The Anti-Narrative
Sexism, racism, homophobia, culturism. All of these -isms take part in the grand narrative of oppressed peoples, tied together and advanced against conservative elements of society, usually without any understanding of the elements they criticize. That is, to say, this grand narrative is essentially an anti-narrative, possessing no positive element, and ironically performing the same function Schenker accuses Wagner of musically — playing on the expectations of persons influenced by prior traditional concepts to destroy those concepts.
This is not to say that in any of these cases (women, Jews and other non-European races, homosexuals) there are not legitimate grievances against the power structures that preceded and oppressed them. It is to say that the narrative that has accompanied their attainment of greater political power has not provided any significant formative or positive aspects to replace the structures which preceded their ascent.
However, conservative values and power structures having totally eroded (America possesses the last ebb, but it is a weak and pitiful ebb), the world seems set for completely anarchy, or rather, the rule of the machine and purely quantitative apparatus which is the last bastion of competence.
What is ‘racism’ according to this anti-narrative? By definition, it is simply anything that denies the oppressed race’s journey to liberation. What is ‘liberation’ ? It is simply an increase in power relative to whomever previously possessed it. According to the narrative, a decrease of power and other social goods is acceptable so long as the oppressor ends up the relative loser. See for example, the state of Zimbabwe. Consequently, the purveyors of this anti-narrative do not care so much about the people (who have suffered far worse under Mugabe than Ian Smith) but about the emotive high felt by participation in the mass movements which accompany the spread of the anti-narrative, not dissimilar to frequent African genocides.
Consequently, it is common to accuse anyone who opposes third world dicators, even Obama, as racists, simply on the basis of the anti-narrative’s endorsement of oppressed third world peoples and sympathizer. Is this simply a yielding to the definition of the anti-narrative? Certainly, but the fact remains that for this word, as with ‘sexism,’ anti-semitism,’ ‘Islamophobia,’ there simply are no other definitions. The result is when one uses provided words or is forced to make the denial, ‘I am not a racist,’ one essentially yields all non-quantitative discourse to the violence of purveyors of this mode of discourse. One has, ipso facto, become a slave.
Why does one instinctively react with the phrase, ‘I am not a racist’ ? The reason is essentially fear. The grand narrative of oppressed peoples has achieved such cachet that not to immediately voice assent is to risk violence upon your person. Usually threat of social ostracization is sufficient. Human beings, especially when deprived of close knit communities of persons with similar cultural presuppositions (as is especially the case with the current phase of global capitalism), are unable to voice an opinion which counters such a narrative and will immediately fall back into the societal line. At a higher level, various interest groups exist in America which attempt to destroy the careers of persons who threaten this narrative.
American religion possesses two layers. The first layer is America’s civil-religion, with its own telos and pattern of ritual and law which govern the state. Accompanying priests and teachers of the law perform essentially the same function as earlier state-religions. In Catholic Spain shared holidays focus on the liturgical calendar. In the American civil-religion shared holidays are those of the civil-religion, celebrating wars and saluting past heroes for their function with the civil-religion. What is the function of a theologian in a Catholic state? Generally to determine what is and is not permitted within the context of the received tradition. What is the function of a lawyer in the American state? To discuss the permissible within the context of the more recent traditions of the American state. In the Protestant-derived tradition the code of law takes primacy. Sola Scriptura.
The second layer are the various actively religious sects which complement America’s civil-religion. Christian sects catering to the upper classes have always been well integrated into the civil-religion and have tacitly endorsed the norms of the civil-religion even when this runs against the stated traditions of their own sect. The rest participate in what essentially is revivalist religion, the focus of which is the production of an experience of God’s love. In traditional revivalist sects there is also reorientation towards telos called salvation. In American revivalist sects this telos is often subordinated to the telos for individuals in the civil-religion, namely the pursuit of happiness.
The traditional American civil-religion possessed as its starting point various philosophical principles current among Anglo and French philosophies. Because the state was founded by consensus, there was no well-defined telos. To the extent there was definition, it was found in Jefferson’s writings, which never made their way in law. Nonetheless, there remained in many sectors an active devotion to the principle of ‘liberty,’ the subject of a very large statue in the harbor of America’s largest city.
What did ‘liberty’ mean? It meant the greater extension of the American civil-religion by missionary effort. The primary selling point was that individuals insofar as they wished to follow the American telos of pursuing their own happiness they could do so better within the context of the American civil-religion. Native peoples who preferred their own traditions to the American civil-religion were not permitted to maintain them.
The ‘rights’ dialogue from the beginning (see Alasdair Macintyre) was an attempt to separate ethics from the religious tradition and present them as derived by reason alone, never philosophically sound but with other reasons for appeal. During the twentieth century, the predominant stream of effort within the American civil-religion was the greater extension of these rights, predictably resisted by the American South.
Along the way two interesting things happened. First, the influx of self-described oppressed immigrants from Europe led also to the introduction of the anti-narrative, which upon arrival was immediately directed against the oppressive ethics and rule of those of Northern European descent. The second was the increased integration between the lower layer (revivalistic religion) with the American civil-religion. The argument made was that the ethics of the New Testament are not about apolitical worship, but the love of the New Testament requires action. The direction of implied action was of course the ‘rights’ already existing as an implied good within the American civil religion.
Having essentially completed its triumph horizontally, also extending in part into Europe in the aftermath of the world wars, the American civil-religion now attempted to complete its triumph by extending its reach vertically into the lower layer of American revivalistic religion. MLKjr represents this clearly, but the key thinker is Reinhold Niebuhr, who picks up the disorganized fragments of neo-Orthodoxy and reformulates it with respect to participation in the American civil-religion, particularly an endorsement of what one might call ‘welfare capitalism.’ The liberation theologians attempted to discount revivalistic religion; Niebuhr and MLKjr attempted to integrate it with the state-religion.
