STORYTELLING AND MAKE-BELIEVE

In his wonderful essay, "Home", contained in an anthology of his essays titled, "Owning It All", rancher and author William Kittredge wisely observes that "Storytelling and make-believe, like war and agriculture, are among the arts of self-defense, and all of them are ways of enclosing otherness and claiming ownership."

We are selfish. How could it be otherwise? Even altruists have at least the need to succeed at altruism, as altruism is variously defined. Our scattered desires turn out to be selfishly individual. The "Left" and "Right" are not going to resolve their differences. "Left" and "Right" have become more than political rubrics, they are now metaphors, competing symbol systems. America may be one nation, but it is not one people. We are in the midst of a religious (metaphor-centered) war that is not only shaping the course of life amongst us, but of life at large as well. Some American's want a plutocratic, feudal society. Some want no part of such a project. Some American's interpret select elements of ancient Levantine myths as socially relevant principles in the here and now. Some do not. The problem is, there is nowhere to sail off to, no "New World" where "alternate" social forms might emerge. We are stuck, in other words, on a finite globe, and we are expanding -- Oh, how we are expanding!

Do you think this situation can be "corrected" without violence, already rampant? I hope so, though predominant evidence suggests it cannot.

Rick M

-- Rick Marcus (sea@pacinfo.com), March 15, 2001

Answers

YES WE CAN SAVE OUR LIBERTY WITHOUT VIOLENCE!!!IF...

IF.... If each of us who are aware of what is happening will dedicate time every day for four years to awake citizens to the danger and to scare them into voting to save their lives and their fortunes and their future.

That is it. A few minutes a day. and just an hour every 2 years to go vote so we can get some real people in office and save our Democracy.

-- myself (person@privacy.com), March 15, 2001.