Wake Of Liberty: 16 – We The People
Cooley has lit a small fire by one of the pillars. He is telling Smyth a story.
“Rebellion, Mr. Smyth, has both good and bad sides to it. It is a complex issue and very hard to delineate. But the premise is simple and straightforward, involving the right to protest against any administration that has broken the social contract with its individual constituents by becoming oppressive towards them. My dear buddy John Locke said these words to me, straight to my face, like I’m telling you now, at a spirit gathering. But I, being a simpler creature, prefer to shave things down and call them by their name. My version of rebellion is the following: terminate a situation and initiate a new one. End of story.”
Cooley grabs a rock and bangs the pillar with it. A spark flies across the room, slicing the darkness in two.
“There is more to it than that, of course. It’s tricky and dirty business, which requires pain and sacrifice. Bad things have happened in its name, as have with every noble cause, and the stories are never black and white. Rebellion harbors rebels of all colors and hues, some of which are true visionaries, seizing the moment to forge the future, others being closer to crime and avarice, hiding behind the exalted skirt of ‘Rebellion as Redeemer’.”
The exalted skirt of Rebellion as Redeemer! I like that. Sounds impressive.
“I’m afraid they are not my words. Locke came up with the phrase in a gathering of spirits in a Virginia womb. We were on a tour of the American Revolution, showing some European students around. I’ll tell you about it sometime.”
Yes, Cooley, sometime later. One tour at a time, please, if you don’t mind. I’m having a hard time with this one as it is. Now remind me who John Locke was.
“A British philosopher and revolutionary thinker. The man who believed humans were born like blank slates, upon which experience inscribed its discourse.”
Right, I read about him in a social sciences class. John Locke, the rationalist, as opposed to Thomas Hobbes, the empiricist, the man who wrote Leviathan, if I remember correctly; who thought Man was a wolf to man; who thought humans were innately aggressive, selfish, and greedy creatures in need of authoritarian rule to be kept in check.
“That is correct, Mr. Smyth. Contrary to Locke – and a few years before him, during the early and mid 1600s – Hobbes came up with the idea that men, sic, needed to engage, or rather, be forced to engage, in a strict social contract with their rulers in order to be governed effectively and be protected from their own vices. In Hobbes’s mind, authoritarianism was the only mode of governance fit for humanity, and truth be told, he had a point, yet he got duly carried away with it. He discounted the fact that those in power were subject to the same vices as those they were governing. To him, this was a technicality and non-issue. Monarchs were not mere mortals, on the contrary, they were special, supreme and, thus, not afflicted with the same limitations. Or so he thought.”
Go on.
“A monarch’s personality was immune to all vice, according to Hobbes. To him, monarchs were naturally endowed to govern the human wolf and keep order in the land.”
Sounds like an x-rated version of monotheism, with lupines taking the place of sheep and hunters the place of shepherds.
Hobbes wrote Leviathan, the seminal book on despotism and the Monarch's right to rule supreme
“That’s an interesting analogy. Thank you for that, I’ve never heard it before. I’ll be sure to tell Hobbes when I see him, though I don’t have high hopes for that; he avoids all spirit gatherings like the plague. Some say he still has some issues to resolve. Others believe he has gone over to the dark side. Never mind, what was I saying? Oh yes, Hobbes believed monarchs could rule as supreme rulers, endowed as they supposedly were with more virtues than commoners, but not on behalf of God or anything like that. Hobbes wasn’t particularly fond of the Church, as you may have already gathered, nor they of him. When he described man as wolf, he essentially scuttled his membership with the clergy, as well as his relationship with the divine. His philosophy on despotic rule and government was in fact secular, based on a faith placed in the supreme standing of the monarch as a superior being; someone who possessed great knowledge and profound understanding of human nature; the final arbitrator on all matters of society; the only figure able to curb the destructive tendencies of humans. The Monarch.”
Stop saying the word Monarch, Cooley, you are getting on my nerves.
Cooley gives me a sharp look, then throws the stone he was holding to the side. It crashes on the rubble unnaturally loudly.
