Times like this cause me to examine the picture of my cultural experience. While consuming newsworthy events in these United States I am oft-distant and dependent on the news media to paint a picture of what is happening. But is the picture I am receiving a Rembrandt or a Picasso? Words are written, interviews enacted, and cellphone videos captured but where do I find the truth?
Perspective makes the world go around. Each day the Sun comes up and then sets as if it revolves around the Earth. Science tells us this is an illusion. Even an elementary education proves this so… and the world is not flat… and astronauts landed on the moon. But there are always differing perspectives even in the face of facts.
When push comes to shove, I turn to the classics; the authors and thinkers who have impressed me with their logic. One who currently has my attention is Dietrich Bonhoeffer, a German pastor and theologian martyred by the Nazis just days before their surrender in an apparent attempt to keep him from saying, “I told you so!” after the war. The Prologue to his Letters and Papers from Prison includes a section called On Stupidity. In it he attempts to comprehend how so many educated, advanced minds in Germany consented to and conspired with such evil. Bonhoeffer concludes that humanity is flawed by an impulse which overtakes the rational mind (Facts) in favor of an emotional pretext (Propaganda) creating a consciousness known as Stupidity.
But in today’s political discourse, how do we determine which viewpoints consist of Bonhoeffer’s hypothesis? His theory of stupidity is a double-edged sword, cutting across all political persuasions as they interpret the U.S. Constitution and Amendments. How these documents are perceived establishes which side of current events one finds themselves. But which ideologies are underpinned by Stupidity? The longevity of this Country’s founding documents is evidence Stupidity, though rogues and naysayers persist, has been unable to overcome the Reason embedded within their framework. So may it be today.
Happy 250th America!
Daniel Cunningham, Jefferson IA
