Tag Archives: heroism

Yuval Noah Harari, Angela Lansbury, and Things Hidden in Plain Sight

Commentary and Analysis, , , ,

By Scott T. Allison

In his recent book Nexus, philosopher Yuval Noah Harari observes that modern humans have access to more information than ever before, yet “it doesn’t seem that all this information has given us answers to the big questions of life: Who are we? What should we aspire to? What is a good life and how should we live it?” (Harari, 2024, p. xi).

This is an odd statement, perhaps even alarming. How do we not know who we are or what a good life is? Human beings have been aware of the key components of “a good life” for many thousands of years. In antiquity, literary classics and entire philosophical traditions were built around these components.

The answers have been hiding in plain sight for millennia. Every day we are bombarded with pointers about how to live our best lives.

Stories as Vast Reservoirs of Wisdom

Everything we need to know about living a meaningful life and becoming our best selves can be found in good storytelling. The vast majority of people grow up hearing stories, reading stories, or watching stories. In Europe or North America, fairy tales from Bambi to Hansel and Gretel offer recipes to children about how best to live our lives.

As much as they need nutritious food, adults need good stories, too. Consider the Epic of Gilgamesh, composed over 4,000 years ago. Gilgamesh was a mighty but arrogant king who befriends a wild man named Enkidu. When Enkidu dies as punishment from the gods, a grief-stricken Gilgamesh embarks on a futile quest for immortality. Ultimately, Gilgamesh is humbled and transformed into accepting his mortality and finding meaning in his life.

Gilgamesh teaches us that the key to a good life resides in understanding that suffering is transformative, that the material world is fleeting, that friendships sustain us, that nature and humility are essential, and that legacy is found in meaningful actions.

These same life lessons have been imparted to us through the telling of countless stories. You can choose almost any popular story, such as Hamlet, The Wizard of Oz, The Epic of Sunjata, The Great Gatsby, A Tale of Two Cities, the Bhagavad Gita, Harry Potter, Star Wars, and countless other tales.

In all these stories, heroes go on a journey of self-discovery and metamorphosis. We are drawn to these stories because they all call us to go on the same journey as these heroes. We love Harry Potter, Jane Eyre, and Mulan because each one of us is that same awkward underdog who must discover their hidden talents and blossom into someone who does great good in the world.

All our favorite stories, both ancient and modern, point to what comprises a good human life. Painful things happen to us that challenge us and force us to seek help from others. We are humbled into healing, learning, and growing into our best selves. We then give back to others.

Wisdom Hidden in Plain Sight

So then why does Yuval Noah Harari write that modern humans have little understanding of who we are and how we should live? The answers we seek are in plain sight, revealed in every good story we’ve ever encountered in novels, plays, movies, and television.

Most people make the mistake of believing they read and watch stories with the goal of being entertained. The deeper reason is that stories exist to convey wisdom about how to best live a purpose-filled life. The authors of those stories are our mentors, imploring us to use our suffering to grow into resilient, resourceful, caring human beings who make a positive difference in this world.

I’m reminded of the late, great Angela Lansbury, who sang the wonderful theme song to Beauty and the Beast. The opening line is, “Tale as Old as Time,” a clear reference to ancient story patterns that connect us to the wisdom of deep time.

Yuval Noah Harari makes the point that modern humans are overwhelmed with information yet starved for wisdom. Perhaps the solution is to put away our smartphones and begin reading and gleaning insights about life from good stories.

References

Campbell, J. (1949). The hero with a thousand faces. New York: New World Library.

Harari, Y. N. (2024). Nexus: A brief history of information networks from the stone age to AI. New York: Random House.

 

 

 

 

 

 

Heroic Lag: The Time It Takes Society To Catch Up With Its Heroes

Commentary and Analysis,

By Scott T. Allison

“Every society honors its live conformists and its dead troublemakers.” — Marshall McLuhan

In one of our recent books, we introduced the term heroic lag, referring to heroes being ahead of their time, and society resisting the hero – at first. There are many examples of a hero championing ideas that are so radical that the hero is initially seen as a villain but then later viewed as a hero.

During the 19th century, Susan B. Anthony was reviled for promoting women’s suffrage and is now a cultural icon. In the early 1960s, Martin Luther King, Jr., was despised by most of America for leading the civil rights movement, yet now we have a holiday honoring his accomplishments.

The Black Lives Matter movement, established in 2013 in response to police shootings of unarmed Black citizens, was unpopular among mainstream Americans for years. In May of 2020, the brutal murder of George Floyd by a Minneapolis officer, captured on video, seemed to represent the tipping point in public opinion. By June of 2020, support for the Black Lives Matter movement had reached 76 percent of Americans. This number was a significant departure from 2013 when a majority of voters disagreed with Black Lives Matter.

We’re also witnessing a rise in public approval of Colin Kaepernick, who for years was widely condemned for kneeling during the playing of the American national anthem. Heroic lag seems to have run its course, as the NFL is now embracing Kaepernick. In a video released in June of 2020, NFL commissioner Roger Goodell said: “We, the National Football League, admit we were wrong for not listening to NFL players earlier and encourage all to speak out and peacefully protest. We, the National Football League, believe black lives matter. I personally protest with you and want to be part of the much needed change in this country.”

Heroes are ahead of their time, and history has shown that almost all people ahead of their time are vilified, and often even assassinated. The dark period of heroic lag cost the lives of Jesus, Gandhi, and Martin Luther King, Jr. It can take years, even generations, for the general public to catch up to the level of moral development of a heroic prophet.

In a perfect world, there would be no heroic lag. A new, good way of doing things would be proposed and people would accept it. But a sad truism in psychology is that people resist change, especially any change that threatens one’s ego or one’s tribe.

Heroic lag appears inevitable in any system in which there is some uncertainty about truth and objective reality. In 1954, social psychologist Leon Festinger was argued that in the absence of objective reality, social reality becomes paramount. Social reality, however, is vulnerable to distortions, biases, emotions, and motivations, making it slow to evolve.

But we can take heart in a great truth articulated by Martin Luther King, Jr., who once observed that “the arc of the moral universe is long, but it bends toward justice.” We can be reassured that despite heroic lag, the moral truth of a heroic principle eventually becomes acknowledged and revered.

But there is a great cost to heroic lag. Good people die and society suffers great losses before a heroic ideal gains popular acceptance. Heroic lag is fed by psychological and structural barriers to progress. The American two-party system creates an ingroup versus outgroup mentality in which one’s party affiliation often determines one’s position on the issues. Tribal delineations are rarely a good route to resolve ambiguity. Such delineations only increase heroic lag and prolong cultural suffering.

References

Denver Post (2020). Colin Kaepernick has more support now, still a long way to go. Retrieved from https://www.denverpost.com/2020/06/06/colin-kaepernick-more-support/

Goethals, G. R., & Allison, S. T. (2019). The romance of heroism and heroic leadership. West Yorkshire: Emerald.

New York Times (2020). How public opinion has moved on Black Lives Matter. Retrieved from https://www.nytimes.com/interactive/2020/06/10/upshot/black-lives-matter-attitudes.html