“As I was saying, Mr. Smyth, Hobbes’s views on science and nature are mechanistic and monistic. He regards people as machines created to obey the rules of the material universe. He believes there are no mental or spiritual elements at work, only matter. He believes that perception and the mind are the extensions of a material world working on our sensory organs. He argues that free will is an illusion, and that the basic drive behind humans is to seek pleasure and avoid pain.”
Cooley picks up another rock and strikes the pillar with it. A flash of light blinds me. When my eyesight returns, he is leaning on the other pillar, eyeing me through orange eyes.
“Enter John Locke, in the mid to late 1600s. He believes humans have innate faculties but not innate ideas and that people are born like blank slates into a world subsequently shaped by experience. He argues that experience stimulates and creates ideas through sensation and reflection, and that the mind is something distinct, separate from the material physical world, and yet, interacting with it somehow to create ideas.”
The fire in the room roars for a second, then subsides.
“It is an extraordinary perspective, a far leap from the beliefs of the day. At the time it was thought that ideas existed somewhere intangible, like in a collective reservoir, where they were hiding in waiting, potentially available for all people to retrieve. My dear friend Descartes said that.”
Descartes?
“Yes, the father of modern Western philosophy. He believed in a divinely-kept well of thoughts, which people accessed to become conscious and creative.”
I know who Descartes is, Cooley. I read about him in class too. You just pronounced his name funny. Regardless, don’t you think his notion of a well of thoughts sounds more like the garble of a kook or a theologian than a philosopher?
“Descartes was no kook or theologian, I assure you. He kick-started modern philosophy, giving humanity a great thrust forward. But being the founder he was, he made a few assumptions along the way that proved incomplete and which, over the years, needed to get amended. In this case, he believed humans had limitless innate potential, which could be stimulated by divine intervention and pumped with ideas through a heavenly funnel. It was a superb idea for the time, but had plenty of room for improvement. Like all human things.”
Cooley throws a nasty glance at me. I stare back at him, unwilling to be terrorized. My heart begins to race but I try to hide it.
He smiles and hovers over to the fire.
“Hobbes improved on that idea, Mr. Smyth, taking it a step further. He added logic to it. He made the case for a reactive mind in a mechanical universe reacting to cause and effect. Ever heard of cause and effect, Mr. Smyth?”
Locke is considered the father of liberalism. He advocated the people's right to rebel against their rulers and annul oppressive social contracts
Yes, I have. It’s how everything works.
“Good. But incomplete. Thankfully, Locke had something to say about that. Dry cause and effect wasn’t good enough for him, and neither was Hobbes’s mechanistic, reactive model of the world. So he elaborated on it, making the first modern arguments for the creative mind.”
Cooley picks up another rock. I have a feeling he’s going to throw it at me and smash my head.
“Now, would it shock you to hear that Locke’s political views supported a government by the people and for the people? Not only that, he also considered elections a proper way to set up a social contract between individuals and their administration. He considered legislature to be part of that social contract. And he defended the people’s right to rebellion in order to annul a tyrannical or frigid social contract.”
My eyes are transfixed on the rock in Cooley’s hands. He gleams for a moment, then puts it down gently, smiling.
Stop baiting me, Cooley. Just tell me what you want to say.
“John Locke, Mr. Smyth, is one of the major influences on the Founding Fathers of the United States, the first modern nation to rise to power by breaking the social contract with its monarch. It was the first to devise a new social contract, a constitution based not on religious or divinely-justified rights but on rational thought, on natural laws and rights. On human rights.”
He pauses, waiting for me to say something. I stay silent. He continues.
“The Founding Fathers of the United States, Mr. Smyth. Pioneers of liberty, enterprise, and rational free thought, exercising their right to rebel, claiming what we now consider their inalienable rights and privileges.”
The smile turns into a smirk.
“But in the eyes of the British nothing more than criminals and dissidents.”
His hand moves with terrible speed, thrusting the rock at me. It smashes into the pillar, right by my ear, sending me reeling to the ground.
