I used to think that truth and joy were close allies. Not two sides of the same coin, but close companions in a life well lived. But now I'm not so sure.
Some people may find truth and joy to be allies, but only those who find joy when they understand a truth. In such cases joy is dependant on truth, where understanding leads to a deep satisfaction, and that satisfaction, coupled with a sense of understanding one's place in the cosmos, leads to joy. But I have come to suspect that most, as in the vast majority, of my fellow travelers don't see it that way. For them truth and joy are two entirely separate, and sometimes mutually exclusive, commodities. When they conflict truth is always sacrificed for joy.
If the poles are to be respected most Americans be live in some form of creationism. While not all are young earth creationists, most think that a god created human beings, just as we are now, within the last ten thousand years or so. Even many who admit to evolution see it as just a tool used by god to create humanity as the center of interest in his cosmos. For them joy comes from being special in the eyes of an all powerful, all knowing, all loving being. They are chosen, destined for a blessed eternal life, for whom all things happen for the good, even if they can't see the good on this side of death. Any truth that contradicts this sense of being, this source of joy, is rejected. Any observation, any finding, any understanding that would tend to undermine their world view, and thus their source of joy, is simply dismissed. The need for joy is paramount; only truth that supports the claim for joy is acceptable.
Religion is not the only ideology guilty of subjecting truth to joy. In America the rich get rich mostly on the backs of the working class and the poor. This is nothing new. All through history the rich have gotten rich by claiming for themselves the wealth created by others. In America that particular form of greed is known as "trickle down" or "supply side" economics. But greed is pervasive in our society. From the cradle to the grave we are taught to be consumers, that money is the measure of success, and that to be rich is to be blessed. We all want to be rich. And we are taught that capitalism in general, and specifically supply side economics, gives us all an equal opportunity to be rich. Thus, if we are not rich it is 1) probably our own fault, and 2) possibly a reflection of our relationship with god.
None of this is the least bit true, but most of us find joy in the delusion that we can be fabulously rich one of these days. All we need is that one lucky break, that one good idea, that one best selling novel. And when we don't get to be fabulously rich we blame it on "the government" which takes too much of our money in taxes, or burdens society with too many regulations, or somehow or the other "gets in the way" of free enterprise. We find joy in the idea of riches. Any suggestion that the truth might be that not everyone can be rich, or that (for the most part) the rich are born to money, or even that being rich might not be a goal worthy of a thinking, caring, human being, is greeted with howls of protest. We find joy in the idea of greed. The truth that greed can and is destroying what was once a good and noble experiment in democracy, must be ignored.
Those who are rich must ignore the truth that most of them were born to money and power. In the USA today Mitt actually thinks he earned the name and access to power that allowed him to be rich and vie for the office of President. Those in the Bush empire suffered the same delusion. Those who flood the Democrats and Republicans with money actually think they have earned the right to dictate policies to the rest of the nation. After all, they have been blessed by god. Therefor what they see as good reflects what god sees as good. They find joy in money and power. Any hint that they are not actually anything special is a truth they must, and do, ignore.
Here is the rub, at least to me. Truth is an external thing. It exists regardless of what we feel. The cosmos is roughly 14 billion years old. Human kind was not created, we have evolved from a species of tribal ape, and all of our ideology gives evidence to that history. More, we are a natural expression in a universe that is, itself, continuously evolving. Of the three "Superpowers" likely in the modern age, the USA, the USSR, and China, two were (are) socialist economies. Capitalism is just another human attempt to organize a society. Gay people were born that way but, even if being gay is a choice, it doesn't matter. Gay people hurt no one, do not call down the wrath of a god, and experience love just like straight people. The earth is a globe, it revolves around the sun, it is a few billion years old itself, and its history is wrapped up in the history of the solar system, galaxy, and cosmos. These things are true regardless of what humanity believes.
Joy is an internal, and somewhat selfish, thing. It is mostly self centered, focused on the "me". If I find joy in a thing I will bend heaven, earth, physics, and history, to justify the thing that brings me joy. Unless I am very, very careful, I will not allow the truth to intrude on my joy. If I find joy in a god belief no amount of truth will dissuade me that the god does not exist as I believe he does. So self centered is this god belief that other people's god beliefs are dismissed.
Worse, if I find joy in a god belief, and that belief leads me to conclude that gay people are evil or that strapping a bomb to my chest and murdering as many infidels as I can will lead me to paradise, no amount of truth, nothing approaching rational thought that conflicts with those ideas, will be tolerated. My need for joy has inoculated me from the truth. I am, so far as truth is concerned, unreachable. Separated from external truths, I have become an agent of evil in the world.
If I find joy in riches nothing will convince me that my joy is based in greed and likely bad for most everyone else but me. Nothing that a god might say will convince me that riches are evil either. In fact I will find a god that condones my greed.
This all sounds like joy is a bad thing in the world, blinding us all to the truth. Sadly, I think that might be the case, at least for a lot of us at this point in history. For a long time there was so little that we understood that truth and joy were not often in conflict. But now? What other explanation is there for the rise of religious and political fundamentalism? Something is driving us to ignore truth. What could it be besides our clinging to joy?
And...if we cling to joy at the expense of truth, eventually we will extinguish hope as well.
This is not to say that we dismiss truth out of hand. On some inner level we all know that making good decisions is a key to survival. It is hard to make good decisions based on bad information. Indeed, all of us are descendants of those who made at least enough right decisions to live long enough to breed. We don't dismiss truth out of hand. But we often hold our short term, selfish joy dearer than truth.
Anytime we reject truth in order to protect a source of joy, we are engaging in a really base act of total selfishness. We are claiming that what we want is more important than how the universe really is. No wonder it is so destructive, for ourselves, and for those around us. Somehow we have to stop looking in at our own joy as the most important thing, and find joy in looking out to find truth. Until (and unless) we do, it is hard to see how the near term future will unfold without a lot of death, greif, sorrow and war.
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