Critical Mass (or Not)

Are Mass Movements The Only Game In Town?

“The problem is getting enough people to think like that…” She trailed off, dropping hands on the table.

I know that feeling of resignation, of discouragement, of utter improbability. Everyone does. John Mayer codified it into an Millennial anthem, but it resonates with anyone who’s ever cared.

Now we see everything that’s goin’ wrong with the world and those who lead it / we just feel we don’t have the means to rise above and beat it / so we keep waiting / waiting/ waiting on the world to change.

The conversation last night crackled. We all gathered ‘round the table and talked AI. AI.

Sure, we discussed neural networks, but people are more concerned with what does it mean for the world?

(Nobody knows.)

The question became: what does it mean to be human? Something further bubbled up from that stew, something specific, a existential challenge.

What are we to do in the face of overwhelming systems?

Orwell hypothesized Big Brother unfettered in 1984.

Solzhenitsyn witnesses the real consequences in The Gulag Archipelago.

(I think we’ve forgotten, and would do well to remember.)

Havel says Tell the Truth and live a good life in his communism-wrecking essay The Power of the Powerless.

But still, the systems are so…big.

The Needs & Deeds of The World

Without big systems, we wouldn’t have lights, or be conversing on this topic over the Internet. We’d be dead.

But sometimes they get too big, and crush us. During the height of COVID, the local health department issued another lockdown, and said “we’re not even giving you a phone number to call. We’re too busy. Do as we say, or else we’ll fine the daylights out of you.” (Wording mine, essence theirs.)

That tiny sample, mild by any historical standards, had too much tyranny in it to ignore. I tasted the faintest hint of mud. I think it was from a boot. Then I went and told the old folks my orders.

We ate the mud, and tried to tell ourselves that it contained minerals.

(But it tasted like lead.)

This drifts dangerously close to partisan issues, but let’s take a wide view.

Right vs. Left

I stumbled into an excellent summation of the Right/Left political spectrum, abstracted beyond party issues:

If society is a hierarchy, the Right maintains the order of it. Unchecked, it gets murderously rigid.

Any hierarchy crushes those at the bottom. The Left looks out for those. Unchecked, the nurturing spirit, admirable in limited form, drags everyone into the chaos of caring, and we become infantilized and starve to death–safely.

I’d add a further bit:

The Technocratic Left adore experts and systems, which lets them build incredible things, win WWII, etc. But, if every living organism, club, or organization becomes overly concerned with it’s continuation as the main goal, supersystems emerge, and crush, often in the name of care. “We decide it’s for your own good.”

The Libertarian Right despises systems, and checks their counterproductive proliferation. Unchallenged, the danger is devolving back to harmful levels of individuality, and squandering the opportunities that collaboration affords.

(End state maintenance. Begin potholes. Although that example is laughably untrue, and often the opposite, I use as an illustration, not evidence.)

Note: I’m sure I’ve overlooked at least 17 things, and expect (and hope) for notes from friends and esteemed colleagues poking holes in this. But please do. Let’s refine and figure it out.

Not a New Thing for the Old Thing

My focus for the past five years or so has been the Small to Big: affecting change on an individual level, working up to a wider reach.

My focus in my community organizing days was the opposite: passing top down laws to save the trees.

Both are needed. I have friends and colleagues who do good work in all genres. For me, the small-to-big approach has been the most fertile ground lately, but I applaud anyone and everyone who’s working hard to make the world a better place. (And you can count on my support.)

But are these the only games in town? Cut to last night. As we all talked, I outlined this small-to-big approach, in the style of Havel: tell the truth (or as near as one can figure), aim for a good life, and work outward.

“The problem is getting enough people to think like that…” She trailed off, dropping hands on the table.

Then it hit me: Is all change dependent on critical mass?

Plenty is. Most is.

But the old folks I write about in Cities on a Hill burned so brightly, and so alone, that they continue to illuminate my path forward. (They’re long gone, and never had an audience.)

The most famous man in history was crushed by three tyrannies. He fatally rankled the entrenched religious leaders, was executed by the occupying Romans, and intractable of all, betrayed by the human condition. Then everyone ran and hid. Hardly critical mass.

Something strange happened next.

Christians say he broke Death itself. At the slightest and least, historians agree that Jesus changed the world forever.

Religious examples can be mistaken for unfashionable. But a cursory glance at top level historical ramifications and metaphorical significance shatters the casual dismissal.

We all know his name. If it didn’t have some power, why would we use it as a curse when the ol’ hammer falls on the toe?

The Opposite isn’t the Same

Another revelation of the past half-decade: The opposite of one ideology isn’t another.

The solution to racism against blacks isn’t racism against whites. It’s the refusal to engage in group identity and its tribal actions, a quitting of the game that always ends in misery, and playing a better one.

The next idea is less than a day old is: Maybe the only answer to crushing or flawed systems is not the rise of a “better system”. (This time we’ll get it right.) Maybe “critical mass” of getting enough people to agree isn’t the goal.

It’s certainly not realistic. Perhaps that’s a sign I’ve been looking in the wrong area. A repeated nope of the world might mean something.

I’m still not sure, but maybe there’s more than the Old System vs The New System. Maybe there’s an Outside the System.

To quote the friend of a friend…

What do you think?

–Josh