Organizing for America | ed conley's Blog: The myth of the Western Savior

The myth of the Western Savior

By Ed Conley - Sep 18th, 2008 at 9:58 am EDT

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I think we Democrats fail to realize the power of identity politics and the misplaced hope and need for a savior. Both Reagan and Bush came into our national town on a horse from the West with guns blazing and a Dirty Harry zeal to bring justice to our morally degenerate society that has fallen prey to evil doers, namely the government at home and commies (Reagan) and terrorists (Bush). With the marriage of the Evangelical belief in the coming of a savior in history to save the chosen tribe (namely them) and the politician of power, you have a populace (hopefully a dwindling segment) that waits with their lanterns held high for the first sign of the coming savior. In a world where myth and reality reinforce each other, facts carry little weight because facts get magnetized to fit the mythic story. Saying Palin and Bush are empty suits means nothing because in the Evangelical mind they are already empty illusions of their dream of the coming savior who is going to take human form. They even mocked Obama as being that savior to the deluded liberal masses, not realizing that they we looking at a mirror image of themselves.
The Evangelical mind has confused the Holy Spirit with excitement, and they need a constant tide of incoming wave of excitement to exist. Without excitement they run the risk of falling into the hollowness of their myth. So like a bigger and bigger balloon they have to keep pumping themselves up with a new excitement. The bigger the balloon, the greater the Holy Spirit they tell each other. So in all the policies that they adhere to expansion is good because expansion is increasing the size of their church/nation and reassures them that their suit is not empty. Like a hot air balloon, they can't afford to stop heating the air with excitement.
When the Republican Party turns to its base, it is turning to its excitement engine. But to start that engine it needs symbols of the savior, and we can see them trying to fit that western costume with its gun belts on Palin. She is being portrayed as Durga, the Hindu angry Goddess who comes in and slays the demons that have taken our nation hostage although they don't dare put a red bindu between her eyes. No, the target is the Liberals who have been long time demonized as the forces of Satan in the Evangelical myth. But what is really interesting is that McCain/Palin are now turning on Republicans as being the demons. They are trying to position themselves outside the myth where Republicans were always on God's side.
If you dream of the coming savior, you also have to dream that you need saving from some external force that has corrupted your world. In the Evangelical mind the world is at war for eternity, but there is a dual way of looking at this war. On one hand, salvation comes after death if you have been good. On the other hand, salvation comes in history if you have been good. And being good, of course, is defined by the myth. You are good if you are the right side of goodness. But this goodness needs badness for its own existence. The Evangelical goodness is defined by its current evil of the day, and when one evil goes, guess what, another one pops up. And with each evil, one needs a new savior. Ah, Republicans forever.
The only way to defeat a myth like this is to (1) see the myth as being not real, a dream of the mind; (2) and when the Republican machine attacks you (Obama), don't attack the attacker, attack out the myth. One attacks the dream, not the dreamer. For the dreamer to awake from his sleep, he cannot feel that he is being personally attacked because that just strengthens the dream. You are in the dream with him as his foil, and the stronger his enemy gets, the stronger he (his savior/identity) gets.
One must engage the dreamer without playing the rules of the dreamer's dream. And the field for this battle must be compassion. Just as Christ had compassion for those that were lost in their myth and crucified him, we have to have compassion for our fellow countrymen who are asleep in their myth. Compassion is the only sign we have that we are not also dreaming the dream of the Liberal who is going to save the world. Saviors only exist in myth. Only those who are awake can save themselves, and, here's the great paradox of the human mind: if you are awake, you don't need saving.

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