I Did It My Way

I DID IT MY WAY!

Frank Sinatra may have made a fortune singing that song among others, but it seems to me that that idea has become the greatest obstacle to our common life together. 

It appears to me that more and more of us are rejecting the mega narratives and living in our own narrow personal narratives.  What I have in mind is  best suggested by the story of the mother who complained to the school board that the Social Study teacher was infringing on her daughter’s religious faith by just teaching the history and tenets of the Muslim faith.  The “in coming” freshmen at a college refusing to read the assigned book because they did not agree with the author’s purpose. The Clerk of Court refusing to issue marriage licenses to all people because she felt that giving licenses for homosexual marriages was contrary to her religious faith.  The refusal of people to accept as fact the information from authoritative figures. For example, the refusal of leaders to accept the reality of climate change.

People have become more and more separated from the common narrative. The dramatic rise in the number of home schooling children and the ever growing number of religious and charter schools means that parents now can pick the education they desire.  The parent who does not want her child to know about the history of this country with Native Americans can pick a school that “white washes” American history.  The family who does not want their daughter to read Slaughter House Five will go to the school board and get her child exempted from that assignment. 

The multiplication of news sites adds to this problem as we can now pick the news media that gives us the facts that fit our assumptions rather than the media that gives us facts that challenge what we know.  There seems to be very few media outlets now that we tell you both sides of the facts.  One source will repeatedly tell you that the economy is horrible, as it is in certain locations and for certain kinds of skills that have become obsolete because of robots and technology, and another will tell you that the stock market is at an all time high and unemployment is at record lows. 

We pick the information and the source we like and refuse even to hear or listen to other information.  There does not appear to be mutually accepted authorities on the major questions of society.  The collapse of “universals” that all of society accepts as a starting point seems to have become total.  The poet wrote, “things fall apart, the center cannot hold, mere anarchy is loosed upon the world.”  The recent election present a very clear example of each side picking the facts and reality that want to hear and not hearing anything the other side was saying.