0198 Although Jones does not articulate the object that brings all into relation_2cC, I suspect that it_2cC is why nineteenth century Americans find the arts and architecture of old Europe so evocative.

0199 Now, I want to add some caveats.

This relational object_2cC reaches full differentiation by the time that Europe celebrates 1000 A.D.  Yet, only now, after 2000 A.D., has scholastic philosophy developed a way to allow its depiction.

This relational object_2cC is an actuality, as befits Peirce’s category of secondness.  Secondness consists of two contiguous real elements.  Most curiously, each real element consists of a nested form.  The contiguity, the substance, stands, in esse_ce, with Jesus (the Son of the Father and the Word of God), and in essence, with Jesus (the Son of Man and the Messiah of God’s chosen people).

0200 The Trinity appears in purple.

Mohammed’s revelation appears in green.

The Calvinist doctrine of covenant-election appears in red.

The radical individual is the form in red.

0201 Consequently, there is a lot to unwind.

So much so, that one’s structure_3a and identity_3b may consist of only a fragment of the relational object_2cC that calls all into being.

0203 What about those Catholic doctrines about the pope and Mary, mother of Jesus?

One must keep in mind that this relational object_2cC occupies the perspective level above sovereign decrees, laws and actions_2bC on the situation level.  Consequently, the pope is assumed_3cC to stand above any sovereign_3bC.  Also, Mary foundationally influences the potential of the object that brings all into relation_2cC because she is the mother of Jesus (as the Son of Man) as well as of God (Jesus as Son of the Father).

Theologically, Mary belongs to the potential of ‘consilience’_1cC.

Ironically, many contemporary Protestants accuse Catholics of an inversion of the co-opposition in the above figure.  They say that Mary_3c is assumed to be above any sovereign and that the pope_1c is supposed to be an agent of consilience_1c with respect to their “reformation”.

0204 Chapter 18 reports on a shift that occurs during the lifetime of American-born Orestes Brownson (1803-1876).  Orestes Brownson is a generation older that Henry Thoreau (1817-1862, the topic of Chapter 17), who ridiculed Calvinism in light of the identity_2b that he fashioned in his retreat to the shores of Walden Pond.

There is something “old school” in Orestes Brownson and “new school” in Henry Thoreau.

Consistent with the Quaker tradition of virtue-signaling one’s moral superiority by refusing to carry a gun, Thoreau embraces his self-aggrandizing innocence as an exemplar of Kant’s pure reason, which undergirds Kant’s practical reason.

0205 How elegant can an American intellectual get?

Here is a picture.

0206 Orestes Brownson grows up in the Calvinist tradition.  He decides that he wants to be a minister, but is unsure of which congregation to join.  According to Jones, there is not much to distinguish the various denominations at the time.  So, Brownson enters the Presbyterian Church at the age of 19.

What is the hitch?

Brownson finds Presbyterianism logically incoherent.

He concludes that reason must be a preamble to faith.

Does that sound like St. Anselm’s slogan, “Faith seeks understanding.”?

Maybe not exactly.

0207 Here is one of Brownson’s riddles.  Can the Presbyterians claim the right to break away from the Catholic Church and then deny Brownson the right to break away from the Presbyterians?

But, where would Brownson break to?

On one hand, it would have to be the Catholic Church.  On the other hand, it would have to be no church (which turns out to be Thoreau’s option).

0208  At 21 years old, Brownson changes from a supernaturalist to a rationalist and becomes a preacher of “Universalism”.  Unfortunately, universalism does not think much about scripture… er… the Bible, but other scriptures are fine, such as Scottish socialist Robert Owen’s and English political philosopher William Godwin’s book, Enquiry Concerning Political Justice.

Today, replace the word, “political” with the term, “social”.

0209 At 29 years old, Brownson is a Unitarian minister, which allows him to put humanity in the place of God.

Then, he attends some lectures by Theodore Parker (1810-1860), who had written several essays on the doctrines of the Catholic Church.

0210 At 39, Orestes Brownson has remarkable respect as an American writer.  He talks to everyone.  He knows artists and intellects of the day.  He notes that there is a secret dissatisfaction with the continuous divisions occurring in the Protestant tradition.  Jones discusses the multiplication of sects following the demise of Calvinism in America.

At 41, Brownson approaches the Irish bishop of Boston, and says that he wants to become a Catholic.

0211 Chapter 19 discusses the irony.

Irony?

