Fanaticism

If you haven't noticed, the world has been awash in fanaticism lately, and there seems to be no sign of it letting up. But before we can critique fanaticism (not that they would listen), we must do what fanatics do not do and take a long and thorough look at ourselves. That is, i'm going to take an honest look at myself, come what may.

A friend of mine mentioned, long ago, that people like us are the most susceptible to cults and far-out political craziness. He never bothered to put that into perspective, but echoes of that off-the-cuff comment have stayed with me to this day. And I ask myself what within me is a lever to fanaticism. I have found several trouble spots.

I try to think of the long term. This inclines me to ignore the present and think of the ends of some doctrine, whatever it may be. I am stubborn, meaning that I'd be willing to endure privation and short-term setbacks in pursuit of the greater goal. I am not conviced that lide as is isn't unprofitable and that the balance of happines does not tilt away from me. I am sexually frustrated, which kindles every imaginable fire of acquisition: I have not yet reached the point of substituting material goods for human interaction, but I can only endure so much. A closely related point is creativity. When I feel my ability to creatively impinge on the world threatened (which happens regular as clockwork: I get cycles of inspiration and writer's block every week, if not every day) I would like nothing more than to belong, to be free of the frightful responsibility for my own actions. (The sexually satisfied and creative human being is practically immune to cults and mass movements that promise everything and deliver nothing. Think about it: would you be unfurling a banner if the banner shining in your head were way cooler, or if you had already gotten that idealist-chic sexual partner you joined the movement for in the first place?) When the factors all come together and I can't deal with them, I take solace in thoughts of the blackest evils loosed upon the world by my hand: stem cell monstrosities stalking the streets, cancers metastasizing their way through sewers and crawling up outtake pipes, rows and rows of identical desks in the windowless rooms of the idea factories of the future, sludge on the oceans from the bio-engineered algal blooms which are our only remaining source of nutrition and oxygen. Do those seem like very non-misanthropic ideas?

Having said that, that rational part of me that still has executive control recoils at these tendencies. I am still firmly in control. I'm willing to bear the burden of freedom even if it crushes my face to a fine pulp against the floor. Even if my self-fulfilling prophecy casts me by the wayside and shits on my back. I'm still young, still liberal, and still in love with humanity. I will be that way as long as there is energy in this thinking part of me. And who knows how ling that will last?

Consider: "We will create a civilization of the Mind in Cyberspace. May it be more humane and fair than the world your governments have made before."