What is it about this era that we seem to be surrounded by such hubris? Whether it’s Julian Assange of WikiLeaks, oblivious to the danger in which he puts the lives of Afghans who trusted us, or Dr. Donald Berwick and his blithe willingness to be the arbiter of everyone’s medical decisions and practices, or the proposal --- coming from the same Congressional clowns who created the mortgage mess -- that it’s the mortgage brokers ought to be finger printed, there’s an entire class of people that is convinced that they are smarter, wiser, and more moral than the rest of us – when in fact precisely the reverse is likely the case.
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Re: Hubris
I think the death humility in modern culture can lead to hubris--but that begs the philosophical question of why humility has died, which is a question I won't pretend to have the wisdom to answer.
Re: Hubris
A hundred years ago, Americans weren't big on "mitigating circumstances." You knew that if you did the crime, and got caught, you were going to do the time. Now everybody, including murderers, thinks their own situation is somehow "special." Other people may've broken the law for bad reasons, "but my motives were good and pure." Great. We'll make sure the chemicals in your execution needle are good and pure.
Re: Hubris
I'm not sure hubris is a new phenomenon. Consider where the word comes from.
Re: Hubris
Our elites have been spoiled to death by their yuppie parents and told that there is nothing they can't do. Is it any wonder that some of them believe it?
Re: Hubris
Agreed. It's not new to the U.S., either. We've plenty of examples of elitist prigs trying to tell everyone else what to do - the Alien & Sedition Acts, Andrew Jackson's attack on anything that smacked of rudimentary finance, T.R.'s progressives, Woodrow Wilson (and Edith, too), the New Deal, JFK's "Best and Brightest," Nixon's constant economic tinkering, Carter's feckless moralism. The difference in the U.S. has been the willingness of citizens to howl in protest and crowbar as many of these people and their notions out of authority as possible. The change that concerns me is not that we are seeing hubris politics, but that one day citizens will not howl in protest. Hopefully, people began to howl last summer - just remember the lady who jumped into Arlen Specter's grill and blasted, "You've awoken a sleeping giant!" Let's hope it doesn't die off.
Re: Hubris
I will take a stab at this. Humility is on the wane because people have become the end all. Liberalism has convinced us that we are all that is. There is no greater power by which to be humbled. Images of space will sometimes have people feel insignificant, but the wonder, complexity and beauty of the immediate world around them does not.
Re: Hubris
"We are the ones we've been waiting for."
Re: Hubris
Y'know, I've always had a good feeling about this little motto, hearing something along the lines of "let's stop waiting for someone else to fix things, and get on with it ourselves." This is a sentiment I endorse.
Unfortunately, in practice the idea twists into "We are the ones they've been waiting for!", a much more dangerous idea. Seeing yourself as the solutions to other people's problems... there's the hubris.
Re: Hubris
- the dozens of Afghan civilians named are in trouble if USA doesn't take responsibility for the leak (and instead just blames WikiLeaks). If USA takes responsibility, then maybe these dozens and their families can be repatriated here. Or at least we could have the CIA slip them some plane tickets to Mexico so they can at least get here as illegals (safer than being legal in Afghanistan). I served, so I have a pretty balanced view here, and feel strongly that we (USA) screwed up a lot more here being immorally negligent than Assange did with his own set of bads.
- medical rationing? Right now the market is the final arbiter. I was at a benefit at the Canal Room last night for someone who lost his leg to cancer. The benefit was to allow him to get a better prosthetic. Which is better, for a Citi officer in a multimillion$ pad in Tribeca to get his third house in Aspen, or for this 20 year old to get the best prosthetic money can buy? And when I ask "better" I mean "more moral".I think Berwick, whom I despise, is asking theseQuestions.
- reallyAbackground checkThatTakesFingerprintsJustLikeWeHaveAllBeenBefore.AgreedFingerprintingIs Creepy
Re: Hubris
Perhaps humility has become less popular in part because of America's increasing self-identification as a democracy, rather than a republic. The democratic aspect is vital, but extreme democracy encourages egotism.
We have crossed from liberty to libertinism. Our freedom from tyranny should be a freedom for nobility. Our rugged individualism should enable us to serve our fellows. We have divorced the concepts of individual liberty and sympathetic responsibility, so we fail to see that freedom elicits charity and good will.
Our focus has shifted from individual liberty to individual power (political power). We seek to act through government, rather than apart from it. And, in doing so, we lose what we sought to gain. Americans are trading neighborhoods for communes; which is to say, we're shifting from being neighbors to being coworkers.
I might be stretching this, but I'm in a rush. Gotta go!
Re: Hubris
I don't think Assange is "oblivious" to the danger his publication poses to Aghanis who collaborated with the US. I believe he fully expects a number of them to be slaughtered, with the result of substantially hampering our efforts.