Two types of Catholics immigrate to America in the first half of the 1800s, German and Irish.  The Germans immediately begin to blend in with other Americans.  The Irish congregate in big Northeastern cities, such as Boston, New York, and Philadelphia, because – to them – America is England writ large.  And, the English are never up to any good when it comes to the Irish.

0212 For three centuries, Protestant England runs roughshod over Catholic Ireland.  The Irish cling to their peasantry and religion as styles of resistance.

0213 So, imagine a convert from educated Boston, having left the Transcendental Synagogue for Roman Catholicism, moving to New York, the diocese of Bishop John Hughes, in order to aid the conversion of… what?… Irish to Protestants or Protestants to Irish peasantries?  Can I substitute the word “Americans” for “Protestants”?

What a trap.

Jones writes, “Brownson was too Catholic for the Yankees and to American for the Catholics.”

That is, the Irish Catholics.

0214 At 53, Orestes Brownson gives a commencement address at Fordham University.  Then, the bishop of New York, criticizes him for being too American.

0232 Why would John Calvin (1509-1564) have advocated for the Catholic Church to condemn “Americanism”?

What happened after the Catholic Church condemned Martin Luther (1483-1546)?

Being condemned can be good for business.

0233 Chapter 22 raises a question about two contending options for American identity_3b during the second half of the 1800s.

The Northern abolitionists unite against the lack of virtue of the Southern plantation owners.

The Northern transcendentalists unite against the undisclosed transcendental that is implicated by the gun.

Finally, the literary classes of America cannot wrap their heads around how such beautiful European art_1a can come from a civilization that lacks modern expertise_3b and wallows in superstition_2b and Dark-Age philosophy_2b.

0234 Here is a comparison.

Surely, adopting one normal context entails rejecting the other.

0235 The irony is that ethnic Catholics develop a hybrid identity, under an “ethnic-American” label.  So do clergy.  As a result, Americanism covertly identifies with the abolitionists (who are against the lack of virtue of others), the transcendentalists (who signal their lack of guilt by not owning guns), and the literary classes of America (who have faith in practical reason and marvel at how these Catholic ignoramuses could have produced such magnificent art).

0236 Chapter 25 starts with artistic license, so to speak.

During the War of 1860-1864, if a soldier in the Connecticut regiment goes on holiday, then he can use a handy manual, The Gentleman’s Guide, to the arts of New York City.

While there, the soldier can subscribe to mail order pornography, thus giving new meaning to the term “first-class mail”.

0237 The abolitionist Henry Ward Beecher (1813-1887) is the son of one of the last great Puritan ministers in America, Lyman Beecher (1775-1863).  Jones tells the story.  The son moves west, first from Connecticut to Ohio.  Here, he composes articles repudiating Catholicism.  Then, he moves to the real west, Indiana.  He begins to preach in the Methodist style.  He learns to speak like Emerson, while using different words.

Emerson says, “Self-reliance.”  Henry Beecher says, “The great law of Liberty.”

0238 Then, Beecher receives an offer to become pastor of a church in Brooklyn.

He accepts the offer and adopts a theatrical slogan.

Salvation comes from love, rather than obedience to the law.

0239 In the 1850s, gold from California arrives in New York.  60% of New York’s population is born in another land.  New York is cosmopolitan.  New York already offers ideal subject matter for a gentleman’s guide.

Beecher’s practical experience out west_1b inspires him to make freedom the cornerstone of his ministry_3b.

Freedom for what?

Well, he may have picked up a copy of The Gentleman’s Guide.

0240 Here is a picture of my associations.

0241 In Chapter 26, the author tells what happens next.

That story ends around the year 1867.

0242 Chapter 27 tells the story of Mark Twain (1835-1910), who arrives in New York shortly after the birth of… um… someone related to Henry Beecher.

“Mark Twain” is a technical term used by steamboat operators on the Mississippi River.

Mark Twain is the label for a man of the west, at ease with the ribald humor of Americans, as well as their Civil War-related moral decline.

Does Henry Beecher hire Mark Twain to be his publicity agent?

0243 Mark Twain takes a European vacation on a tour that Beecher arranges, but does not attend.

The tour takes him through some of the most beautiful cities in Europe.

He uses his notebooks to write The Innocents Abroad.

0244 Chapter 29 concerns a verdict.

Who is guilty?  Who is found innocent?

0245 The student should read Chapter 30, 31 and 33.

0246  Eight years after Mark Twain publishes Innocents Abroad, Henry James (1843-1916) publishes The American.

0247 The year is 1877.

One author represents the attitude of the west, which is still the frontier.  The other author expresses the attitudes of the east, which looks across the ocean… or is it the Jordan River?… at the civilization that Americans left behind.

