The Cult of Self (Part Two)
How often have you been told that you are special and unique? In today’s society, we are constantly bombarded with messages that emphasize the importance of self-esteem and self-worth. But what if the central claim underlying this emphasis is built on a falsehood? Join me in this episode as I explore the global impact of the self-esteem movement and delve into the implications of our self-centered culture on society.
Get comfortable and listen in as I explore the global impact of the self-esteem movement, how it spawned a $10-billion industry and brought about massive policy and legislative changes, and how it was all built on a falsehood. I also explore how the societally promoted emphasis on the self and the self-centered culture has led to an implicit notion of our specialness and an increase in narcissism, and analyze the broader implications of this cultural phenomenon for society.
And as with everything I share on the podcast, this is what I believe based on what I’ve read and researched. But please don’t take my word for it. Keep what sticks, discard the rest and for goodness sakes, go out and test drive it!
What You’ll Learn In Today’s Episode:
How the Human Potential movement in the 20th century marked a peak in self-focus.
Why there are concerns about the monetization and potential cult-like aspects of the personal transformation industry.
How there is a high level of self-focus in Western society.
How the focus on self has an impact on our cultural ecosystems.
How the self-esteem movement has impacted policy and legislation.
Why we should be concerned about the current framework of social contracts.
What Was Mentioned:
Selfie: How We Became So Self-Obsessed and What It’s Doing to Us by Will Storr
The Education of Selves: How Psychology Transformed Students by Jack Martin and Anne-Marie McLellan
How the Self-Esteem Craze Took Over America And why the hype was irresistible by Jesse Singal
Sham: How the Self-Help Movement Made America Helpless by Steve Salerno
Hearts And Minds: Self-Esteem And The Schooling Of Girls by Jane Kenway and Sue Willis
Ideas Worth Sharing:
“We live in an incredibly fascinating time in history to explore what our self-focus actually means in our day to day experience.” – Christina Sestan
“Choices in and of themselves aren’t necessarily a bad thing – I’m just pointing out that they seem to arise from our demands and expectations.” – Christina Sestan
“Everywhere I look, I’m offered a customized pathway to accommodate my unique set of needs in just about any situation I find myself in.” – Christina Sestan
“Too much unmitigated self-focus definitely has the potential to lead to harmful outcomes.” – Christine Sestan
“When so many of our social contracts are coming under fire, it seems especially critical to learn how to have a conversation that includes some divergent thinking.” – Christina Sestan
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Speaker 1 0:01
Hey, it's Christina. Thanks for joining us. And welcome to The Squeeze. It's actually frighteningly easy to see the effects if you know what you're looking for. The litany of impacts of the self-esteem movement is all around us. Welcome back. This is part two of a three part series called The Cult of the Self. If you recall, in our last episode we took a rather lengthy journey back through time to ancient Greece and the origins of the self, and if you were paying really close attention, you might also recall the metaphor that I was using of a giant pendulum that was swinging back and forth between the periods of history that were focusing on the self and the periods of history that focused on the denial of the self and where we left off was really on the heels of the human potential movement and that was at the end of the 20th century and you know as I go deeper into this research I still can't help feeling that the giant pendulum has never swung so far in the direction of the self before, and if you're like me, and you love to untangle complexity, and you know, kind of probe deeper meaning and nuance, I think we live in an incredibly fascinating time in history to really explore what our self focus actually means in our day to day experience, how we relate to one another, what has become of our religion and faith? What we value, what we create, and what gives us meaning. And, of course, everything is not rosy. I mean, I already referenced some of the concerns that arose after the fires, the initial fires, anyway, of the human potential movement died down, and perhaps, like any potent movement, you know, it takes a little bit of time for the darker layer to be revealed. Will store in his book, Selfie, that I referenced a lot in the last couple of episodes, he describes how one of the original co-founders of Esalon expressed concern. He saw that some of the movements that were spawned out of Esalon had gone in what he thought was a decidedly cult-like direction, and that they were giving rise to some pretty powerful and concerning gurus as well. He was concerned watching a sharp upswing in what he saw as the monetization of the personal transformation industry as a whole. Storr also referenced a Harper's Magazine writer by the name of Peter Marin, and he was describing an Esalon conference in San Francisco in 1973 and he writes, quote, one could feel