Harrumph!
Rusty Guinn
July 7, 2020·8 comments·Politics
A moral obligation with centuries of grounding in Western political philosophy has been transformed into something unrecognizable. In less than two weeks in June 2020, "silence is complicity" became the dominant framework for cultural debate across every outlet and political faction. But somewhere between defending genuine duty and enforcing ritual conformity, the phrase stopped meaning what it once did. The question is whether this shift represents a movement finding its voice or something closer to a demand for performance.
- The phrase appeared suddenly and everywhere. Before late May 2020, "silence is complicity" was occasional rhetorical language. After May 26, coverage exploded across major outlets, from progressive to conservative publications, suggesting not organic moral consensus but rapid memetic adoption.
- It's being used to demand ritual performance, not actual change. Half of June articles using this language don't mention George Floyd or police brutality at all. The framework has become a tool for enforcing public loyalty tests on social media, where a corporation's post counts as activism.
- Both political sides are weaponizing the same framework. The patriotic right demands you prove your love of country through anthem-related performance. The progressive left demands you prove your anti-racism through specific organizational endorsements. Both redefine silence as disagreement with their exact demands.
- An authentic moral duty is being hollowed into empty theater. Speaking against injustice has real historical weight from Burke, Mill, and MLK. But when that obligation becomes a demand to perform rituals exactly as others specify, it transforms from Holy Theatre into Deadly Theatre, serving only ego and social capital.
- A bottom-up movement may be getting reshaped from the top. The narrative structure suggests pressure to transform genuine grassroots activism into something that conforms to pre-existing political divisions. The cost of this co-option is unclear, but the pressure is real.
The Why of Epsilon Theory
- Direct access to leading narrative-tracking technology across global news.
- Deep analysis of how narratives shape markets, politics, and society.
- An active online community of independent voters, investors and thinkers.
Subscribe to Premium
Already a member? Log in
Looking for Deeper Insights?
Unlock exclusive market intelligence, trade ideas, and member-only events tailored for investment professionals and active investors with Perscient Pro.
VISIT PRO
Politics
Comments
“Give the governor harrumph!”
One of your best analogies ever - and that’s saying a lot.
Brilliant diagnosis, Doctor Guinn! Anytime you include Burke, J.S. Mill, MLK, Jefferson (and Harvey Korman) in one commentary, you’ve hit a truly important conceptual target.
I feel like some of this is our inability to handle nuance. It seems (that is, I don’t know or have any specific evidence) that mass communication, by its nature, demands the simplification of messages. Dealing with intractable problems is difficult, requires consensus and compromise, and involves trade-offs between policies that may desirable but incompatible. It is just easier from a communications standpoint to focus on one specific issue and hammer it like a propagandist.
So, for instance, instead of discussions about/destruction/removal of monuments being just a part of a larger “ideology” or movement or protest it becomes the focus of the rhetoric.
I feel like there’s an unfortunate confluence between what is easy to do and what is simple to act upon. It’s riskless and easy to send a broad message of performative, rhetorical support for a simple part of a complex issue. Ex. A tweet saying: “I have white privilege and we need to stop ignoring it as a society.” And then doing nothing and changing nothing. But because there’s no risk and no rigor it lacks meaning, and can only serve the previously organized/existing channels and divisions.
I think your framework here of Holy vs. Deadly is a great way to understand how all of our public discourse (or, at least a lot of it) gets dragged out of reality into the rhetorical plane of narrative and speech.
All of this to say: I wonder if social media/the internet/24 hour news has truly made us all into the other-regarding Sheep to such an extent that it makes it almost impossible to fix anything as we’re all just crowd-watchers, unwilling to risk anything that may damage our social standing. No risk = no meaning = our perception of an empty, narcissistic, and nihilistic culture.
Just some random thoughts here that this piece brought to mind so don’t mind me. Excellent as always.
Thank you, Jane! I had a memory that Harvey had died only a couple years ago. The instant aging process I underwent when I discovered it took place 12 (!) years ago was regrettable.
So kind of you, Mark! Thanks!
Thanks, Eric. FWIW, I agree.
I think you’ll get the “two” of a one-two punch from Ben tomorrow, as it will argue something much like what you describe - and offer a solution. It is not an easy one, but worth a shot.
If you were referring to cook-book essay then I guess ET and their audience are on the same wave-length - though wasn’t expecting that much porn. Thanks!
Rusty, I celebrated the 4th by watching Hamilton and I was struck by how it seemed an anthem to the current bottom up movement. I had the hopeful feeling that it would be the classic of our time, that these young people and those young people sprang from the same unending revolutionary fount. Thanks for putting the risks to this revolution in such clear terms.
Continue the discussion at the Epsilon Theory Forum...