0248 In Chapter 30, Jones discusses Henry James’s novel in detail.

In Chapter 31, Jones turns his attention to Henry Adams (1838-1918), the Old Man of the East, who is not Henry James.  The switch of focus is a little disorienting, because both men are named “Henry”.

0249 But, the year is still 1877.

In this year, federal troops withdraw from the South, ending Reconstruction.  The new post-war era is to be called, “Redemption”.  Three decades later, the war itself would get a new label, “the Civil War”.  It is amazing what a change in labels can accomplish.

In this year of 1877, the American labor movement surfaces with a surprising railroad strike.

In this year, a descendent of President John Quincy Adams, Henry Adams, resigns from his professorship at Harvard, disappointed that his dream of a unique American Mandarin class had not come to fruition.  If he had only lived another half of a century.  Once science encourages the birth of “expertise”, Henry Adam’s dream becomes a reality.

He must have known what was coming, because he writes an autobiography that is published right after his death and after the conclusion of the so-called “First World War”.

Jones tells the story of unfortunate Henry.

0250 The War of Southern Rebellion and the War of Northern Aggression derails the American experiment, as well as Henry Adam’s career as a public intellectual.  Even his professorship at Harvard does not seem to give him a lift.

0251 Chapter 33 covers what happens to Henry Adam’s wife, and how Henry spends his end of days.

At this juncture, I would like to mention an American philosopher whose life (more or less) overlaps with Henry Adams.  This philosopher is Charles Sanders Peirce (1839-1914).  Charles is the son of a Professor of Mathematics at Harvard University.  Tremendous intellectual ferment occurs during the latter half of the nineteenth century.  Very little of that turmoil influences the westward expansion of the Re-united United States or the migration of Catholic Europeans to the East Coast (Italians join the incoming Irish and Germans).

Peirce does not concern himself with Protestant or Catholic concerns.  Rather, like Henry Adams, he recognizes that everyone is talking as if science is the key to all knowledge worth knowing.  The century-long contests between Catholic and Protestant doctrines are no longer relevant, since science surpasses both.  Unlike Henry Adams, he reads the Baroque scholastic, Francisco Suarez (1548-1617), then arrives at the same definition of sign-relation as John Poinsot (1589-1644).

So, while Henry Adams ends his days writing paeans (in effect, aesthetic travel guides) to Catholic European tourist destinations, Peirce wrestles with the causalities inherent in sign-relations.  The diagrams in this examination are products of Peirce’s postmodern reclamation of Baroque scholastic thought.

0252 The student should read chapters 35, 37, 38, 39, 40 and 41.

Keep in mind the following two-level interscope.

0253 Chapter 35 discusses Theodore Roosevelt (1858-1919), who serves as president at the turn of the century (1901-1909).  His presidency starts with the assassination of William McKinley. At the time, Roosevelt is Vice President.

Bullets are in the air during this time.  Lakota leader Sitting Bull (dies 1890), New Orleans Police Chief David Hennessy (1890), Lamatta Chief White Bird (1892), US Chicago Representative Carter Harrison Sr (1893), President of France Marie Francois Sadi Carnot (1894), King Umberto in Italy (1900), and so on.

0254 Thoreau’s option reaches a nice optimum, with the people_2bm remaining Protestant as they take the form of democracy_2bf.   The people_2bm amend the Constitution, now that the states are reunited and… um… redeemed.  Americans are still walking_3a to settle the frontier, but now they can take trains out west.  Some Americans are driving automobiles. Some are taking mechanized passenger ships back to Europe, for “vacation”.

So, walking_3a stands in for what Thoreau does, that is, ideating reality_3a.

Here is a picture of Thoreau’s option, as the western frontier comes to a close.

Notice that ‘pure reason (innocence)’_1a occupies the same slot as ‘gun’_1a.  By not carrying a gun_1a, one signals one’s virtue_2am (and the nature_2am that unites us).  By deploring people who carry guns, one denounces their lack of virtue_2am.

What does this imply?

When the people_2bm [stand for] themselves_2bf, the selves_2af that the people_2bm stand for are the virtuous ones_2af, not the ones who carry guns.

If that makes sense, then you might be a candidate to become an expert.

0255 Teddy Roosevelt promotes sports and sportsmanship.  Democracy is so successful that Protestant people_2bm will be supplanted by our nation_2bm.  Plus, our nation_2bm stands for “a muscular Christianity_2bf“.  Muscular Christianity_2bf virtually situates our attitudes_2af in the normal context of winning_3a arising from the potential of ‘fair play’_1a.