rising from the crowd a palpable sense of hunger, as if these people had somehow been failed by both the world and their therapies, they had come to find help, the human potential movement had still not done for them what it had promised, their lives had remained the same, or perhaps worsened, and the new world, the promise transformation seemed very slow in coming. End quote. So that was 50 years ago, and I'm curious about where we've gone from there. Have we done any course correction, taken more precautions have things improved for the average person living in our Western society, and obviously that's a pretty complex question to ask, with, of course, many different measuring sticks, but generally, while my findings thus far have been a little dubious, to be perfectly honest, one thing for sure, our hunger for the self has not abated. If my initial Google search is any indication, and I think to some extent it is, then we are all still diligently pursuing all things related to the self. So I just googled the phrase the benefits of focus on the self, and that netted me like countless hits, so I'll just hit you with a few of those names. 11 simple ways to focus on yourself, five tips for how to focus on yourself, 10 benefits of focusing on yourself, five crucial reasons to better focus on yourself. Focus on yourself, because most of the time no one really cares. 31 ways to focus on yourself. Okay, that sampling definitely does not qualify as rocket science, but isn't it just the tiniest bit telling that there are even that many how-to articles for focusing on yourself? Clearly, there's demand, so just looking around, it's pretty difficult to swing a stick in our everyday lives without hitting something that reflects a pretty high level of self-focus.
Speaker 1 4:42
I mean, this whole topic is enormous, and I sincerely hope I haven't bitten off more than I can chew. I can already tell you that I'm not going to be able to wrap this whole topic up in two parts, so stay tuned for part three, but to try to maintain some semblance of manageability in this episode. And I'm going to explore several different cultural ecosystems, and I'm going to be sifting for the impact, both good and bad, of our self-focused Western culture. And to start with, I thought I would share a story. This comes from Will Storrs' book, Selfie, and I include it because it is such an incredibly pivotal and important account of how self-esteem as a concept catapulted into the mainstream in the Western world on the heels of the human potential movement, leaving a destructive wake that really so few people are aware of today, but believe it or not, are impacted by every day. So I'm going to share a high-level abridged version, and so I encourage you to read the full story in Storrs book, or just research it yourself online. There's plenty to discover. All right, so our story starts back in the 80s when a man by the name of John Vasconcellos, or Vascos as he was known, he was determined to institutionalize and legitimize the human potential movement by backing it up with legislation and research. It was an incredibly bold move. As up to this point, self-esteem was a fringe concept. It was associated mostly with therapy or education, but definitely not mainstream government programs. And Vasco is early attempts sounded to a lot like a California fad, so Vascos himself was an Esalon alumni and a powerful Californian assemblyman, and my take, as I read the story, because I too have been part of some pretty high-energy and transformational workshops and retreats over the years, is that during his experiences at Esalen, Vascos probably drank the Kool-Aid hook line and sinker, and was then compelled to bring the Esalon experience to the entire California population. His aim was to prove scientifically that self-esteem was the vaccine for all social disease, that includes child abuse, educational failure, teenage pregnancy, alcohol and drug abuse, welfare dependency, and of course crime and violence, and against all odds, and in spite of his bold and entirely unfounded claims, you have to remember that in 1986 he got funding, government funding, and he was able to put that toward a three year task force promoting the value of self-esteem. Now, during the startup stages, the entire endeavor was really regarded as a joke by the national media. One headline from the Wall Street Journal at the time read, quote, "Maybe folks would feel better if they got to split the $735,000, end quote. The amount, of course, referred to the government's initial investment in the program, and was contingent on the assurance that the research evidence would back up those initial causality claims. Now, midway through the task force program, and in a pretty surprising show of faith, the University of California recruited seven professors to research the self-esteem data, and the university also committed to publishing their results under the prestigious University of California Press imprint. No question, this was a huge credibility win for Vascos. Now, when the research was complete, Neil Smessler, he was the academic at the center of the research, he shared a statement from the initial findings, which, like, not to be dramatic, but lit the fuse for the entire self-esteem movement that we are still experiencing today. So, here's