Yesterday, a TV news channel showed a video of an adoring crowd cheering on Kamala Harris and shaking their heads affirmatively as she said she would make inflation her priority "on day one." Putting aside that Biden-Harris policies caused the inflation she promises to address in some as yet un-articulated manner, I'll note that the same TV channel has shown videos of enthusiastic crowds at a Trump rally as he promised to reduce the same inflationary spiral. I would like you to put aside the two candidates' promises and focus instead on the adoration and enthusiasm. The videos brought to mind a blog I posted on 5/30/2015 titled "Take Me to Your Leader." I repost it here:
An alien sees a planet with water, assumes it houses life, and lands in your backyard. Then the alien, approaching you as you drink your morning coffee on the patio, says in your language, “Take me to your leader.”
Taking a sip of the coffee while it is still hot, you, as a native Earthling, say, “I don’t have one. I am my own leader.”
Would you say that? Really? I hope so, but in what context would you proclaim to be self-led? You are, as you must surely realize, a product of inculcations beyond your ability to recognize or count: Influences from crib to current age both subtle and overt. And in this age of social media and mainstream media influencers, now including AI influencers, can you recognize when you are more follower than leader?
Listen today to the voices of your fellow Earthlings. Many around you proclaim their “individuality.” What do those Earthlings mean when they say they are individuals? What constitutes the individuality they seem to cherish and defend with mental, emotional, and physical tools? Once defined, does that individuality ever succumb to disintegration, to dissolving like sugar in hot coffee? Are there people who are not “individuals”?
What’s that you say? Yes? But you are different, right?
If you recognize the individuality of others “dissolving like sugar in hot coffee” as they adoringly shake their heads at a political rally, can you recognize in yourself that same process that results in your own individuality dissolving in a solution of society?
No? Not even a little dissolution? Be honest here. When you try to pin down the nature of individuality, you run into some difficulty and maybe into some frustration.
Sorry, I didn’t mean to upset you; rather, I was just posing the question asked by a hypothetical alien. To what degree would you insist, “I am my own leader”? Is such self-leadership possible? if so, do you see it in your thinking and behavior?
An alien sees a planet with water, assumes it houses life, and lands in your backyard. Then the alien, approaching you as you drink your morning coffee on the patio, says in your language, “Take me to your leader.”
Taking a sip of the coffee while it is still hot, you, as a native Earthling, say, “I don’t have one. I am my own leader.”
Would you say that? Really? I hope so, but in what context would you proclaim to be self-led? You are, as you must surely realize, a product of inculcations beyond your ability to recognize or count: Influences from crib to current age both subtle and overt. And in this age of social media and mainstream media influencers, now including AI influencers, can you recognize when you are more follower than leader?
Listen today to the voices of your fellow Earthlings. Many around you proclaim their “individuality.” What do those Earthlings mean when they say they are individuals? What constitutes the individuality they seem to cherish and defend with mental, emotional, and physical tools? Once defined, does that individuality ever succumb to disintegration, to dissolving like sugar in hot coffee? Are there people who are not “individuals”?
What’s that you say? Yes? But you are different, right?
If you recognize the individuality of others “dissolving like sugar in hot coffee” as they adoringly shake their heads at a political rally, can you recognize in yourself that same process that results in your own individuality dissolving in a solution of society?
No? Not even a little dissolution? Be honest here. When you try to pin down the nature of individuality, you run into some difficulty and maybe into some frustration.
Sorry, I didn’t mean to upset you; rather, I was just posing the question asked by a hypothetical alien. To what degree would you insist, “I am my own leader”? Is such self-leadership possible? if so, do you see it in your thinking and behavior?
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