Because of the pragmatism of the American populace and their detachment from the events and history on the European continent, the propagation of the anti-narrative (initially targeted specifically toward Europeans) had limited success; Marxist liberation theologians retreated to the academy or media institutions and focused on the de-education of the youth by overthrowing oppressive traditional ethical values. The language was that of violence and intimidation, especially relying on extending universally accepted wrongs within the American populace. For instance, any use of power to suppress destructive speech was labeled with Nazi similitude. If the purveyor was ethnically Jewish, certainly also ‘anti-semitism.’ Through such means the purveyors of the anti-narrative were able to extend this cachet to other subjects, including all discussion of race, ethnicity, culture, gender, and sexual practices. Moreover, as typical with this approach, it was to do the opposite of the traditional ethical notion that was especially lauded and seen as admirable.
By the time of Obama’s youth certain sectors of the American academy were so overrun with purveyors of the anti-narrative (anthropology especially, as it had always distinguished itself from ‘missionary’ work) that his mother could say of her fellow countrymen while traveling that they were ‘not my people.’ In other words, the Marxist justification of violence toward the oppressors was being taught to the younger generation at almost all top-tier universities outside of quantitative fields.
Another interesting shift happened after the second World War. This was the increasing feeling of American triumphalism on the basis of the self-destruction of Europe, the American-led rebuilding of Europe and Japan, the creation of a ‘universal’ human-rights platform, and military preeminence enjoyed. Consequently (and despite the obvious derivative nature of America’s founding ideas from Occidental precedents) Americans developed a strident belief in the possibilities of the ‘new,’ complementing and providing ease to the spread of the anti-narrative even during the Cold War period. The historical account taught in American schools shifted to an exaltation of this cult of the ‘new,’ complemented by the anti-narrative wherever possible — by definition destroying the very concept of history.
Another interesting trend was the movement of purveyors of the anti-narrative under the umbrella of religion, which always enjoyed an protected status in the American state. Most recently, adherents to black nationalism realized they could more successfully prosecute their claims within Christianity; many Marxist activists also claimed Christianity and became liberation theologians. Because of a lack of centralized authority in such traditions or American academia generally, there was no way for persons of a tradition orientation to prevent the appropriation of their tradition for political means, especially under the constant threats of violence internal to these various institutions.
The political alliances later formed were a logical extension of the essential triumph of the aforementioned ideas. At the beginning of the twentieth century the American right remained populated by persons claiming the essentially negative definition of ”freedom from,’ instead of the downward extension of the American civil-religion. For instance, the civil-religion enjoyed little power over ‘marriage,’ which was essentially a stamp on the basis of the traditional religious definition. The expansion of ‘rights’ complemented by the anti-narrative led to the gradually successful establishment of a broader definition of marriage in the minds of the younger generation which has yet to be complemented by complete recognition by law (but certainly will within 20 years). Another current example is the faith based programs. Under the Obama institution, faith-based organizations receiving federal funding are to adjust their hiring practices based on the norms of the civil-religion, effectively destroying the particularity of any religious sects seeking still to provide social services as a distinct second layer.
Adherents to traditional religions generally are ignorant of these larger trends, typically working through the political/legal system and attempting create little geographical bubbles in which they can oppose the norms of the civil-religion (for instance the debate over evolution education in Kansas). In general, Catholics are less inclined to accept the American multi-layered solution. In general as immigrants from oppressed peoples, they trend towards wholesale support of the anti-narrative, although there is also a conservative faction which is essentially Constitutionalist and unsurprisingly seeks to maintain a traditionalist approach towards America’s founding documents. One especially interesting segment are the Catholic converts, many of whom support the primacy and extension of the American civil-religion but because of pessimism regarding current trends wish to extend its lifetime by the adoption of conservative Catholic principles, especially within the field of ethics.
In early first century Christian documents, ‘true religion’ is defined with respect to action on the behalf of disadvantaged persons. Although the American civil-religion has similarly always placed emphasis on action with respect to ethics, the source for these ethics has always been problematic. Figures like Lincoln grounded their actions on some combination of moral intuition and biblical sources. Obama claims to do the same, especially clear allegiance to Niebuhr’s project.
The problem with moral intuition or passion as a grounding mechanism is that there is no measurable element and it can easily become tied together with other sources for passion, especially one’s greed or self-interest. To the extent that one expresses admiration for Lincoln (as I have on various occasions), it nonetheless seems that the positive elements he hoped to foster in the American republic have been, in many respects, displaced by the triumphalism and greed of the Northeastern establishment. This pattern has continued to the present day, despite the many positive contributions made in other sectors.
It is frequently claimed that the string of conservative Catholics, bible-believing evangelicals, and Jews who support Israel for religious reasons represent a threat to the extension of the professedly secular American civil-religion, as they support what is essentially a national narrative on the old twentieth century model, which was supposed to be replaced by the ‘new’ combination of the American civil-religion and anti-narrative. This is essentially correct. Despite some who have attempted to articulate a Jewish universalism (Rav Kook) the foundation of the Jewish state in many respects no different from the blood-and-soil nationalism which preceded it, simply a substitution of ethnicities, and has not yet made a full transition to Jeffersonian democracy.
The irony is that many of the more intelligent expositors of support for this state within America do so in opposition to similar governing structures, even those with a religious basis which effectively resisted the Marxist influx. They depend on the anti-narrative in their discussion of destruction of previous models, yet without offering anything genuinely new. The interpretation of capitalism is as the great destroyer, that destroys communities and creates individuals, and then as Schumpeter predicted, leaves them unable to mount any coherent resistance to the triumph of this anti-narrative.
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