what the phrase read: quote, the correlational findings are very positive and compelling, end quote. The findings also concluded that, quote, self-esteem is the likeliest candidate for a social vaccine, something that empowers us to live responsibly and that inoculates us against the lures of crime, violence, substance abuse, teen pregnancy, child abuse, chronic welfare dependency, and educational failure. This lack of self-esteem is central to most personal and social ills plaguing our state and nation as we approach the end of the 20th century. End quote. So, as you can imagine, these early comments were greeted with massive fanfare, and immediately the task force was able to shed its sort of comical beginnings, and it transformed into this like really legitimate and respected scientific endeavor, and a lot of the vocal opponents were sort of forced to eat their words.
Speaker 1 9:28
So the final study results were published in 1990 under the title Toward a State of Esteem, and it was widely endorsed by many, many influential people. So, as you can predict, the self-esteem mission then kind of went global, and Vascos traveled all over the world, preaching self-esteem as the new vaccine. He was interviewed by Oprah Winfrey, among many other people, and simultaneously, school boards across America began implementing self-esteem programs in upwards of. 80% of elementary and high schools, and this was the beginning of the era in kids' sports where just turning up would net you an award. Some school teachers stopped marking with red pens, believing that a lot of red could harm a child's self-esteem. If this is making you roll your eyes at all, just keep listening, because you haven't heard anything yet. So, in a paper that was entitled Self-Esteem: The Costs and Causes of Low Self-Worth, Nicholas Emler writes, quote, teachers and those working with young people became increasingly reluctant to voice meaningful relative judgments about those in their care, end quote. In another paper entitled Esteemicide: Countering the Legacy of Self-Esteem in Education, author Kenzo Bergeron writes, quote, genuine criticism was far too risky, and according to this logic, there could be no separation between announcing winners and announcing losers. Consequently, standards were dumbed down, and merit awards were handed out based solely on participation, end quote. In the book, The Education of Selves: How Psychology Transformed Students, authors Jack Martin and Anne Marie McClellan write, quote, 1000s of meaningless merit awards were handed out in schools across the nation, and grades were inflated to protect the self-esteem of low performers, leaving little doubt that psychologizing of education was here to stay. End quote. Now, by the year 1994 30 states had enacted over 170 legal statutes that were designed to promote, protect, or enhance self-esteem of Americans. So, self-esteem was big business and organizations were paying consultants a ton of money to help them update curriculum and policies to align with the new self-esteem findings, but as it turns out, the self-esteem boom, you know, the one that ended up spawning a $10 billion a year industry, the one that brought about massive policy and legislative changes within education and elsewhere, the one that gave rise to a belief that most people still hold today. Well, the entire thing was built on a falsehood. Let's take a minute to let that sink in. You see the most pivotal part of the research had been distorted and in fact hidden from the public, so there was this single sentence that could have potentially derailed everything back in the late 80s, and this is what it said. Quote, the news most consistently reported, however, is that the association between self-esteem and its expected consequences are mixed, insignificant, or absent. End quote. Not only had the promised causation not been delivered, but it was far worse. The story the research actually told did nothing to validate the massive mobilization of bureaucratic changes taking place through California, the US, and other parts in the world. And it's probably not hard to guess why the truth was covered up. Sadly, we have more than our fair share of organizational or governmental corruption stories to reflect on, and yeah, undoubtedly money played a role here, but I think there was more at stake, and to help unpack the idea I'm thinking of more deeply, there's a good quote by Will Store, and he's quoting Neil Smessler years later, so remember Neil was the central researcher on the task force project who was employed by the University of California, so this is Neil's quote, he says, quote, the task force would welcome all kinds of good news and either ignore or deny bad news. He goes on, I found this was a quasi-religious movement, and that's the sort of thing that happens in those dynamics. Unquote. So, was it simply a case of believing something so strongly that they couldn't or wouldn't see the truth, writer Jesse Single, in an online article from The New Yorker Times, The Cut, entitled How the self-esteem craze took over America and why the hype was irresistible, writes, quote, the self-esteem craze changed how countless organizations were run, how an entire generation, millennials, was educated, and how that generation went on to perceive itself quite favorably.
