Shut up and listen
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| y2.dy by B Rosen, CC BY ND 2.0 |
In the book, Israel is the first nation to realize the scale of the catastrophe swarming over humanity. To protect itself, it withdraws behind its walls, abandoning the West Bank and Gaza Strip. However, it will accept any Jews who want to go to Israel, and any Palestinians who at one point lived within the pre-1967 borders.
A Palestinian father living in Kuwait City prepares to take Israel up on its offer. His oh so woke son tries to argue him out of it, that the idea of the dead walking and eating the living is just a Jew lie, that soon they will be in Al-Quds as liberators and will drive the Zionists into the sea. He finally insults his father, calling him a weak coward, and that he will not go with the family.
The father, who in general is a meek, mild-mannered man, suddenly becomes this enraged lion protecting his cub against himself. "You will go with this family, or I will kill you myself!"
One of the peculiarities of this election cycle is the "OK Boomer" phenomenon. It's the disparagement of age and experience as being inherently corrupt, or, at best, woefully behind the needs of the moment. We saw it gestate in 2016, and it's now come into full flower.
Twenty-year old LL would have been on the son's side against the father. I had such firm convictions and clear sight then. The young know exactly what needs to be done; however, they seem to lack any plan for doing it. One of the pleasures of youth is thinking that what you've thought of is the first time the thought has ever been conceived. You have very little idea, or at least appreciation, for what came before.
Maybe it's the prejudice of reaching a half-century on this earth, but looking back at my younger self, I know realize how addled I was. All these grand ideas, which would be effectuated by some grand revolution sweeping away the old. (Sound familiar?)
I've earned every gray hair on my beard. And unlike those of my age and older who've been seduced by the socialist from Vermont, every gray hair is a result of lessons in pragmatism.
The young revolutionaries see pragmatism and compromise as betrayal. Or worse than betrayal: they see it as condemning them to a future of death. They don't have time to listen, as they have a world to save.
But listening is the key factor in effecting any change. You can have the grandest revolutionary ideas, ones which you think will heal the world; but unless you listen to the people you putatively want to save, any success will depend on coercion, at best. The twentieth century is a litany of what can happen at worst.
Listening is something which the followers of the Vermont socialist don't seem to think is necessary. Like the son in World War Z, they are full of passionate intensity, which brooks no qualms or questioning. They take after their leader, cocksure of their rightness, not willing to make alliances or make incremental improvements. Incrementalism is exactly what they see as wrong with the American experiment. Nothing but a complete cleansing will do.
However, in this they share many traits with the followers of the Queens conman. They, too, want to wash away the improvements made to the Republic, and start anew. Both have a nihilistic worldview which, like Yeats, see a rough beast slouching towards Bethlehem, its hour come at last. That's great for poetry, and great for revolutions; it's not so amenable to a peaceful life.
Most people want to be listened to. They don't want to be lectured, or hectored, or bullied. The growing backlash against the socialist from Vermont is not due solely to his toxic followers; it's due to the man himself, this supremely unaccomplished backbencher who is convinced that only he can solve what ails the country. Much like the son in World War Z, he can't see the forest for the trees.
The fact is that he and his followers are awful politicians. Ideologues usually are. Congress is full of their like, on both sides of the aisle, lost in their own self-righteousness over doing the public good. If we're to have a shot at any decent future, less talking and more listening would be a good place to start.