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Why Progressives are Insatiable – and Unstoppable
Human beings, by nature, are hungry. A basic human need is to feed our hunger, and it shows up in many different ways. Our most fundamental hunger appears in our bodies telling us that we need to nourish ourselves, that we need to be fed. Some people hunger for recognition and even fame. Others are hungry for learning. Still others want to control others, either in their work or through authoritarian means. Many seek material possessions to satisfy their cravings. The question for me, though, is why do people crave the impractical or impossible, when they already have attained so much?
The possible answers have occurred to me, and they are dismal and tragic.
For one, people are not self-reflective enough to look into their hungers. Like a primitive people, they think the source of their perceived deprivation is outside themselves. The basic instinct which is intended to keep them alive and well has taken on enormous proportions, a life of its own. It grows larger, weighing down human beings, and instead of looking inside themselves for what might be missing, they decide to change the world in which they feel trapped.
They will try to satisfy this yearning through the material, if they have the means. New cars, new houses, expensive vacations, notoriety or fame. But the hunger lingers on. If they don’t have the means to acquire “things,” or to indulge in excesses, they may stop to look at the world around them. Unfortunately, they evaluate the world in terms of what it provides for them. And the dearth of opportunities (in their minds) is depressing, or they are not prepared to do the work required to explore them. They perceive others around them with all kinds of things, happy as larks, while they are miserable, and their disaffection grows. Their ability to reflect on the possibilities they could pursue is missing from their worldview. They only see emptiness, loss, loneliness, and experience a poverty of the soul.
So they dream. Dreaming only requires the imagination. It’s easy and always available and comforts them. In their dreams they can create the perfect world. Jobs for everyone. Wealth for everyone. Material riches for everyone. And how will they do it? Why, they can take the wealth from those who already have more than they need; they have plenty and owe it to all of those who don’t have enough to share what they have. There is a justice in that effort. A fairness. An equality. Over time, those who are forced to give up what they have will get accustomed to it. It’s a perfect plan.
They will find others who want a perfect world, easily acquired. They will all link arms in achieving this mission. They will dream together, promote their beliefs and values and recruit others who are as idealistic as they are, who want a perfect world. Some will not recognize that their efforts are selfish and self-serving; instead, they will satisfy their hunger with their illusions of serving humanity. Those who do not have enough will surely be grateful to those who spread the wealth. They will honor those who do this “work.” They will celebrate them. They may even elect them.
* * *
Those of us who realize the countless human casualties that will come out of these efforts are alarmed. How do we change the minds of these craving and craven souls? How do we convince them that they will be destroying the souls of the people they are trying to help? Given the “rewards” these idealists perceive that they will reap, I see little hope of changing their minds.
Thanks to @oldbathos for the inspiration to write this post.
Published in Culture
Their unhappiness is held out as a badge of virtue, which is sufficient to keep them from examining the base metal from which it was forged and the cheap glue that holds the pin to the back. They rage against systemic forces that prevent utopia and hence thwarts their happiness, and fall into a slough of despond when utopia’s heralds are unsuccessful. They exult The People as a potentially grateful mass to be liberated, and hate The People for the false consciousness that prevents them from revolting. They find a cause or movement that subsumes their own insufficiencies, and lets them claim membership in a higher cause as proof their insufficiencies are insignificant.
Daddy or Mommy issues, in other words.
I’m only half-joking. Our relationship to the world is forged in childhood, and one’s attitude towards authority and community is shaped early on at the elemental level – both in what the parents do and what ideas they manifest.
One other point to make about Progressives: in theory they might be right. But then, once they realize they may be right, all thinking stops.
Take the issue of vegetarianism. To people on the Left, and even some people in the Center, like my spouse, not eating meat is a morally superior activity.
However my spouse feels that every person is an individual and should make their own decisions about what to put inside their bodies. He has lived among people who raised beef cattle; as have I.
We both realize that if meat were phased out over some period of time, humankind would continue to flourish. But that period of time would have to be decades.
I am opposed to such a reality, as I like beef and the way it tastes. Also I am not convinced that a person can get all their vitamins and nutrients from kale. Or even a diet rich in kale, soy and nuts.
Bu the activists on the Left are totally convinced that not only is their thinking on this issue morally superior, but it is superior in such a way that no real planning needs to occur. Their main mantra is: stop people from eating animal flesh now! They are long on philosophy and short on implementation.
Should AOC or someone of her ilk be elected, with enough Congress critters to support her, we could see an overnight tax on beef, such as is now happening in Germany.
Cows are expensive animals for farmers to raise. If people no longer can afford to eat beef, there will be an overnight slaughter of dairy and beef herds such as no one can even imagine.
The Lefty crowd would be applauding this. But over the following weeks, when people visit their grocery stores, and come to find out there is no longer anything in the meat freezers, or cheese and dairy coolers, and that not enough nuts and soy has yet been raised to replenish the needed protein supply, what then? Soy and nuts are already too expensive for what they are. Should meat disappear overnight, most people in the lower class will be without a real protein source. And yet Lefties would be proud of how they finally “saved the poor cows.”
Just read an interesting blog article by Fr. Dwight Longnecker that addresses this issue as one of resentment:
https://dwightlongenecker.com/the-dark-beast-of-resentment/
“We might do great things–but they will all have been achieved through Resentment and Hatred–not through charity and grace.
We can spot this sort of Resentment Campaign because once they win a battle they are not appeased. They can never be satisfied just as Gollum and every addict can never be satisfied. If they do win a campaign very often they will sabotage their success because they don’t really want to win. If they were to win their Resentment Loop would be destroyed and their meaning and purpose in life would be destroyed.”
And here I am – selflessly eating the creatures that impinge on their food supply.
No need to thank me.
Fascinating. It certainly seems to apply to our current conditions. Thanks, @ammodotcom.
With this early conditioning, the possibilities of their changing are bleak. It would require an enormous effort and commitment to develop their self-awareness–which is too frightening and difficult. Thanks, @jameslileks.
It would be interesting for someone in child behavioral studies to conduct a 30-40 year test to see if children who are prone to tantrums and who have permissive parents are more likely to grow up to be the angriest types of immediate gratification progressives, who are never happy unless people are doing what they want them to do. Of course, in the current woke climate, to do a life’s study like that and to come out with those results would likely not get you published or drummed out of the various psychological organizations for heresy.
No kidding. It’s like climate change–you are either woke or you might as well be dead. It certainly would be a fascinating study, @jon1979.
I loved your entire comment Carol. I just wanted to comment on that point. I don’t know if it’s morally superior but I do sometimes feel a compunction when I eat meat. Some poor animal had to give up its life for me to enjoy this. But then I eat a juicy hamburger and I think, sorry Bessy, you taste too good to abstain. ;)
I not only thank you; I join with you in your selflessness.
There is a place for all of God’s creatures. Right there between the green beans and the mashed potatoes will do nicely, thanks.