Speaker 1 14:24
As it turned out, the central claim underlying the trend that there's a causal relationship between self-esteem and various positive outcomes was also almost certainly inaccurate. End quote. Single continues, quote, but that didn't matter for millions of people, this was just too good and satisfying a story to check, and that's part of the reason the national focus on self-esteem never fully abated. Many people still believe that fostering a sense of self-esteem is just about the most important thing one can do, mental health wise. End quote. That last part of the. Story here is Pevro, the story that was being told in the original research was just too good and satisfying to look more deeply, and now all these years later it's actually frighteningly easy to see the effects if you know what you're looking for. The litany of impacts of the self-esteem movement is all around us, from his book Sham: How the self-help movement made America helpless. You can see there's a lot on the topic. Writer Steve Salerno writes, quote, advocates focused on self-esteem rather than hiring better teachers, spending more money on actual schools and instruction. It, the self-esteem movement, became a surrogate for the stuff that might actually have done some good. End quote. The author, Bergeron, again, he says, by legitimizing the idea that individuals should not look to the government for help, the task force members undercut their ability to argue for legislation that might respond to some of the underlying structural causes of supported levels of low self-esteem, such as poverty, racism, inadequate job opportunities, homophobia, et cetera. The focus on self-esteem became a mechanism for blaming the victim. End quote. And from another article in the American Educational Research Journal, entitled "The Politics of Self-Esteem, Jay Kahn writes, "With self-esteem as the goal, policy makers could focus on simply raising the self-esteem of the poor or racialized individuals. End quote. So, what the research report from the University of California and the self-esteem movement in general obscured was the need for institutional change and real governmental action. These outcomes also helped to explain how the original task force proposal had gained bipartisan support on what, at first glance, appeared very West Coast woo woo. From Bergeron, again, he writes, the task force found tremendous success in legitimizing the idea that individuals should not look to the government for help, and the full onus of responsibility for overcoming the impact of oppression was placed squarely on the shoulders of the oppressed rather than on the large structural forces that negatively impacted their lives. End quote. You see, for the more conservatively minded, this would spell huge cost savings and potential spending cuts on social welfare programs, and was a large scale example of something we've seen a lot of since, namely victim blaming in the book Hearts and Minds, Self Esteem, and the Schooling of Girls. Jane Canway and Sue Willis add another nail to the coffin. Quote, advocacy for positive thinking and positive feelings as the keys to significant individual change and social reform is naive for several reasons. People in oppressed social situations may be urged to feel happy and self-satisfied in order to maintain their oppression, rather than support the development of self-determination and collective empowerment necessary to confront the sources of oppression, focusing attention inwards onto personal domains of self-evaluation, self-esteem programs imply that individual transformation can occur without the need to confront the larger questions of social conventions, social structures, and the distribution of privilege and power in their social relationship, end quote. Bergeron has something to add. He says, quote, the emphasis on self-esteem contributes to greater selfishness, excessive individualism, and processes that are undermining the health of family and community life. End quote. Clearly, this story is a case in which self-interests collide with the common good to very harmful outcomes. Hey, you're listening to the Squeeze, and if you like what you're hearing, there's a whole world of citrus couching to discover. We've got an online leadership program, it's called Citrus You, and it features those three key tools you need to be a better leader. Well, to be a better human. We also have a number of mini learning bundles that you can get into, and there's plenty more. If you're interested, you can follow us on Instagram, or check out our website@www.citruscoaching.com and the show resumes now.
