RECOVERING HUMAN AGENCY: SELF-RESPONSIBILITY, SOCIAL AWARENESS AND POLITICAL ACTION

Understanding this global phenomenon, call it the “viral effect,” is not about some sort of self-evident factualities versus conspiracy theory, as if these are the only two possible perspectives of thought.  The former reifies “factuality” and becomes a mythic “factualism.”  The later reifies the source of action, control and intent and imagines some “big brother” in cyberspace or nefarious bad-guy Illuminati in smoke-filled back rooms planning to orchestrate world change.  Get real.  The ‘viral effect’ is a mass mediated idea that is historically catalyzing global trends of divergence away from the Universalism or globalism, empire building, civilizational homogenization, totalitarian one-dimensionality, etc., etc.  No medical facts will clarify what is happening at this historical turning point.  We must rethink the whole of contemporary life and the parts of that whole in particular.  We all can play a part in this or turn it over to the self-appointed emperors of existence.  It’s time to re-appropriate one’s self in the deepest and broadest existential and spiritual sense.  It’s the opportunity for every individual to become a player and not a pawn.  One can be at play passionately in the fields of the Lord; or a minion worker bee passively responding to the “expert authorities” when they tell you to “believe,” “feel,” “act” as they see fit.  The ‘viral effect’ is the opportunity to fully become a human being in thought, feeling and spirit and re-appropriate the living Self whose experience creates the real, constitutes the real and decides upon the reality to be created.

One aspect of this possibly emerging ‘new normal’ is the recognition of the institutional force or ideological force of official, ‘mass mediated’ authority/expertise/specialization.  The medical aspect of the ‘viral effect’ is what we see in a few official experts such as Fauci, Birx and Gates commandeering the reality of what is going on and attempting to force or suggest universal political solutions: masking, social isolation, socio-economic shutdown.  These actions are the result of a Liberal/Enlightenment psychology (become ideology) that imagines a universal solution to a health problem.  Bill Gates states this most ludicrously when he claims that nothing can return to normal until there is universal global vaccination.  This is the delusion of all delusions.  This is a rich boy playing with his money and consequent power trying to make his vacuous existence meaningful and undoubtedly also enrich his bank account beyond all dreams. 

But in keeping with the medical issue, what is at stake here in the face of the official authority/experts influencing health policy and socio-political action is the question of the locus of control of one’s health and the locus of control of one’s identity and self-understanding even and especially at the personal, subjective and spiritual level.  In short the authentic ownership of one’s own body, mind and soul is at stake. 

If for example, I make any comment on Facebook regarding the medical knowledge around the ‘viral effect’ someone will inevitably respond with a comment like “what medical school did you go to?”  The challenge here is to prove my “expertise” in terms of institutional norms, traditions and practices.  So I’m not allowed an informed opinion unless I am an “expert” whose authority comes from a recognized institution.  Even though I have a Ph.D. in philosophy, have taught for 30 plus years at a college level, read constantly, think and write about politics, spirituality, culture, etc., my opinion means literally nothing unless I have been sanctified by the powers that be. This attitude and article of faith would mean the end of public discourse, critical thinking and democratic association.  It means the end of any belief that public education prepares one and authorizes one to effectively and competently participate in public, political discourse.  This worship of the “expert authorities” de-subjectivizes the individual, expropriates one’s mind and displaces one’s capacity for self-determination to the one’s “supposed to know,” the one’s who are allowed to claim to “know,” the Fauci’s, Birx’s, Gate’s, or, God forbid the Kanye West’s or Kim Kardashians!  Knowledge and truth becomes specialized, institutionalized, compartmentalized.  The “expert authorities” will tell you what is believable, what you can or should think, want and do; even what you should feel and therefore whether you are healthy or not.