reply to post by schrodingers dog
I agree with your premise.
I believe that originally "secret societies" were formed by shamans, mystics, etc., not to keep others out, but out of recognition that the things
they experienced were not conveyable via language.
They did not want to keep these "secrets" from anyone, far from it. More than anything in the world those privy to the things unspeakable want to
share them. It has always been so. But they were wise enough to see that attempting to led many farther from the truth than saying nothing.
Some where along the line someone figured out that you didnt have to have the experience, or a "truth" that was beneficial to people to gain power.
All you had to do was pretend to have something everyone needed, and pretend to guard it jealously. And then begin taking in payments from those who
wanted to know it. And like you said, it doesnt matter if they are jealously guarding an empty box. It doesnt even matter if someone sees the box is
empty, they can just do the "emperors new clothes" trick (pretend something is there and say that only the ignorant cant see it, but of course you
can, right?) and regain control of the situation.
I have been thinking around this issue too. THAT this is the case is not a problem for me. Daniel Quinn brings up not exactly this point, (he isnt
concerned with secrets) but a very similar point in Ishmael when he discusses how we ended up in such a hierarchical world. (And in Beyond
Civilization he explores possible paths out of this hierarchical or "secrets" society. It really, to me, matters little what they are using as
leverage to maintain the hierarchy, but secrets certainly are one way power is maintained, but the secrets are just a means to an end. Getting, and
maintaining power over the majority and persuading them to do your bidding, and support you to boot.
I am more concerned with, how do we get out of this at this point? Is it even possible?
Plato created a very good system to prevent this from happening. And I am convinced it would be workable. Today, with our technology, more than
ever. But how could you ever get people to leave this glorious, entertaining, abject failure of a way of life that we have now?
Like Plato said back then, to the masses who had never known anything other than the circus we call society, the alternative would look like it was
horrible. Boring. Fit for pigs. (his analogy) It doesnt matter that our glorious entertaining circus makes very few people really happy and
satisfied. That so many spend much of their time on some sort of drug or distraction to forget their unhappiness. The trinkets and glass beads of
our society look so much more shiny and pretty than the society that would actually make people feel fulfilled and content, and allow them to be what
they are meant to be.
Thats what bothers me. All that you have said is right on target. But how do we move from that to something more humane when the "victims" of the
conspiracy are completely unwilling to let it go?
Plato surmised that the only way might be perhaps if some tragedy occurred that killed off most of the people, and some philosopher, (real philosopher
not some idiot who memorizes terms like "existential" to impress others) took the surviving children out and raised them in the new Republic.
I tend to think he is right. It annoys me. I wish for once he were wrong, and there was hope for the current adults, but as much as I hate to admit
it, I think he is right. You cannot make non-seers see. You cannot make non-reasoners reason. And once beliefs have been set in the hearts of
non-reasoners, they are almost impossible to change. Reason cannot touch belief unless the believer him/herself is willing to do the reasoning. Just
tossing it at them is pointless.