The Sheeple And The All-The-Way Fools

Source: Decline of the Empire

On Saturday I attended the main rally of Occupy Pittsburgh in Market Square downtown. Our local newspaper the Pittsburgh Post-Gazette estimated the total crowd (for all protests that day) at about 2000 people, which I thought was a pretty good turnout. Less than a mile from Market Square, in Heinz Field across the Allegheny River, 43,719 people showed up to watch the Pitt-Utah college football game. And there are football games every Saturday throughout the fall. Occupy Pittsburgh was the first significant protest of anything in about four decades. The total population of Allegheny County, which contains Pittsburgh, is 1,223,348 (according to the 2010 census). Clearly there’s something to be explained here.

The answer is not hard to find.

What is Enculturation?

Enculturation is the process whereby an established culture [or society] teaches an individual by repetition its accepted norms and values, so that the individual can become an accepted member of the society and find their suitable role. Most importantly, it establishes a context of boundaries and correctness that dictates what is and is not permissible within that society’s framework.

Enculturation is as natural to humans as breathing. The term socialization refers to the “general process of acquiring culture” and that’s the term I prefer. Socialization is said to be a lifelong process, but I don’t view it that way. I would say that socialization is pretty much over by the time an individual reaches their late teens/early 20s. After that, there is a lifelong process of gradual adaptation to changing conditions in the society a person belongs to. The initial socialization creates what we might call the status quo, business-as-usual, or the consensus reality. If we’re feeling risqué, we could call it The Matrix.

Gradual adaptation preserves one’s immersion in the status quo as life goes on and the society changes. Throughout human history, not much adaptation was required because what little change there was came about very slowly. In modern times, starting in the 19th century and accelerating up to the present day, rapid change has been the norm.

How do we relate this to the United States? At the Occupy Pittsburgh rally, a woman held up a sign that said We The Sheeple (with a cute picture of a sheep on it). And I thought, that’s right, that’s exactly what we might expect. Successfully socialized people, who make up the vast majority of Americans appear to be “sheeple” (meaning mindless conformists) to the tiny minority who don’t accept our totally unacceptable the status quo.

As conditions have deteriorated in the United States over the last 30 years (e.g. economic inequality or lack of opportunity), almost all Americans have “successfully” adapted to those conditions, no matter how bad things have gotten. (It will get worse.) Initially I described this process in my post The Empire And The Boiling Frog. Thus the vast majority of Americans are not protesting; they’re attending the Pitt-Utah game instead.

The protesters claim to represent the 99%, with the 1% being the wealthiest Americans (often bankers or those running hedge funds). I am sympathetic to that characterization. But turning this rhetorical point on its head, in actuality the protesters are the 0.1%, and the well-adapted, well-socialized non-protesters are the 99.9%.

I found a post on the blog The Big Study which speaks to this all-too-human situation. It’s called Consensus “Reality” vs. All-The-Way-Fool. To my great disappointment, the author of that blog, who styles himself The Professor, is into UFOs, Bigfoot, mysterious sea monsters and other “anomalies”. Well, never mind, there’s a greater point to be made here. I’ve edited the text slightly for clarity.

In any of the Problem-solving situations that we face in life, there is the possibility of a “conservative”, a “liberal”, or an “All-The-Way-Fool” type of solution…

If someone wanted to sell Grand Tetons Park for a lumberyard and a new real estate development, I’m a “conservative”—I say stick that idea where the sun doesn’t shine.

If someone says we need to keep business-as-usual and revel in using up the Oil as fast as possible, then I’m a “liberal” [lot more radical than that, actually]. One hopes that all one’s fellow travelers think the same. The first diagram [left, click to enlarge] shows four simplified “situations” that might arise to a thinker.

One can view the Status Quo as alright. Or it’s not, but minor tinkering will do. Or tinkering will not get you where you need to go, and some significant change must be made—in some way, the Status Quo needs to be redone. Or, for All-The-Way-Fool, a major thought and behavior shift has to occur. This applies to “real life” as well as the “mysteries” [like UFOs].

Example: the complexity which is the Energy, Global Climate Change, Restricted resource availability, Destabilization of Countries, War, etc. crises.

Status Quo says: Don’t worry, business-as-usual and market forces will provide the solution. Don’t meddle.

Tinkering says: Yeh, pretty much true, but we need more nuclear plants so we don’t have to build new fossil fuel ones, and we should supplement the gasoline with corn ethanol. We’ll be alright. [These are the conservatives.]

Change says: We’ve got to seriously cap carbon emissions and do some sacrificing of wasteful lifestyles. We need to seriously alter the fuel efficiency of automobiles. We need massive retooling of homes and buildings to conserve heat. And so on. [These are the liberals.]

The Fool says: All those roads lead to hell, sooner or later. The only sustainable world does NOT burn fossil fuels at all. The most important thing to do now is gradually but quickly get rid of the individually owned automobile. Etc, etc. The Fool, even if he’s right, is as unwelcome in polite company as an orangutan in heat.

Anomalies researchers face these same choices…

Of course you can see the point right away. The protesters are in many cases the all-the-way Fools. For all those well socialized Americans—those who can’t live without the status quo, the conservatives (tinkerers), and the liberals (changers)—the protesters might as well be holding up signs saying UFOs Are Real! or I See UFOs, Why Don’t You?—meaning they can clearly see that the richest 1% own all the wealth and make all the important decisions, and why don’t you see it? The all-the-way Fools in the crowd think you might as well tear America down and start over again. The socio-economic and political situations in the United States are beyond the pale, the country is broken. I know I feel that way most of the time.

This is the situation we face in the United States and globally today. However, as things get much, much worse down the road, as I expect they will, the current situation may change.

Read more at Decline of the Empire