The Tribe

Have you ever asked a shy toddler what her name is only to find that, surprised by the interaction, she scurries back to her mother's leg, hiding her face for a moment, then, when she has musters the courage, looks at you from the safety of her mother's protection? There seems to be something within us that instinctively forces us to return to what we know when we feel spooked, in danger. In the uncertainty of the world, that is, when it gets to be too much, we retreat to what is familiar, to be amongst those like us, those who will "have our backs". One of the aspects of the current environment in which we find ourselves is the growing distrust of public institutions. Those large entities, first devised in order to protect us and to enable us to speak with a collective voice, have now been proven to be incapable of shielding us from the dangers of life in 2017. And why should we rely on them if they don't work? In 2005, when GW Bush appointed John R Bolton to the United Nations, effectively installing one of its greatest skeptics, I remember having been gobsmacked. Why would he have assigned someone to work within an institution that he didn't believe in, or may even actively work to further degrade? At the same time, Bush's criticism of the UN, that it was a gargantuan organization, encumbered by its own red tape and procedure, incapable of stopping genocide, war or any number of other calamities was on point. For all of the good the institution had done in the world, not the least of which its promoting of wider human understanding, it had also been a failure in my eyes, albeit the eyes of a wide-eyed and admittedly too-hopeful youth of the 90s. The hippie in me was unwilling to let go of the possibility of a world at peace, both literally and with itself. The UN, NATO, our own governments-federal, state or local, have all failed us by now. They have been unable to protect us from 9/11, from mass shootings, from economic collapse, from income disparity. Can you really blame people for giving up their childish ideals of a world free of hunger and war, retreating to mother's familiar leg, to those who are "our own"? If human consciousness experiences expansion and contraction, I think we can safely say we are in an era of contraction, as our circles become smaller and smaller and come to include only the very small core of people who we see as family. And as people regroup, aligning with those with whom they most identify, we start to isolate ourselves from uncomfortable, pesky, opposing opinions as well. There is enough dissonance in the world; I need not add more to the simmering pot, thinks the individual. The move to digesting only information presented to you from sources with whom you agree is just the beginning, though. As Man regresses to his feudal state, only engaging within his own community, what do you suppose will happen? I mean, that is the great question. The French, after having experienced democracy, actually chose to re-instate the monarchy. The Germans, after having experienced freedoms previously unknown to them in the Weimar Republic, turned on their proverbial Nazi heels to reject said freedom. We have, over the last several decades, profited both culturally and economically from globalism. But now, because of cultural, political, and financial circumstances, we are reverting to a kind of chosen isolation. Unlike the isolation of old, though, we will have, all the while, full access to worldwide information. This will mean that, more and more, we will be able to observe the happenings of people outside of our tribe. Will we view them with more and more disdain, because we can no longer relate, and, because of our separation, we are able to objectify, and, therefore, de-humanize them? Or will we view them as distant cousins, seen with empathy, yet all the while being unable to really relate them? If current norms are any indication, we will see of their plight, donate to their causes, and mourn with them at a comfortable arms length, right where our computers sit. It is impossible to predict where things will be going at this point. Steve Bannon, in his 60 Minutes interview, closed with a very interesting idea: the election in 2020 WILL be about populism. It is just unknown whether it will be a populism from the Left or Right. One thing is for sure, the re-grouping of humanity is underway. I just don't know what will happen when the many different arcs have received all of their prodigal sons and they begin to close the gates.