate privilege. One has to be above need.
This week the founders of Substack published one note praising Musk and Zuckerberg, then another appealing to the left. The statements don’t neutralize one another, and straddling is not congregating.
I hope they will try again, because we all deserve better.
We deserve a gathering.
Are you making art that invites a gathering?
Thank you for taking the time to read/listen. I hope you have a great week!
Warmly,
Ren
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I think neutrality is an illusion. To not take a side is to take a side. I also think binaries are an illusion; all I see are spectrums, continuums. To be in the center of the continuum is not the same as being neutral. And, weirdly, those at the extremes often share more with each other than they do with those in the middle, which suggests that continuums don't exist along flat lines, but lines that curve. Latitudes and longitudes. So many things are not as they seem. I find belonging with those who can see a whole world in a wasp's nest.