Speaker 1 19:25
But let's look more deeply at the concept of self-esteem itself, because for most people who don't give the concept more than a passing thought, it probably sounds at best positive and at worst benign. I mean, what could go wrong in a culture of people with higher self-esteem? Well, it turns out quite a lot, and many of the writers I've already referenced had much to say on that. Bergeron first, he writes, what emerges in lieu of substantial and meaningful change is the reproduction. Of reified knowledge, pacification of minds, and preparation programs that function in the interest of the brutalizing force of capitalism. End quote. I think what he's talking about here is how education under the new self-esteem reforms was literally shaping students to become the kind of people who would be beneficial to capitalism. Kahn next quote, there was another problem with affirming approaches in that they may help to preserve the status quo and do nothing to facilitate critique of our reflection on the values in society that are marked as the source of self-esteem. End quote. As soon as I read that, I thought of the concept of online echo chambers, you know, echo chambers, they result from those algorithms that filter your feed for your beliefs or opinions that coincide with the views that you already hold, and as a result, then your position is reinforced and the alternate points are held at bay. But then I stumbled onto something even more interesting and familiar. Actually, couldn't believe it. In her book, Generation Me, why today's young Americans are more confident, assertive, entitled, and more miserable than ever before. I love that title. Jean Twenge references a specific language that arose from the self-esteem movement. So, listen to this example. Tell me if it sounds familiar to you. Quote, believe in yourself, and anything is possible. End quote. Twenge explains, quote, phrases like this were very uncommon before about 1980 and then became much more popular. They're all very individualistic, they're all very self-focused, they're also all delusional. Believe in yourself and anything is possible. Nope, it's just not true. End quote. Aha, vindication. Exactly the conclusion I'd come to with just do what you love and the money will follow. Twenge elaborates a little bit. She says the self-esteem movement is at least one factor in explaining why millennials have higher self-esteem, are more likely to see themselves as above average, and in general have more positive self-views than previous generations did at their age. Okay, I think most people would largely agree, but that's not all she has to say on the topic. Listen to this quote. I also think it may explain why they score higher in measures of narcissistic personality traits. End quote. Hmm, interesting. And speaking of narcissism, when the original task force research was reviewed with a fine tooth comb many years later, it was discovered that self-esteem was the result, not the cause. In other words, good grades led to an increase in self-esteem, and not the other way around. Storrs' description of the findings doesn't pull any punches. He says a report reviewing the literature made the claims of John Vasconcellos look like those of a street wizard. He goes on, they did, however, find a few benefits. High self-esteem makes you feel good, and it also seems to support initiative. Okay, I mean, that sounds pretty good, right? But as the paper archly observed in its conclusion, quote, Hitler has a very high self-esteem and plenty of initiative too, but those were hardly guarantees of ethical behavior, end quote. This report then was published in May 2003 So Twenge and Campbell have something to say about true impact of high self-esteem. Quote, it's possible to see narcissism as a kind of addiction to self-esteem, reflecting on the generation of young people systematically and repeatedly told they were wonderful and special. Could those children grow into a generation of narcissists? Storr responds, sure. Narcissism causes almost all of the things that Americans hoped high self-esteem would prevent. I'm going to say that again. Narcissism causes almost all of the things that Americans hoped high self-esteem would prevent. He goes on in trying to build a society that celebrates high self-esteem, self-expression, and loving yourself. Americans have inadvertently created more narcissists. What do you think, looking around? Think there's any truth to that?
