DUDARD: What could be more normal than a
rhinoceros?
BERANGER: Yes, but for a man to turn into
a rhinoceros is abnormal beyond question.”
(Rhinoceros, Eugene Ionesco)
***
“If a rhinoceros were to enter this restaurant now,
there is no denying that he would have great power here. But I should be the
first to rise and assure him that he had no authority whatever.
(Gilbert K. Chesterton)
1. When the institutions of the
state no longer embody the ‘ethical will of the people’, when they no longer
live up to the standards they were designed to uphold and when their actions
become malign, uncontrollable and against the interests of the people they were
meant to serve[1], it is not
politics that can be relied upon to solve the crisis, but civil society itself.
A civic/intellectual
forum/movement, detached from party politics, with its inabilities, temptations
and corrupting mechanisms of success, is called upon to raise the questions
that transcend or have been abandoned by politics – questions relating to the
very existence of the human society, which are not political problems, but
problems of life itself – and lead to a new relationship between the State and
its citizens.[4]
The reduction of everything to mainstream party politics
nowadays has made us subject to its ineptitudes, limitations and corruption; it
has replaced what is right with what is expedient (and useful to a smaller and
smaller part of society). Today’s political parties are too inwardly
interconnected with the State’s power structures – while, outwardly, they
maintain the pretence of being separate from and thus unable to reform them.
Transcending politics and its
divisions, civil society needs to move from particular effects to general
causes, it needs to go back to the level of concepts and ideals, to
re-habilitate, update and re-establish the principles and values that underpin
a true liberal democracy which, with time, through neglect and subversion, has
become undone.[6]
2. An authentic liberal democracy
requires an engaged and enlightened demos. Misinformation and lack of knowledge usher in tyranny. Yet, more and more people live in fear of expressing free thought and taking ethical positions that challenge the official narrative. With the
abdication of the mainstream media from its vital role[2],
intellectuals must step in to inform, inspire and serve as the moral compass
and conscience for the whole of society. Whatever mainstream media and politics touch turns to slime. We need a dissident elite, different
from the growing class of pseudo-intellectuals[3]
who are in the service of power or intimidated by it, a peaceful
“extra-parliamentary opposition operating outside the rules created by the
system itself”[4], with its
own communication channels; we need a forum of public-dedicated parrhesiastes,
to teach or remind citizens how to be free and why freedom is necessary in
order to achieve ‘complete humanness’. [5] [6] [*]
The difficulties lie, of course,
in the mobilisation of such a corps of veritable intellectuals[7]
who cannot be isolated, infiltrated or corrupted, prepared to serve “the truth
consistently, purposefully and organise this service”[8],
in the circumstances in which we’ve got such a crisis of integrity and courage,
and in which all communications and social interactions are controlled and
manipulated by a increasingly authoritarian State trespassing more and more
into civil society territory[9].
A few whistleblowers, at great personal cost, have drawn our attention to the
unchecked proliferation of state surveillance that has reached dystopian levels
and now looks to be heading into the paranormal. When more is revealed, we are
going to be very shocked at how deep and how far the depravity goes.
3. We need a new Age of Reason,
not to stand up against superstition, but against the disintegration of
humanity, under pressure from the abusive forces of the State and its covert
network of power, abetted by the passivity of a more and more fearful and
distracted citizenry. Referring to the government’s Prevent[10]
programme, Gracie
Bradley, Liberty policy and campaigns manager, said, “It is utterly chilling
that potentially thousands of people, including children, are on a secret
government database because of what they’re perceived to think or believe.” We
need to be constantly reminded of these dangers and that “our careless
indifference to grand causes has its counterpart in abdication in the face of
force”[11].
It is the duty of dissident
voices to foster civic engagement[12]
- indignant, critical and discerning. Membership of a political party and
mobilisation in the causes of party agenda are ineffective[13],
and so is mere local community involvement (within those anaerobic
organisations where the very word ‘community’ has been banalised by over-use, syntheticity
and the nauseating mushiness of their scope[14]).
A coherent, unified dissident class of thinkers and decent
people, when animated enough, can bring about profound changes. Because, we are
where we are and, “to paraphrase Heidegger, only dissidents can save us
now”[15].
_______________________________________________________
[1]
Society is no longer, other than theoretically, yielding the power behind
politics, hence dismissing a bad government by popular vote – the so-called
ultimate source of power in a democracy –only brings in another bad government.
[2]
Mainstream media today is not free speech – it is manipulation – falsehoods,
distorted semantics, or dead silence. Many journalists are in fact working directly or indirectly for intelligence agencies and write articles on their orders, no matter how untruthful the subject is.
[3]
Long time ago, Julian Benda spoke of a “cataclysm in the moral notions of those
who educate the world” – very relevant today.
[4]
Vaclav Havel
[5]
It is very worrying to hear of the targeting and the arbitrary, extra-judicial
punishments of whistleblowers and regime critics conducted in secret and with
extreme cruelty by the repressive arms of the state. The Western governments’
habit of compiling secret watchlists of thousands and thousand of innocent
people, marked as enemies of the state, and targeted for surveillance and
persecution - and in some cases torture - is also slowly coming to light. [https://www.theguardian.com/uk-news/2019/oct/06/counter-terror-police-are-running-secret-prevent-database]. Constant defined absolute despotism as "where liberty can be taken away from citizens without the authorities deigning to explain their motives, and without the citizens having the right to know them.".
[6] Roger Kimball, The treason of the Intellectuals and the Undoing of Thought
[6] Roger Kimball, The treason of the Intellectuals and the Undoing of Thought
[7]
That is in addition to those brave souls who are already engaged in public
discourse on various particular subjects and have already made their mark
[8]
Vaclav Havel
[9]
As Benjamin Constant wrote, “the art of governments that oppress citizens is to
keep them apart and to make communication difficult and meetings dangerous.”
[10]
A UK government’s anti-radicalisation programme which collects details of
people who haven’t yet committed a crime
[11]
Alain Finkielkraut
[12]
What author Dana R Villa calls dissident citizenship or Socratic citizenship,
practiced in an “alternative public sphere” beyond the boundaries of the
official public realm.
[13]
“Ideologies separate us. Dreams and anguish bring us together” Eugene Ionesco
[14]
That is when they are not used by local authorities to serve nefarious roles,
such as snooping on and harassing their neighbours