I stay down with my hands over my head, waiting for a second blow that never comes. I open my eyes and look up, saying nothing. Cooley is holding another rock, tossing it up and down, up and down. I sit back up, staring at him, frozen in place. I have the urge to piss myself but hold it in. It is replaced by the urge to piss on him, to humiliate him for humiliating me, for tracing out my weaknesses so cruelly and making me feel cowardly and worthless. Hatred floods through me from top to bottom.
“As you can see, Mr. Smyth, power makes the world go round. And perspective governs everything, especially a successful and dominant one. It holds the quill to the paper and writes the future. Here, have some more soup. You deserve another bowl.”
He thrusts the bowl in my hands and smacks me in the face lightly, raising his brow.
I begin to gobble the horrid slop down. It’s all I can do for now.
“There’s a good little boy. Do as you’re told.”
This is not fair, Cooley. You’ve made your point already, why are you rubbing it in?
“Oh, so you think I’ve made my point already? You think I should move on? Is that it? Show you the next piece of the puzzle and get it over with?”
Yes Cooley. I mean, I get it, I get it, damn it. Life was unfair, and those in power abused their power, making those below them suffer, forcing them to live in misery and do their bidding and all sorts of nasty things – live in poverty – obey blindly – live in fear, I get it. What else do you want from me?”
I feel something crack inside my mouth. I spit it out. It looks like a bone.
“Found another finger in your food?”
Rebellion leads either to grace or to the fall from it. The only constant in the process is conflict and confrontation
I wretch violently by the pillar. Cooley is watching me bemused.
“You think that power and oppression come only from above? That living an incarcerated life is the work of perverted monarchs abusing their poor people? Is that your scope of power and oppression?”
I hear the rock rustling in his palm, landing with a thump every time he catches it.
I don’t know what he’s getting at. I look at him through glazed, burgled eyes.
He shakes his head.
“Mr. Smyth, let’s run a little thought experiment by you, help you expand your mind.”
He throws the rock up high, spins on the spot, plucks it out of the air and shows it to me. Only it’s not a rock anymore. It’s a mirror. He thrusts it at my face.
“Look at yourself, Mr. Smyth. Look deep and hard inside the looking glass and tell me what you see.”
I try not to look but he forces my head round and jams my face in it. I see specters inside it, swishing through my head as my face turns into a skull, then into a shadow. I sense muffled screaming coming from inside it. There is light somewhere in there too, but it is bleak, subdued.
“See how you have rendered yourselves, Mr. Smyth. This is what you have become over the years, a conglomerate of shadows piled around light, pretending you are following your destiny.”
I want to turn away but can’t, I am transfixed by the spectacle. I see myself scream and out of my mouth come a million tiny heads, bloodied and crying. My eyes dilate in horror and the horror assumes form and penetrates those heads and makes them explode. Their blood splashes on me and burns my face. I scream to drown out the pain, but the more I scream the more I hurt. Out of my face oozes hatred and suffering, dripping to the floor, assembling into form. It is a homunculus, ugly and deformed, and carries a paper on which the names of those who have caused me to suffer are written. In capital letters I see the name COOLEY atop the page, inscribed in crimson, dripping with scorn.
Cooley is blaring through my head again.
“Thoughts are very powerful things, Mr. Smyth. They are alive and real, causing things to happen in ways you cannot understand. They cause and effect, if you get my meaning, like a hand that wields a stone. Bricks and stones may break your bones but words will maim your soul. Understand? Shall I continue, or are my words not hurting you enough yet? Shall I revert to good old stoning? How about stonewalling?”
The mirror begins to close in on me, engulfing me. I feel pressure and hatred, tremendous hatred toward Cooley, but the more I feel it the more the mirror closes in, swallowing me inside its world of dread. I see a light at the corner somewhere and try to grab it with my thoughts. It’s elusive. The pain prevents me from focusing.
