** This was an article I wrote last September 11 that did not get published because it did not fit in with the orientation of the website - it was not spiritual enough. I'm publishing it now because I still believe in the ideas here and because writers abhor throwing away anything they've written.
911 + 5
A few days after 911, Jon Stewart, of “
Daily Show” fame,
addressed his audience in a way that is still inspiring today, five years later. His naked humanity and his vision of hope touch me more than some of the spiritual soarings that came out of that holocaust. Most of them tried to comfort us with a view from a spiritual dimension, where a universal "Law of Goodness" reigns supreme. And to the extent that this pulled our attention away from the horror and reduced the pain somewhat, spiritual thoughts could be deemed useful. But it is highly unlikely that they had any effect on those who courageously strove to give help in the days and months after. People did what is in the heart of everyone to do in such cases.
In contrast, Stewart faces the horror head on and lays his heart out on the desk for all to see. He mirrors our deepest humanity, its vulnerability as well as its aspiration after something better.
He tells how the view from his lower Manhattan apartment used to frame the World Trade Center towers. They are gone, so hideously, so swiftly, and so mysteriously even to this day. And yet he squeezes out a statement of hope: the view now presents the
Statue of Liberty for him to contemplate. It is that faith in liberty that is stronger than the hate and religious delusion that struck out at America that day. And I find it stronger than abstractions about another world and another set of actors.
Liberty, or freedom, is not an ancient fact. Almost all of history has been a process of blind determinism, trial and error, accident and ruthless competition among the constituents of the universe. Freedom came with the rise of human consciousness, which is a relatively – in evolutionary terms – recent. But with this new tool, “the planet has finally grown a nervous system - us,” as Daniel Dennett notes in
Freedom Evolves (2003). And with “us” lies the ability to destroy the planet, or to advance it to higher states of order and harmony. The latter is not a slam-dunk. The former is more likely, as was demonstrated five years ago when technologically equipped fear, superstition and religious conviction destroyed two buildings and their occupants. But so much more.
The restriction of personal freedoms that accompanied the paranoia after 9/11 is just one of the ripples of collateral damage that eats at the essence of America. Ideological imperialism under the guise of a “war on terror” is another.
A higher level of thinking is required now, more than ever. And “higher” doesn’t mean abstract and supernatural. Only a new respect for reason can prevent further escalation of high-tech-equipped ideological insanity. Appeals to an abstract supernatural force will just add one more bit of irrationality to the volatile chaos-cocktail that threatens us. See Sam Harris's eloquent and impassioned book,
The End of Faith, for details on how "faith" is so easily hijacked for evil ends.
It is time to take control of our destiny and support causes and actions that can lead to peace. And not peace that is simply the quietude of zombies, but peace that allows freedom to ring loud and clear. If you believe in a God, don’t let that belief deaden your humanity. Let the planet’s nervous system receive support from your own heightened rationality, your own heightened humanity. Otherwise, there will be a new date that is shorthand for terror. And it may be the last date.