Here is a diagram.

0256 Notice how ‘fair play (our lack of guilt)’_1a occupies the same slot for ‘gun’_1a in the original American identity.  Teddy Roosevelt is known for his “gunboat diplomacy”.  So, guns have not really left the realm of possibility_1a.  Rather, ‘the gun as a talisman for some opaque transcendental that is too terrifying consider’ retains its charisma, since guns are employed for assassinations by criminals (1890, maybe 1893), anarchists (1894, 1900, 1901, 1914) and agents of the state (1890, 1892).

So, what is the point?

‘Guns’_1a have no place in ‘fair play’_1a.  At the same time, ‘guns’_1a serve as indicators for a lack of fair play_1a, so to speak.  The use of ‘guns’_1a defies practical reason_1b in a nation_2bm that stands for Christianity_2bf in the normal context of expertise_3b.

0257 Chapter 37 discusses an example of how expertise_3b develops at the turn of the century.  The artisan is eclipsed by the industrial designer.

0258 Chapter 38 discusses the closing of the American frontier in the popular (or… rather, the literary class’s) imagination.  A key event is the Columbia Exposition in Chicago in 1893.  Jones reports on a speech by Frederick Jackson Turner at this spectacular “World Fair”.  He announces that frontier opportunities had come to a close.

According to Jones, Theodore Roosevelt personifies a new American identity, characterized by the above diagram.  Situation-level matter_2bm veils the federal government, as a centralizing state, beneath the tapestry of nationalism_2bm.   Our nationalism_2bm stands for a strenuous Christianity_2bf in the normal context of expertise_3b and arising from the potential of practical (that is, “not religious” reason)_1a.  Protestant Christians_2bf virtually situate the sportsmanship_2am that trains healthy attitudes_2af.

0259 At the same time, Protestant Christians_2bf increasingly become wage slaves to a managerial class_3b(1b) working for oligarchs_2c, such as the Mellons, the Rockefellers and the corporations that they own.

0260 Part 2 (The Rehabilitation of “Nature”) leads to Part 3 (The Return of the Satanic Wilderness).

The first wilderness stretches out from the fortress edge of the Massachusetts Bay Colony.

The second wilderness stretches to the north (Canada), the south (Mexico and Central and South America), the east (across the Atlantic to Europe and the Middle East) and west (across the Pacific to the Far East).

That sounds like an empire to me.

The second “wilderness” is tamed by the American empire.

0261 Chapter 39 discusses the writer, Jack London (1876-1916).  London comes to age in San Francisco.   He reads European authors of the day.  He circulates in Bohemian circles.  His novel, Sea Wolf (1904), serves as a witness to Darwinism replacing Calvinism as the hidden grammar of the nascent American empire.

I wonder, “Where have I seen the term, ‘hidden grammar’, before?’

Oh, it_2a labeled the contiguity in the content-level actuality_2a.

I wonder, “Can I adjust Teddy Roosevelt’s revision to embrace Darwinism?”

This serves as a good template for reflecting on the author’s review of Sea Wolf.

0262 Chapter 40 discusses the writer Ernest Hemmingway (1899-1961), who was born in Oak Park, Illinois.  That is a nice suburb of Chicago.

Henry Adams dies in 1918, when the First World War ends.  Adams’s autobiography, The Education of Henry Adams comes on market.  At the same time, Hemmingway is recovering from wounds that he received while driving an ambulance in the First World War.  After the war, he makes his way to Paris, where he meets Ezra Pound and other literary figures of the so-called “Lost Generation”.

0263 Jones sets the scene by discussing the birth of modern art.  “Modern art” involves a clever and subversive re-definition of the term “visual arts”, from decorative to… well… transgressive.

I suppose this indicates that neither Protestantism, nor nationalism nor Darwinism are adequate to appreciate the end of the world as everyone knew it.

Oh, I meant to say “the First World War”.

0264 What is left?

Science, of course.  Modern expertise_3b carries a certain righteousness_3b, as well as certain freedoms_3b.  Modern reason_1b accesses opportunities_1b that practical reason_1b does not.  For example, consider the logics of modern finance, quantum mechanics,  industrial-production, and mass-marketing.  All these fields develop in the interwar period, along with the ideologies of Marxism and Fascism.

0265 What do these ideologies have in common?

They both rely on modern experts_3b operating of opportunities_1b.

Of course, their subversions_2bm are um… “value neutral”_1bf.

