What boggles my mind is how a culture of the higher minded ideals, such as the West, with Enlightenment principles of reason, Modern principles of experience, and post-Modern principles of “to hell with it all” cynicism can be so ridiculously obtuse in its pursuit of Truth. By cultural observation, I seek to elucidate the hilarious drama which goes on under our noses without the slightest laugh or snicker. I realize I am being a bit obstinate by using the phrase “pursuit of truth” but I would like to point out that no one denies the inherent goodness of Truth. That is why the word is so convenient a title to slap onto everything under the sun. A word with such rapport with the world was bound to be the source of all manner of vices and virtues. A word that has meant everything can in the end, only mean nothing. Of course, that is why we post-moderns think we have finally landed on the Truth…quite literally. Ah yes, here is our first punchline.
The pursuit of truth is like rowing a galley, like in that Ben Hur movie with Charleton Heston. 500 years, the West has toiled as a galley slave pursuing truth. One fine day, the post-modern said “Ah hah! I’ve got it, instead of pursuing truth, let’s make fun of everybody else who’s rowing.” It started out with one or two people saying “Ewww, this galley slave is all sweaty, pursuing truth.” When that bald guy dies in the movie, they yelled “Oh dip, this guy just committed suicide trying to find truth.” But pretty soon, a couple more galley slaves got the idea. Before long, even the drum-beating-guy was busting out in some reggae, and the galley was dead in the water. Everyone was laughing at the dead guy and all the other rowing galley slaves, except no one was really rowing anymore. In fact, everybody was laughing at no body and no body was laughing at himself. (Sorry Herselves, in this blog, gender inclusive language depends on the temperament of me, the author…and right now I feel like being concise, so that I can add off-handed comments like this one).
With a sudden lurch forward, the trireme ran into the Sandbar of Subjective Reality. While the galley slaves were breaking piñata’s and blowing their kazoos, the view from the upper deck took on a more grim perspective...just before this exchange:
“Hey guys, this isn’t funny, we just let Truth get away.”
“Yeah, it looks pretty bad” another one chimed in, “we don’t have enough morality to last us a week!”
“Hey, that’s right,” another one said.
“What do we tell the others? They won’t appreciate being told that they struck the Sandbar of Subjective Reality!”
The admiral thought for a moment as he surveyed the vast expanse of the ocean, his very presence exuding years of human history and secular wisdom. Directly, his grim countenance improved into the sincerest form of cheerful stupidity. With a chuckle, he slapped his knee as if it were obvious, “I know, we’ll just tell them the truth.”
