The Baby in the Bathwater
The case against just throwing it all out
Desperate times call for desperate measures. To many, these seem like desperate times. They that believe this aren’t all just people of a political stripe or a specific cause, although they are certainly included. They are so disparate that they are arguably as true a representation of the spectrum of public thought than any other. While they are still a subset of society, they are large enough to have a very meaningful impact on the discussion of how society is governed.
For many people, there is a belief that the current path that society is on is unsustainable. You can pick from an array of reasons for this whether it be climate change, political unrest, famine, racial or other injustices, or simple greed and avarice. The reasons span across the political spectrum. There seems to always be a multitude of reasons for pessimism for every reason for optimism.
In the case of America, however, the pessimism runs deeper and at a more sinister level. Significant numbers of people on both the left and right see the other side not only as opponents or even enemies, but as downright evil. Forget for a moment, if you can, who is actually right or wrong. An objective analysis of this requires setting that aside. This deep seated enmity is primarily based on one thing, and that is ideology.
Ideological thinking is in conflict with critical thinking. Ideology in is denotation is benign. It is just a framework of concepts and even a suggestion of method for exploration. In its current connotation, however, it is a rigid set of rules that govern all truth including morality, ethics, and even (in its most perverse sense) belief in knowledge itself. In fact, it purports to be truth.
When ideology becomes truth, justice and liberty are at dire risk. The very right of free speech would effectively become null and void as any dissention from the ideology would violate truth and be intolerable. There is a reason why most systems of justice today have multiple avenues for redress and appeal. This is the basis of any system which is based not on some predetermined truth, but the exploration and discovery of truth.
The basis of this is humility, which in many respects is the opposite of ideology. Where ideology is sure, humility is contemplative. Where ideology is insistent, humility is inquisitive. Where ideology is condescending, arrogant, and aggressive, humility is demure, confident, and at peace.
Humility also has a secret weapon. It is the doorway to learning. After all, only a humble mind can receive wisdom. Perhaps this wisdom is what stops you from throwing out the stinky, dirty bathwater before you realized there was a baby in it. Where ideological thinking is akin to wearing blinders, humble thinking allows one to see the full panorama. Humility demands that we know what we are doing before we act.
Truth be told, none of us really know what we are doing. How many of you have lived before?