0266 Here is how I associate Hemingway’s “Lost Generation” approach to Jack London’s revision.

0267 Chapter 41 covers William Falkner (1897-1962), who writes a novella titled, “The Bear”.

This portion of Jones’s book looks back at the American identity and wonders, “How have we sold our identity?”

0268 It seems that Americans sold their identity_3b for a bowl of porridge.

Or something like that.

Americans pass from sola fide_3b, sola sciptura_2b and sola gratia_1b to the following nested forms, as well as everything in between.

0269 The student should read Chapters 43, 44, 46 and 47.

0270 Chapter 43 opens with a quick synopsis.  By 1902, the American frontier had been replaced by eye-catching progress.  Also, popular novels fictionalize the failure of Protestant America to envision a common identity.

This makes sense, in so far as, in the Protestant movement, every literate person is granted equal disposition_1a to read the Bible_2am, and render his own interpretation_2af.  That interpretation_2af generally falls within established congregations (the Puritans, the Methodists, the Presbyterians, and so on).  The American Revolution accommodates the various powers_1b by establishing a relatively weak tripartite central (or “federal”) government over strong state governments_1b.  This political arrangement is a practical solution_1b, allowing people of certain faiths_1b the freedom_3b to self-segregate into their own jurisdiction_2b.

0271 Here is a picture of (what I will call) the Virginian’s option.

0273 What is this potential of ‘gun’_1a?

It is easy to understand how the Bible (for Christians) or nature (for Transcendentalists)_2bm unites individuals of like minds_2af.

But how does the ‘gun’_1a potentiate that actuality_2a?

0274 Well, when one is walking_3a with a ‘gun’_1a, one is conveying a meaning_1a, a presence_1b and a message_1c.

The meaning_1a has something to do with the possibility of self-defense_1a, especially in regards to mortal conflict.  A gun_1a cannot help finding water.  A gun_1a can help when a rustler is “guarding” the water hole.

The presence_1b has something to do with the possibility of practical reason_1b.  Practical reason_1b allows the people_2bm to stand for themselves_2bf, in the normal context of freedom_3b.  Practical reason_1b is another label for ‘responsibility’_1b.  Recall that freedom and responsibility constitute a “co-opposition”.  When one is the normal context₃ the other informs the potential₁.  Responsibility associates to faith.  Freedom associates to grace.

0275 The message_1c?

That is a good question, since the perspective level does not even appear in the above figure.

I can say the following from the clues offered in the examination.

0276 Whatever the perspective level is, I must assume its normal context.

In other words, a perspective-level “assume_3c” virtually brings a situation-level identity_3b into relation with the potential of content-level structure_3a.  The logics of thirdness are exclusion, complementarity and alignment.

In the Virginian’s option pictured above, I must assume_3c that situation-level freedom_3b (or grace_3b) situates content-level walking_3a (or ideating reality_3a).

0277 More crucially, I assume_3c the perspective-level actuality_2c.

Of course, the most magnificent assumption_3c pertains to the object that brings all into relation_2cC. That_2cC includes “God”.  And, perhaps I can add, “us”, as participating in this object_2cC. 

According to the twentieth-century German philosopher and historian, Eric Voegelin (1901-1985), Christians come up with the most differentiated expression of the society-tier perspective-level actuality_2cC, sometime between the 600s and 1000s, centuries before the so-called “Reformation”.

0278 Finally, I somehow intuitively grasp the potential_1cC that there can be an object that brings all into relation_2cC.

I wonder whether this is where the gun_1a comes into the picture, as a talisman for consilience_1c in the face of a failure of practical reason_1b.  When practical reason_1b fails, then the people cannot stand for themselves_2b in the illumination of their freedom to assemble_3b, and live_3b, and express themselves_3b. 

0279 Where are we to go when people who live without a sense of guilt_1a actualize attitudes_2af that express the hidden grammar of nihilism_2am in the normal context of their survival_3a?

It is a jungle out there.

0280 Here is a diagram containing that question.

0281 On the situation level, the normal context of criminal expertise (the righteousness of criminals and their lawyers)_3b brings the actuality_2b, {the principles of our subversion_2bm [substantiate] our fitness over our victims_2bf}, into the possibilities inherent in ‘criminal reason, which is opportunistic to the core’_1b.

0282 In Chapter 44, Jones looks at The Virginian, a novel by Oren Wister (1860-1938).

The book is published in 1902.  The movie comes out in 1929.