Speaker 1 24:14
Just in case you were wondering, there are now 11 studies that show a generational increase in narcissism. It seems that the more parents overvalue their kids, the more narcissistic their kids become. So, let's just take a step backwards here, because the whole purpose of this episode is to look at our current culture through the lens of our societally promoted emphasis on the self. I think it's pretty safe to say that self-esteem is a predictable byproduct of this emphasis, and we've just talked a lot about where that got us, and even thinking about Vascos himself, you know, the eccentric California politician behind the whole craze, he himself was likely a victim of high self-esteem, and did that perhaps make it easier for him to sidestep some of the. Peskier, ethical aspects of the research, just to realize his vision. I don't know, just pontificating here. It makes me wonder, though, if we as a culture are just generally more susceptible to things that make quote too good a story and too satisfying to check, end quote. As writer Jesse Single referenced earlier, likely we may already be in the incubation stages of the next big craze, and not know it. I really like the way that the author Salerno describes it, because it echoes my own experience. He says it feels like today it's increasingly common for academics to sell on stage, often at TED Talks, simple one or two sentence accounts of human nature that supposedly are the key to solving problems that have been around for decades or centuries or millennia. It's all too flippant simple, isn't it? What is it about our collective susceptibility to the next best grift, besides just being too good of a story to check? I have a hunch. I have many hunches. Actually, one of the more obvious characteristics of self-centered culture is an implicit and sometimes explicit notion of something I'm just going to call our specialness. We're told over and over how unique we are, how there's no one like us. We're continually asked what we want and what we think. We have an infinite supply of options everywhere we go, from the type of seat we want on an airplane to the amount of chocolate sauce we want in our mocha latte, to the type of acupuncture we want to use to treat our migraines, to the type of church or sat saying we would like to attend. I'm not saying choices are bad, I'm just saying that it's not too long ago, that Starbucks used to charge what they called a fussy fee if you wanted too many substitutions, and I'm pretty sure the short-lived genius that came up with that idea was canned shortly after. You see, choices in and of themselves aren't necessarily a bad thing. I'm just pointing out that they seem to arise from the demands and expectations that come from us, and perhaps our demands and expectations exist because we obviously feel entitled to choice. This is a simple exercise, but hear me out. I want you to imagine walking into your preferred coffee shop tomorrow morning and finding only one item on the menu, coffee from a pot, your only choice: small, medium, or large. That's it. How would you feel personally? I'd be shocked, but if I'm honest, I'd also feel a bit relieved. I find the choices kind of dizzying, because I'm not your average, order the same thing every time kind of person, I generally feel some FOMO pressure, like I got to pick the right item in when I'm confronted by big menus that becomes very complicated, but how about you? Because back in reality, your actual experience will probably entail something like, I don't know, 18 types of coffee beverages, 32 different flavor combinations, syrups, whipped cream, hot or cold, four types of milk. I haven't even started on the food, and this, this is normal everywhere I look. I'm offered a customized pathway to accommodate my unique set of needs in just about any situation I find myself in. Unique set of needs, even the concept is telling. I remember a comedian doing a bit just after Wi-Fi became available on airplanes, pretty sure it was Louis CK.
