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..:: Freedom ::..
By
Alan Schneider
As we struggle along life’s often
tortuous path, enveloped in the dust of daily battle that is the
hallmark of biological existence, we may occasionally ponder the meaning
and implication of freedom during the periods of respite from our
toil. This essay will highlight some of the meanings of
freedom knowable from the human perspective.
The condition of the flesh is
not fundamentally free – we are quite literally festooned at the
distil end of the central nervous system in the prefrontal lobe of the
cerebral cortex – this is where the “me” that “I” experience as “myself”
resides, as a highly complex, interactive sequence of neural synoptic
patterns. Paradoxically, the realization that this is “identity”
on the Physical Plane is the beginning of the access to the more
relatively free states of consciousness that can be attained from
our perspective among the living! Let us examine the developmental
facets of this, the jewel of extended human experience...
The observer must, of course,
at least be prepared to question the supposed literal nature of
existence to progress along this path, otherwise, the television set and
junk food are always waiting to re-anesthetize the mind! I myself invite
open-minded inquiry as a matter of course, and this approach has
constituted the primary investigative tool of most of the SYNERGY
essays. Once the questioning of existence has been taken seriously, the
additional questions arise; “If I am not the focused self that I have
presumed to exist, or at least am possibly more than that, then
what am I?” At this point, progress can begin in the
investigation of ourselves and our consciousness...
A logical next stage of
inquiry is to probe the external environment beyond our physical forms
for more clues to this mystery. Do I possibly exist outside of myself
in some context or other? There certainly appears to be a plethora of
other upright, verbal bipeds around, engaged in all manner of presumably
interrelated activities. This, of course, is the matrix of society and
culture, and it is here that our synaptic existence derives most
of its meaning – we are defined in relation to each other’s beliefs,
actions, and mores. In the absence of this condition, we would seem to
have only instinctual behavior patterns and conditioned responses to
fall back on as the derivatives of consciousness. Is that it? Are we
merely programmed autonomatons? Or is there more to this picture?
The very first problem
endemic to conscious experience is encountered at this juncture – the
issue of control. At the biological level of expression, we are
compelled by our physiological appetites to seek control over not only
various aspects of the external environment, but over the other
aforementioned sentient bipeds we share space with. This compulsion has
accounted for the great bulk of suffering in human history, as those
individuals “fortunate” enough to have effective control Karma have
developed more and more sophisticated (and invasive) methods of
asserting that control over the great bulk of the human population. The
annals of fascism are filled with the technology of control –
intimidation, manipulation, harassment, incarceration, brutality, and
discrimination are but a few of the modalities that such individuals as
Machiavelli and Adolph Hitler cataloged for posterity. At the
biological level, it does not concern such individuals that the brief
instant of mortality on the Physical Plane passes so swiftly – they
customarily do not think beyond fixations with social power and
advantage.
Most of the control
approaches noted in the last paragraph are more or less literal in
character, and can be recognized and thwarted by the trained observer of
phenomena as human beings seek out freedom, others are much more subtle
in character. Numbered among these more insidious methods is the
process of cultural hegemony. In its simplest form, hegemony
amounts to the dominance of subordinate groups by advantaged groups, but
it is the methodology of this dominance that is so potent.
Hegemony entails the use of all manner of indoctrination authorized by
the advantaged groups(s) to train and convince the subordinate groups
that they are subordinate because they should be, for their
own good, and that only the prescribed methods of
social change officially accepted and ordained by the dominant group may
be practiced for the attainment of resources, and advancement in the
social system. Many times, the mechanisms of hegemony have existed in a
given social system for hundreds or thousands of years, passing into the
collective subconscious, and never questioned again. So it is that the
process of questioning cultural assumptions is so very important
to the support of freedom and free inquiry in any society. Only through
the ongoing application of this process can the wheat of freedom be
separated from the chaff of repression. And if we are confronted with a
condition that is inherently restrictive – as we, in fact, are in the
manifestation of physicality – then the threshing process becomes all
the more important!
