Henry Melville
Try to bust a well entrenched myth – the world-wide war on Terror; Australia’s refugee policy; Tasmania’s clear felling of old-growth forests. At a global or local level you are up against powerful people who don’t mess with the likes of you or me. Logic and fact don’t usually persuade or convince; but there is sometimes an “other-powered” organic element at play that causes these myths to suddenly implode.
MYTHS are powerful concepts in any society; they can provide connection and affirmation around a particular place or a common ethic. Myths have also been used to deceive the gullible and the naïve. It’s said that repeating an untruth often enough with conviction, the majority will accept it as a ‘true’ truth. So anyone who tries to bust a well established myth through analysis and logic is, by definition, in the minority and therefore in jeopardy of being socially isolated.
This seems to be the prevailing attitude of our times; a little person who tries to speak their truth to Power is generally ignored. If they persist they are ridiculed and taunted; if they continue to engage there’s a chance they will face outward hostility and anger; and if they are determined enough to be in it for the long haul, their truth or opinion might be respected and listened to. Equally likely they could find themselves dead!
As Julius Sumner Miller used to ask his audience, why is it so, as? It would be a simple truth to reply, ‘because that’s the way it is’. I feel that understanding the working of the human psyche is at the crux of this. When we have been convinced or persuaded or duped into accepting a particular proposition, something happens inside us – we actually ‘own’ the idea or the thought or the creation; it’s ours and we acquire it as territory. We become comfortable with that belief, idea or concept; it suits us. And then some know-all so-and-so comes in and tells us differently!
What does that do to us and our comfortable territorial myth?
The majority of humans would rather have others do their big-picture thinking and analysis for them. Under our so-called democratic system of governance, we give over this community responsibility to public ‘decision makers’ and politicians. The concept is that a few trustworthy, honest, ethical individuals become our collective conscience. We, the populous, are now mere reactive feelers, consumers and workers within the governance structure. Calming and controlling become important homeostatic mechanisms to manage the reactive body corporate. As long as Maslow’s hierarchy of needs are met then governance evolves and revolution never occurs. The Romans knew all about this – Panem et Circensus. Give the masses bread & circus; today, it might be Credit & Entertainment.
When a very important socially accepted myth is found to be a mis-truth then the vast populous is faced with an ethical dilemma. Even if we, individually or collectively realise that they have been seriously deceived by charlatans, the ability to react is strictly controlled by the processes of politics and social order. This is the tipping point situation when the momentum for change is organic and strong and ‘People power’ takes on the powerful people. I’m sure we can all recall some successful people power insurrections and some courageous attempts that have occurred in our own life time.
These actions only work when sufficient courageous individuals speak out and act up and therefore embolden others to follow suit. Politicians and their minders know this empirically and they do everything possible to ensure that the great mass of followers will hesitate in following. The job of the spin propagandists employed by the powerful is to convince the collective ‘us’ – you don’t need to worry about a thing; life is relaxed and comfortable. If they fail in their spin then there could be a popular revolt! This would cause the controlling elites to go into appeasement mode and back down on an unpopular policy, war, tax, systemic corruption, global financial collapse etc.
Try to bust a well entrenched myth – the world-wide war on Terror; Australia’s refugee policy; Tasmania’s clear felling of old-growth forests. At a global or local level you are up against powerful people who don’t mess with the likes of you or me. Logic and fact don’t usually persuade or convince; but there is sometimes an “other-powered” organic element at play that causes these myths to suddenly implode.
We see examples every day where a well organised and executed effort to marshal the power of public opinion seems to get nowhere, and then all of a sudden, the blink is on and the deal is off! The pack of cards comes down as if it never existed and we all move on…just in time for the next timely public myth to be peddled by the charlatans.
Henry Melville