0283 In Chapters 46 and 49, Jones considers movies starring Clint Eastwood (1930-present).

0285 The student should read Chapters 42 and 45.

0284 Chapter 42 reports on Walter Lippmann (1889-1974), born in a wealthy Jewish family in New York.  He receives a classical education at a private school.  In 1922, after America’s victory in the First World War, “the war to end all wars”, he publishes a book titled Public Opinion.

Perhaps, he knows that the similarly positioned Edward Bernays (1891-1995), nephew of renown psychotherapist, Sigmund Freud, is hot on the same topic, publishing Crystallizing Public Opinion (1923) and Propaganda (1928) in quick succession.  After the Second World War, Bernay capitalizes on his fame by writing Public Relations (1952) and The Engineering of Consent (1955).

0285 I like to call the First World War, 1914-1918, the First Battle Among the Enlightenment Gods, The War Among Naive Mercantilists.

During this time, Lippman works for the intelligence section of the Allied Expeditionary Force in France.  He helps draft President Woodrow Wilson’s Fourteen Point Speech.  He hears about the success of George Creel’s Committee on Public Information, America’s first propaganda ministry.  Creel (1876-1953) later wrote a tell-all titled, How We Advertised America (1920).

0286 Lippmann concludes that identity_3b may be framed as a typology, based on (what E. Michael Jones calls) categories of the mind.

Plus, the subtlest and most pervasive influencers create and maintain these categories, using broadcast media.

0287 Now, I pause to remind myself of the contemporary Thomist construct of identity_3b and structure_3a in order to consider the situation and content levels actualities that get packaged into a stereo- (two) -type (actualities).

Here is a diagram.

What is a stereotype?

The first type in “stereotype” dwells in content-level matter_2am.  It_2am substantiates a form_2af, corresponding to the way that we experience the world_2af.  We are structured_3a to be disposed_1a to certain attitutes_2af that are informed by one or another stereotype_2am.  The task of propaganda_1b is to situate our attitudes_2a by placing a typology in content-level matter_2am. 

Then, the form_2af that we have been structured_3a to experience_2af is situated according to a principle of unity_2bm that substantiates an embodiment_2bf.  The task of propaganda_1b is to prime_2bm a response_2bf through the second type of “stereotype”, dwelling in the situation-level principle of unity_2bm.

The two types in stereotype play the same music through different level matters.

The result sounds so real.

0288 Lippmann writes at the dawn of popular acceptance of moving pictures.

0289 Moving pictures?

In the realm of image processing, a sequence of slightly different images_2am substantiate the form of a mechanically driven display of one image following the other_2af.  Then, the human mind has the power to apply a principle of unity_2bm that substantiates the embodiment of motion_2bf.

Then, sequences of moving-picture clips_2am may be strung together_2af and the audience will apply another principle of unity_2bm to appreciate a scene_2bf.

This constitutes the first type in “stereotype”.

Scenes portray the content-level matters_2am of action and plotline_2af, and the audience spontaneous situates the content-level form_2af using an implicit principle of unity_2bm into a cognitively embodied “narrative”_2bf.

This constitutes the second type in “stereotype”.

The result looks so real.

0290 It is almost as if identity_3b, powers_1b, structure_3a and dispositions_1a are simply going along for the ride.

Why would this be the case?

Is this how humans evolved to be?

0291 So, what happens when stereotypes are promulgated (through cinematic narratives manufactured in order to serve… how shall I say it?… “special interests”)?

Indeed, Jones wonders whether Ernest Hemingway and the Lost Generation are stereotypes manufactured by Madison Avenue (New York) and Hollywood (Los Angeles) as expressions of American cultural imperialism.

A new system arises in order to manipulate public opinion_2bm and orchestrate the accumulation of power and money_2bf through the invention and the promulgation of stereotypes_1am.

The vessel_3b(1b) that accrues both power and money is a network of big(il)lib power brokers who fashion themselves as “liberal” (that is, freedom-oriented) but are really interested in using the authority of government to suppress anyone who would hold them to moral account (that is, responsible).  In other words, this vessel is a contradiction in terms, being simultaneously liberal and illiberal.

Consequently, I label this network, “big-government (il) liberalism”, or “big(il)lib” for short.

0292 Here is a picture of Walter Lippmann as a nemesis to the American tradition of walking with a Bible and a gun.

0293 On the situation level, the normal context of working the system_3b brings the actuality_2b where {our success in accumulating money and power_2bm stands for our fitness over the goyim_2bf} into relation with the potential of using propaganda_1b as a style of public reasoning_1b that cultivates the hidden grammar of stereotype_2am-fueled attitudes_2af.

