Our National Religion: the character of the flock

What is our National Religion?  A cornerstone: what comes first to mind is a dependence on oil that in itself instigates, perpetuates and epitomizes schizophrenia in all of us.  The person that comes to worship in this national religion is a schizophrenic and this characterization is fair for almost all the people in our country.  Our relation to oil exemplifies this for a few simple reasons.

One is our reliance on oil not just for transportation but as a feedstock for omnipresent plastics.  Without it we would not have mega farms, nor would we have suburbs and supermarkets.  Yet, we live our lives unthinking of the miraculousness of this fuel source.  Indeed, we flippantly posit that some renewable alternative is either at hand or will be arriving on our doorsteps tomorrow.  Oil mediates most aspects of modern life yet most discussions of societal status quo and change leave it out.

The other big reason our relation to oil contributes to and exemplifies our schizophrenia is the role this vital substance plays in global affairs.  We may live our lives as though we – individual Americans – are innocent actors on the world stage: you see where this is going don’t you?  I know some people may minimize the effect oil has on our foreign policy but let’s face it, no strategic resources in MENA (the Middle East and North Africa) then no US involvement: probably not even attempts to foster democracy (lol!).  Unawareness of this, at its worst perhaps, yields statements like “They hate us for our freedoms”.  Actually an even more severe utterance wrought by unawareness is “We need to take out ISIS to defend American freedoms”.  Lack of awareness of the concept of blowback is a hallmark of our schizophrenic state, where in one mind we accept or ignore any actions that destroy countries and create refugees, while in another mind we declare the need to accept these refugees into our western countries.  If the creation of refugees was part of the acceptance of refugees narrative then that might make sense, but as it stands it is as though the refugees appear from some apolitical nowhere place, a people to unselfishly embrace who have no connection to any US (or our allies) designs in MENA.

So, a national religion that is all too human.  A national religion subject to the whims and limits of people’s evolved capabilities of awareness.  A national religion that isn’t going away and that will continue to serve as a respectable creed for a people who want to have their cake and eat it too.