WHAT DO YOU KNOW?

 

WHAT DO YOU KNOW And How Do You Know It? Do you know something others do not?  While it is a leftover feel good sentiment of the Sixties that we are all alike, human nature moredarkly suggests we all suffer from EXCEPTIONALISM.  This is the idea that while rules and order must apply to others, our own particular circumstances or talents give us a pass to do what we must. Or whatever the hell we like.  Excuses and explanations are for people less than exceptional.

WHERE DOES THIS SENSE OF ENTITLEMENT COME FROM  and what does it mean for the world? Some would say it comes from a native NARCISSISM in a nation or a person.  Narcissism simply is the curse of only being able to see one’s own self, one’s own image. Most tragically it means a connection only with the self, never with others. One connected only to the self sees only the light and shadow of a single soul, of only one way.  Nothing can challenge the self deluded, least of all facts or the lessons of history.

HISTORY’S IMPORTANCE FOR THE NARCISSIST, for the exceptionalist, lies not in the past, but in a world remade, a world made right in the present. Those who claim the mantle of DESTINY rarely see their future FATE as DOOM.  The self annointed AVATAR may find victory or exact vengeance with seeming impunity.  The righteous have left little for the rest of us in this world.  If our leaders feel exceptional in circumstance and talents and they act narcissistically among us, democracy and the rule of law may be lost with the wave of an imperial hand, life and death determined by the turn of a thumb.

HISTORY CYCLES  between reason and passion, between shared purpose and secret knowledge.  More than we may realize, we are creatures of MYTH.  Or perhaps myth only describes our condition.

QUESTION OF THE DAY: What do you know and how do you know it? How are you exceptional?

SOME LINKS THAT GOT THE HERETIK THINKING
[JOHN STEINBERG/RAW STORY] “What did the President know, and when did he know it?” An important question, to be sure, but I would like to suggest another, perhaps more revealing question: how did he know it?

[GUARDIAN UK] A police source has told the Guardian that there is no need for officers to verbally warn a suspect before opening fire.
The source said: "If the firearms team are reasonably certain the person is a suicide bomber then there is no need to issue any warning.
"Experience from other parts of the world shows that if a suicide bomber knows they are being followed by police, they will detonate."

Comments

[Rook]

I am unique in that I know I am not unique. I breath as all do. My heart circulates blood as occurs in others. I experience all that has been given me as has been given others, whether by a God, nature, or some other unexplainable source. I am unique in that I am the only me, one of a billion only me's on this planet.

[Rook]

Or, as Popeye would say: I ams what I ams and that's all that I ams.

[Pepper]

What a good question ... I see dangerous exceptionalism in this administration. I think it comes from reading "The Fountainhead" too young. So many people in this administration think that it was something special about them that made them powerful. They don't realize it was luck (Bush was born rich; Rove met Bush at the right time), the hard work of others to improve civil rights (Condoleezza Rice and Karen Hughes), or relations with past administrations (Rummy). They don't realize that forces outside themselves have made them powerful.

People who recognize the role of luck and fate in their success are often more merciful towards others who weren't dealt the same hand of cards.