On the content level, the normal context of manufacturing consent_3a brings the actuality of propaganda_1b-situated stereotypes_2am substantiating public attitudes_2af into relation with the potential of ‘selling an agenda, as if we do not benefit from moving the product’_1a.

Jones frames this nemesis as an inversion of Jeffersonian democracy, where the people stand for themselves_2b.

0294 Chapter 45 mentions Ayn Rand (1905-1982), the author of Atlas Shrugged, (1957), as a teaser for his real intent, which is to discuss the fates of the movie-star, Gary Cooper (who plays the role of The Virginian in the movie) and the literary-star, Ernest Hemingway (who acts as an author of American literature as the tradition turns into a curation by the mavens of modern art).

0295 The student should read chapters 47 and 48.

0296 What happened to American literature?

Does it transform into some disorienting house of mirrors.

Does propaganda constitute the new American written word, just like the moving pictures?

0297 Here is a diagram of how this new literary style might operate.

A new American literature_2bf serves as the embodiment_2bf of big government (il)liberalism_2bm.

0298 Chapter 47 discusses The Moynihan Report.

In 1965, the Catholic Assistant Secretary of Labor, Daniel Patrick Moynihan (1927-2003), releases a report concerning why blacks (a category of the big(il)libs) are not as economically successful as whites (another category of the big(il)libs).  The primary reason is broken families (which are the products of a separate big(il)lib agenda, called “sexual liberation”).  Sexual liberation produces broken, fatherless, families, which then must be supported by federal programs with titles such as “welfare for families with dependent children” (a big(il)lib program).  The result is a cycle where the children of welfare families end up as… um… welfare-seeking heads of families with dependent children.

0299 Jones has already written extensively on this topic.

But, does he realize that the public responses to this report constitute a new genre of American fiction?

0300 The Moynihan Report is immediately opposed by big(il)lib establishment figures such as Robert W. Spike (1923-1966), then executive director of the National Churches’ Commission on Religion and Race.  Author of The Freedom Revolution and the Churches, he calls for a political solution.  The “whites” need to expiate their guilt.  Or, something like that.

0301 To me, if this doesn’t sound like a new American fiction, I don’t know what does.

Pity the reverend who has a control file at the disposal of someone with money and power.

Pity the fellow who speaks up, then is served a lawsuit about some… how shall I say it?.. episode of sexual liberation, whether true or not.

0302 This is the literary genre of manufacturing consent.

Stereotypes_2am are like esse_ce.  They constitute a new (virtual) wilderness where human dispositions_1a are subject to literary and cinematic manipulation.  Our attitudes_2af are like the essence that stands between human structure_3a and our evolved dispositions_1a.

The content-level category-based nested form with the normal context of making influence_3a is also like esse_ce.  Making influence_3a is the normal context for a cognitive wilderness_2a arising from the potential of ‘selling a product or agenda’_1a.   Both the normal context_3a and the potential_1a are sign-interpretants of a sign-vehicle, a perspective-level actuality_2c that stands behind the curtain_2b (so to speak) of stereotypes_2am, attitudes_2af, expert self-regard_2bm and the literature of… what?

What is the appropriate label for this new American genre?

0303 Chapter 48 concerns critical race theory and the destruction of American identity.

Can I locate the sought-after label within these concerns?

0304 Jones writes about the subversion of Catholic identity in the ethnic neighborhoods of Philadelphia.

The intelligensia_2bm – the literary classes – now refer to the people who used to live in those neighborhoods as “white”_2bf.  The unspoken accusation is that these “whites_2am” are the reason why “blacks_2am” cannot make a living.  It is their attitudes_2af.  The unspoken accusation covers up the reality that the federal government’s welfare programs have subsidized broken families for generations.

0305 The only promoted remedy is for the federal government to step in and take affirmative action.  This generates new expertise and constitutes the (il) of big(il)lib.  Freedom of thought for modern expertise_3b is mirrored by an expertise that defines the system_3b through the fiction of legal decrees standing for enforcing morals_2b according to the dictates of ‘an opportunistic modern situational ethics’_1b.

0306 Here is a comparison of the Lost Generation’s and Affirmative Action’s situation level nested forms.

Each term seems to be a variant of the other.

What happens when both these situation-levels are reflections in the mirror of… what?…

0307 If Jones states that critical theory is the nemesis of American Identity, then is something else standing in the mirror of this nemesis?