Speaker 1 28:26
Anyway, he told the story of this guy who couldn't get his Wi-Fi to work 20 minutes after takeoff, when the announcement was made that for the first time ever Wi-Fi was now available on this airline. The guy kicks up this huge fuss, and what was funny to the comedian and anyone really paying attention is how blindly entitled this guy had to be to complain about something that didn't exist 20 minutes ago. Funny and kind of sad. I think it's a pretty safe assertion to suggest that the more we focus on the individual by virtue, the amount we focus on the community as a whole has to decrease, doesn't it? I mean, without any significant counterbalance to self-focus, then you know the idea of what is important and worthy of attention, for example, what we want to see reflected in the news or online, or what we want to shop for in stores, what we want to eat in restaurants, etc. it becomes an incredibly fractured and complicated affair, which might be why we're seeing such complex menus. Suddenly, everyone's opinion is valid, and we lose a unifying platform. Now, I'm not suggesting we're fully at that point yet, but haven't you noticed how dang hard it is for individuals, let alone governments and organizations, to land on anything even remotely resembling consensus. Maybe that's why we've collectively lost faith in institutional sources of information over the last few years. Sure, everything went to hell in a hand basket during the onset of Covid, but I think what I'm pointing to was well underway prior to. Pandemic. Several decades ago, we relied on two or three trusted news anchors to help us sort out the complexity of, you know, all the issues that were facing us that day. There wasn't much editorial, it was just the facts. Okay, obviously we weren't able to fact-check Walter Cronkite, so we just kind of had to take him at his word. But our current self-focused culture has all but eradicated institutional distribution of information in favor of nothing but fact-checking, and more importantly, making space for well, everyone's opinion, because we all have an opinion, and those opinions are important and unique, and the journey from a private thought to a public broadcast seems to happen faster and faster, and with the advent of podcasting and streaming technologies. Everyone can broadcast their unique opinions out into the world, which is perhaps why something like YouTube nets 2 billion active users each and every month, to say nothing of podcasting, Twitter, Instagram, TikTok, etc. There are no barriers to anyone creating content and then attracting a merry band of followers, big and small, and by extension, there's literally nothing to regulate the spread of negative, unethical, or downright false information. No wonder it's so damn confusing and noisy trying to navigate what's really going on in the world around us. No wonder the concept of fake news took off like a shot. How much of this fractured and highly polarized environment turbocharged the polarity in politics, certainly in America, but frankly around the world. And lest you think I haven't noticed that I'm doing exactly the thing I just referenced, that is to say, converting my private thoughts into a podcast. Well, let me assure you, I am aware. I know it's a risk to add my voice to the already overcrowded online milieu, but I have considered, and I continue to consider the potential impacts and unintended consequences, both positive and negative, of this choice. I continue to podcast and create content for two reasons: one, I authentically desire to communicate and connect, and what I'm doing is inviting conversation; two, I'm compelled to hold up a mirror as a way to invite more reflection in conversation about the self-focused culture that we're inside of right now. So, if it isn't already abundantly clear from the in-depth expose I just took you on to explore the origins of the self-esteem movement. Too much unmitigated self-focus definitely has the potential to lead to harmful outcomes. I really do see a need for course correction and positive change, but that can only happen one conversation at a time, and it seems to me that at this moment in time we're not doing so well in that department. I'm talking about the conversation department. Doubt me, okay? Pause the podcast and just jump over to Twitter for a second.
Speaker 1 32:52
Seriously, pause it and go look. Okay? Did you? You probably didn't. Well, if you did, let's just assume you know what I'm talking about, okay. Twitter is not exactly representational of every social media platform. I handpicked it for a reason. Everyone knows it's the app with the most egregious stone throwing, excommunicating, and whatnot. So that was an easy win for the argument I'm trying to make here, that I think you get the gist of that. It's hard to swing a stick without hitting a pretty polarizing argument on Twitter, but you see, I think our survival depends on us being able to coalesce around certain issues to a certain degree, doesn't it? Social contracts involve surrendering some of our freedoms and submitting to an authority, such as law or governmental elections, one transitional example I was reminded of recently, while listening to the podcast Tooth and Claw, was the practice of having wild animals perform in circuses. Once upon a time, there was general agreement in Western culture about the entertainment value of such a thing, but in 1984 a large female African elephant named Tyke went on a wild rampage in Honolulu, killing one and injuring several other people before