The great threat of hegemony
as the most present mechanism of cultural control in today’s
world is exemplified by the subtlety of that presence – often
subconscious, couched in persuasion and rhetoric as opposed to
dictation, and residing in the background of society concealed by
custom, tradition, and social mores. Hegemony exists in parallel with
functional provision, and can be very difficult to distinguish
from that, its much more legitimate partner. Just think for a moment
about all of the customs in our culture that we take for granted –
certainly some, such as stopping for red lights at intersections, are
most functional and prevent much chaos, while others, such as
arbitrarily deferring to apparent authority without question, are
much more debatably functional. Most of us will tend to simply
follow the crowd in these matters, and “do as the Romans do when in
Rome” – i.e. conform – and this is an instance of the root
power of hegemony – the herd instinct – the tendency to blindly follow
whatever group or individual has demonstrated leadership capacity by
whatever means were expedient. The questioning process, in comparison,
is challenging – it continuously requires both internal and external
confrontation with mental habits and social power elites. No wonder we
so often just look away from oppression – to directly confront it is no
mean feat!
Once the social institutions
generated by hegemony are set in place by custom and habit, they become
accepted across time, and the extensive consequences to the human
condition are all too often lost to human perception. While it is true
that hegemony contributes to a more convenient society, it is also true
that the price of this convenience is the loss of freedom and
creativity, as we become deeply entrained in advancing cultural
mediocrity and blank materialism at every turn.
Beyond even the questioning
of culture and the authority structure is another consideration that
impinges upon hegemony – the need to question reality itself.
There is no more basic set of acculturated assumptions than that
governing what we accept as real and tangible to the senses. It is at
this point of inquiry that the hegemonic process is most
comprehensive and most deeply concealed from investigation, because we
so often do not even think of looking here. Is not what appears
to be real to the senses in fact real? How can my senses deceive me
regarding the concrete nature of the world around me? The truth is that
they can and do. As was suggested in a previous Synergy 2009 essay,
Observation, the very nature of the senses is deceptive by their
very biological structure – the world they reveal to our consciousness
is only a small fraction of what exists in the universe of observation.
And the conclusions the observations of the senses suggest to our
consciousness about what is concrete and what is mutable, and the
relations between the two, are highly questionable as well. One need
only take heed of the conclusions of our supreme human cultural
achievement, science, to see some examples of just how misleading
the evidence of the senses can be.
As I sit here typing this
essay, the keyboard of my computer seems to be solid enough, as does the
surface of the desk supporting it. But the powerful instruments of
magnification of science have assured me that the vast majority of both
the computer and the desk are empty space, bounded by
submicroscopic foci of electromagnetic influence, the whole constituting
the sensory experience that I perceive as “solidity”. As I write this,
time seems to be passing, but mathematical analysis has confirmed that
this “fourth dimension of existence” is really a sequence of seven
additional dimensions beyond basic length, width, and breadth having the
appearance of the passage of time to my limited human sense
perception. The very fabric of the universe is so distorted that, if I
were to make a fantastic journey traveling always away from Earth to the
best indication of the most sensitive instruments of science, and travel
long enough, I would eventually return to Earth right where and when I
left! Quantum mechanics maintains that it is impossible to
simultaneously know the position and velocity of a particle. If I
attempt to make such an observation with instruments of any sensitivity,
what is really a wave is collapsed by the intrusion of the measurement
into a particle. And this list goes on and on. I must accept that what
I see in front of me is no more necessarily “real” than what I fantasize
within me, it just appears so. And cultural hegemony creates
these appearances.
The
first step away from the “prison of culture” is absolutely to
question everything that occurs within our physical matrix in every way
possible, beginning with the supposed flights of imagination and fantasy
that are only one small step away from realization, if we could only see
this. It is our blind hegemony that defines one reality and denies
another, perhaps many others, perhaps even an infinite range of others.
Somewhere within that range are undreamed of possibilities of expression
awaiting discovery by open minds and free awareness. So, my friends,
the key to knowing genuine freedom is asking questions, and then
having the courage to follow them where they may lead us!
- With Love, Alan -
(Copyright 2009, by Alan Schneider)
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