0321 Welcome to the matrix.

Welcome to a simulated reality constituted by agents that work the system (Q) and minions that believe in the system (R).

The system is always changing, yet always the same, because it lives by cancellation of their opposition.  The system replaces a suspect person’s identity_3b with a stereotype_2am that opposes the adopted agenda_1a.  The stereotype-tagged guilty one_2af deserves social cancellation_1a (the gun_1a of critical theory).

0322 Jones tells the story of a person who… well… had an old-style American identity.

In the big noumenon, identity_3b virtually situates structure_3a.

In the big noumenon of the nemesis of the American Identity (Q), big(il)lib expertise works the system_3b and virtually situates manufacturing influence_3a.

In the big noumenon of those self-identifying within the mirror of nemesis (R), big(il)lib expertise believes in the system_3b and virtually situates making an impact_3a.

0323 For example, self-regarding racial theorists_2bm (Q) compose literature_2bf that isolates stereotypes_2af that – through an unspoken contiguity called “hidden grammar” – substantiate attitudes_2af within the normal context of making influence_3a and the potential of  ‘selling a narrative (that veils the guilt of interventionalists on the perspective level)’_1a.

0324 Oh, did I say “narrative”?

I meant to say, “product”.

0325 For example, educational committees_2bm (R) distill what needs to be enforced_2bf from the fictions of critical theory_2bf.  These experts_3b advocate policies_2b in light of what they perceive are political opportunities_1b.  In this way, the propaganda_1b underlying the literature_2bf of higher-level authorities_2bm manifests as stereotypes_2af that are regarded as relevant_2bf in the normal context of making an impact_3a operating on the potential of ‘the adopted agenda’_1a.

0326 Allow me to compare critical theory (Q) and the mirroring identity of the big(il)lib believer (R).

Here is a comparison that starts with the situation-level normal context.

0327 On the side of nemesis (Q), the normal context of big(il)lib expertise_3b has the intellectual freedom to “work” the system.  Unrestrained intellectual liberty_3b subverts the (old) targeted system (say, the institutional structures_3a of the American Identity of the 1900s), using apparently clever tactics (typical of the manipulation of words in propaganda_1b).

On the side of the mirroring identity (R), the normal context of big(il)lib expertise_3b internalizes the knowledge created by cutting-edge critical theorists_3b.  Even though both nemesis and mirror are regarded as experts, there is a matter-of-fact distinction.  For example, when a language professor teaches a course informed by the critical theories of Foucault_3b, she contextualizes the French theorist’s proclamations as if they are legal decrees_2bm, carrying the weight of authority_2bm. The students know that the professor will use the opportunities afforded by classwork_1b to enforce_2bf that authority_2bm.

0328 The comparison continues in the following figure.

0329 Here is a reminder.  “Big(il)lib” is short for big government (il)liberalism.  The bigger the government gets, the more illiberal the self-declared “liberal” will act.

0330 Potential on the situation level_1b situates the entire content-level nested form, particularly the actuality_2a.

0331 On the nemesis side (Q), the technical language of big(il)lib reason_1b yields propaganda_1b which situates the stereotypes_2am that guide our attitudes_2af by way of a hidden grammar.  [Hidden grammar] is the contiguity between the matter of stereotypes_2am and the form of our attitudes_2af.

On the side of the mirroring identity (R), the action-oriented language of political opportunity_1b yields advocacy (calls to action)_1b that situate stereotypes as matter_2am and proclaims the importance of the attitudes that stereotypes call for_2af.

0332 The comparison is completed in the following figure.

0333 On the nemesis side (Q), making influence_3a is situated by the potential of propaganda_1b.

On the mirror side (R), making an impact_3a is situated by the potential of political opportunity_1b.

Anyone tagged with one of the old American identities is outside this system.  Indeed, the two sides function to sap the resources of those outside their fiction.

0334 On the nemesis side (Q), liberated theorists_3b write the theoretical thought-pieces_2bf that govern the stereotypes_2am that “speak to” our attitudes_2af.

On the mirror side (R), educated believers_3b derive the laws inherent in those thought pieces_2bf in order to enforce_2bf the realness (not fictionality) of the stereotypes_2am, thereby making them palpably real_2af or “relevant_2af“.

Is that not what good fiction is supposed to do?

0335 Finally, both the nemesis of American Identity and those who mirror the nemesis manifest the potential of having no guilt_1a, just like the Satan, at the opening of John Milton’s Paradise Lost.  And, for Americans, that potential is precisely what carrying a gun aims to mitigate.

0336 The student should read the epilogue.