being shot to death. The aftermath inspired numerous increase to animal welfare regulations in Hawaii and all over the world, and it really hastened an end to the social contract that we had around circuses that had been in place for over 150 years, Thomas Hobbes was an English philosopher from the late 16th century, and he posited that, quote, in a state of nature, human life would be solitary, poor, nasty, brutish, and short, end quote. He's implying that when we have unlimited natural freedoms and a right to all things. By virtue, we have the freedom to plunder, rape, and murder. Free people have been contracting with one another to one degree or another throughout history. Perhaps the increase in our distrust in our institutions is a symptom of the pendulum moving further in the direction of individual rights and freedoms. Than it has for a long time, and maybe ever, and perhaps some course correction was necessary back in the time of the dark ages, but what happens when you over correct, which is where I think we are now. I certainly don't believe we could have come this far as a civilization without a plethora of relatively stable social contracts to lean on. I mean, sometimes when I'm driving, I'm absolutely blown away by the social contract that makes us stay on the right side of the yellow line. Stay with me here. I know it sounds obvious, because sure, it's against the law, and it could also be deadly to strain into oncoming traffic, but if we reflect on even a small sampling of the social protests and civil disobedience we've witnessed over the last couple of years, particularly since the advent of the pandemic, aren't we witnessing people breaking laws? Sure, and aren't people putting themselves and others in danger? Yeah, so to a lesser degree, isn't it exactly the same thing as crossing the yellow line intentionally? Covid has, of course, provided a plethora of fascinating opportunities to look closely, how and why people stray from social contracts using civil disobedience. But please, please, please don't start a rampage on my Instagram feed. I know I might be poking a hornet's nest with the topic, but just try and remember that what I'm observing is a pattern and not commenting on the content within that pattern, so early on in the pandemic, messaging consistently emphasized that the most important steps in preventing the spread of transmission were to wear masks, wash hands, social distance, and reduce the geographic mobility while we waited for an effective prevention mechanism. According to the report, global civil disobedience trend against anti-COVID 19 policy. The authors Della Crochet and Nicola Bevra argued that quote conditions of civil obedience, civil, sorry, conditions of civil disobedience against the policies of this country is one of the causes of transmission of COVID 19 to prevent the transmission and human victims social intervention policy is needed. End quote. In essence, what they found was that by driving on the other side of the yellow line, people were getting hurt and dying.
Speaker 1 37:11
The two specific types of disobedience in this case were healthcare professionals refusing to attend work as a protest against unsafe working conditions and citizens who use public demonstrations and deliberately ignore measures of social distancing as a way of protesting against lockdown. Again, whether you agree or not is not the issue here. I'm arguing that the social contract that agrees to bestow authority to our health institutions has greatly eroded, so moving forward, when so many of our social contracts are coming under fire, it seems especially critical to learn how to have a conversation that includes some divergent thinking, and I don't think I'm going out on too skinny of a branch to suggest that is precisely those kinds of conversations that seem to be threatened with extinction right now, and I can't help feeling that this is all coming as a result of our disproportionate amount of focus on the individual. So, at the beginning of the podcast, I said I was going to dip into a few different ecosystems to look for the fingerprints of the cult of the self. We've covered a number of environments through the lens of the self-esteem movement, its reach was pervasive, and it included education, government, judicial, parenting, sports, psychology, personal development, and self-help, not to mention all the social ills plaguing the society that were negatively impacted by the self-esteem movement, and I've just examined the framework, our social contracts that hold our Western culture together, and how they're beginning to fray in a bit of a worrying way. So, in our next episode, I'm going to take a deep dive into how much advertising in the 20th and 20-first century has been impacted by our lean towards narcissism. I'll also take a look at religion and the rise of the computer and the internet, including reality TV and influencers. My goal will be to end with a section on what a healthier relationship to the self might actually look like, and how we might find our way there. So, stay tuned. You won't want to miss it. Oh, and don't forget to hit subscribe, and then everything will be automatically downloaded to your pod catcher, so you've been listening to The Squeeze. Thanks for joining us today. If you want to continue tuning in, don't forget to click subscribe. As always, we want to hear your thoughts, your comments, your feedback, and challenges. If there's anything you don't agree with. Thanks for joining us, and see you next time.
Unknown Speaker 39:45
Bye.