“Let me tell you a little story, Mr. Smyth. It’s about the British monarchy and their all-powerful, prestigious position. They come from a long line of monarchs that ruled Britain for thousands of years, and they are still around, despite the groundbreaking changes that have swept the world. These people, all-powerful as they are, live in a post-royal, republican world, where the rule of law has been transferred to the people. Fair as the situation may be, it creates a conundrum for the British monarchs because they don’t really fit in this new world. I mean, they are there for a reason, sure, preventing the glory of a country like Britain from dissolving into the common pool of the world. British society is not ready to give up its magnificence, they still want to feel great about themselves and put out like a trillion pounds, like an empire on which the sun never sets, majestic and grand as they always were, not just another republic. So they retain their rulers in decorative positions to make believe this is so.”
The mirror engulfs my mind. I see the unfulfilled wishes of millions of people hurl up from the depths of unspoken thoughts and drill through each other, penetrating everything at will, carrying each other forth, smashing one another against the rocks like giant krakens. I wince, trying to keep my mind on that light in the corner. If I can only get a hold of it I know this nightmare will end.
Extremism in revolutions often led to fear and loathing, alienating many people and uniting them against the cause, leaving one wondering if real change was possible
“Thing is, Mr. Smyth, that in the process of retaining this glory, they, the people of Great Britain, have done something horrible to an entire family. They have infiltrated them with their dreadful impulses and littered their lives with wishes unable to be fulfilled, dripping with paradox and contradiction that cannot be satisfied. They want justice and peace, but also power and influence. They want stability but also the ability to forge the future. They want to be safe from belief systems that do not abide by human rights but cannot handle being authoritative enough to make it so, and hate themselves for feeling like that, and sweat and cry over the strain, and reel when they are threatened, and waver when they are decisive, and fight amongst themselves as they try to make headway, shooting themselves in the foot, tying themselves up in knots, unable to decide what is good and what is not, watching the future slip away from them. They end up watching it from the sidelines, pretending they have a say in it, looking up to their monarchy and basking in their reflected glory, while others run away with destiny.”
The pain is beyond belief now. I feel my mind buckling.
“In the process of marrying their prefabricated notions of goodness to a sense of all round justice, not to mention the urge to survive and flourish, they have taken themselves out of the driver’s seat and given it to someone else. In theory this should work fine because the driver is supposed to be a fair one, but in reality things are not as rosy as that, they remain partial and skewed. Not to mention the fact that the British monarchs are, as a result, living a life of plush misery, there to serve a shiny purpose, to sign papers and tend public events and smile and be royal and inspirational, unable to move a muscle or say anything out of line for fear of getting chopped to pieces by the press. In the name of popular justice.”
Cooley sniggers.
“Rebellion brings many things about, Mr. Smyth, but the end of slavery wasn’t one of them. Neither was the end of oppression, don’t make me laugh. You believe things have changed dramatically? They have, but only in terms of who drives the wagon, not the wagon itself. The wheels have turned to carry the world down the same old route, with a few minor changes to its interior. Power to the people, Mr. Smyth. Not a fairer world, just a more representative one – and even that is a matter of debate. Because with time everything becomes unrepresented. Get what I’m saying?”
I decide to stop fighting the pain, the onslaught, everything. There is no sense in trying anymore. I have no more hatred for Cooley, no more dread for the mirror’s wraiths, no urge to right anything. I begin to fade and the light brightens up. Cooley’s voice is booming.
“And it is the same for all people, all over the world. You, the people, are behind your own misery. Stop blaming your leaders and wake up, remember who put them there. Remember they are also people, and that this is the reason for your suffering. Your stinking flesh and its rotten weaknesses. Your righteous, precious minds.”
I open my eyes. I am lying on a mattress, covered in a soft blanket. For a moment my heart flutters, I think I am in my apartment, waking up from a terrible nightmare.
Then I turn around and see Cooley standing by the pillar, juggling a stone. We’re still inside the damn lodge, and he is looking at me, smirking.
FOR MORE: Wake Of Liberty
Images:
The Looking Glass by Gavin Denman
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