COSMIC CONNIE GETS SERIOUS: A SKEPTIC'S VIEW OF NEW AGE AND SELF-HELP

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Most of the essay was derived from material I had written back in the early 1990s but had never published. I originally wrote this stuff at the time when my disillusionment with the new-age and self-help cultures had truly taken hold. That was also shortly after my discovery of the debunkers -- the skeptics and secularists of various stripes. Oh, and I was also newly into Libertarianism. Together, these factors provided me with a sense of purpose for Cosmic Relief, beyond the desire to provide mere entertainment.

In keeping with my earnest desire to encourage rationality -- oh, yes, I was on a mission then! -- I also published a resource list, which included Wendy Kaminer's delightful work, I'm Dysfunctional, You're Dysfunctional. I also cited the Skeptical Inquirer folks, who over the years have been -- pardon the expression, CSICOP -- a great inspiration to me. If I were publishing the resource list today, I would have to add Steve Salerno's book, SHAM: How The Self-Help Movement Made America Helpless. (Matter of fact, I've been spending a fair amount of time lately on Steve's blog, which celebrated its one-year anniversary on July 17, 2006. Congratulations, Steve.)

There are certain things about the essay below that sound a little dated now. First and most obviously, any reference to "recent" articles or events is dated. OJ, for example, is old news by now. The old millennium has ended and we're well into the new one. Several other cultural references are dated as well. "Creationism" and "creation science" have been replaced by and large by "intelligent design." And in the essay, when mentioning my cowardice in regard to lampooning religion, I only mentioned Christian fanatics; obviously, this was before 9/11. Further, it is no longer even remotely cutting-edge to make critical remarks about political correctness -- if indeed it ever was. My current opinion is that many -- not all, but many -- of the people who holler the loudest about P.C. these days are either bigots or boors who are doing little more than rationalizing their prejudices or general rudeness.

It will probably also be apparent that the essay was written at the time the Wild Man / Wild Woman / Native-American-ritual crazes were at their peak. Don't get me wrong; there are still plenty of folks embracing this stuff, but it was fairly new back then, and, I thought, deserving of a few potshots.

I am also more keenly aware now than I was back then that certain parts of this essay will come across as condescending or dismissive, especially to people of faith. I have always made a distinction between spirituality and religious dogma, but these fine points, alas, do not come across in the words below. Suffice it to say that I have lost a bit of my arrogant edge since then, thank God (or whomever).

Yet there is something about this essay that I like, because it shows how passionate I was, and to a large extent still am, about exposing the ludicrous aspects of contemporary culture -- especially the ways in which the English language is constantly being abused, misused and reinvented to suit the needs of hucksters and hustledorks. The essay also illuminates that brief moment in time when I was in danger of actually believing that I am a mostly rational being. For that reason alone it has value, at least to me.

But the main reason I think it is of value is that, as I said on the home page of this site, some things never really change. Dated references and occasional condescension notwithstanding, my "profoundly shallow" analysis may not, after all, be that far off base.

A FEW WORDS FROM THE WET BLANKET
AT THE MYSTICS' ORGY

Being a profoundly shallow analysis of various popular delusions and mass madnesses

"We believe as much as we can. We would believe everything if we could."

~ William James

A true cynic might argue that the main attraction re angels and crystals and UFOs and channeling and those experiential workshops and feel-good seminars and such is that these things are basically so darned entertaining - and as a culture we're bored out of our skulls and constantly seeking new forms of entertainment. Assuming for the moment that our cynic is right, then as your designated Wet Blanket I have to say that this penchant for amusement at all costs could mean big trouble. The acclaimed Latin American author Carlos Fuentes wrote in a recent newspaper column: "We are, argues Neil Postman, the New York University educator and social critic, Amusing Ourselves to Death - to quote his insightful book title...Not that there is anything inherently evil in good old entertainment. The danger lies in its supplanting important, meaningful information."

I've cited Sr. Fuentes a bit out of context, for he was writing about the recent Disney/Capital Cities/ABC merger, not the new age movement. But I've co-opted his argument because it applies here too. And though I hardly qualify for the title of true cynic, I have my moments.

I suppose a bit of time out to state my agenda is in order. I've often described myself as being a refugee from the new age movement, leaning heavily towards the skeptical side but trying hard not to make a religion out of skepticism. In truth, I'm a confirmed fence-sitter, and there's a lot to be said for fence-sitting, particularly because it's so easy to get caught up in the fracas if you climb down on either side. The writer Ron Kaye said, "The argument between the paranormalists and the hard-core skeptics is all too often an argument not of logic, but of conflicting arrogance." Not to mention outright war. I am sorry to say this is not going to be the editorial that paves the way to peace between the two camps. This is going to be a shameless letting-off of steam - my own brand of arrogance, as it were.

For though I may not be a true cynic, long-term exposure to what poet Leonard Cohen once called "the flabby liars of the Aquarian Age" has convinced me that there's much to be said for the cynic's-eye view of cultural trends. For example, can anyone honestly say that the entertainment angle is not a big factor in the new age / self-help subculture? I think not. After all, there's hardly anything worth watching on TV (except during sweeps week, when they drag out all those angel and UFO shows), and there's a lot of trash spewing out of the film industry, and few of us can afford to take a spiritual trek to Tibet or a sabbatical to some remote paradise. Life is just so mundane. Ah, but add crystals and shamans and Star People to the formula, and you have something to get excited about. Throw in a dash of feel-goodism and excellence-for-the-masses (doesn't anyone see the oxymoronic, or maybe just moronic, nature of the latter concept?), and you have the makings of a religion, which, like all good religions, is affordable entertainment.

Or make that relatively affordable entertainment. A lot of this stuff ain't free. You either pay your money up front, or you get gently hounded into making a "love donation." The up-front fee is a more honest approach, but that really doesn't say anything for the actual value of what you're paying for.

Take those weekend personal-growth workshops... please. These things have been going on in their present form for at least a quarter of a century, but there are always new generations of converts, as well as new twists on old philosophies. People are still paying premium rates to be confined to motor-inn conference rooms with militantly ugly carpeting, and all for the privilege of sitting in uncomfortable chairs for excruciatingly long periods of time, waiting for that moment of insight which will transform everything. The high points of these weekends usually involve screaming, hugging, crying and the like. I've always suspected the reason folks feel so high at workshop's end is that they're so glad it's over.

And all those business and real estate seminars are just as bad, the only difference being that they're somewhat quieter and a little less emotional; instead of hugging, screaming, etc., there's rampant networking and, even though the 1980s are over, lots of prattle about "excellence" and "empowerment."

Anyway, the net result is the same: after all those hours of self-punishment, the participants' natural opiates are working overtime. Thus are the seeds of zealotry planted, causing the new graduates to spew forth into the real world and become earnest and obnoxious proselytizers - at least until the next seminar comes down the pike and they're off to be converted again.

Of course, religion has always served a deeper purpose than mere entertainment, as even our cynic must concede. "Into the Universe and Why not knowing," lamented Khayyám, concluding, "And out of it, as Wind...I know not whither, willy-nilly blowing." Indeed, most of us can't stand not having the buffer of a Great Why behind all this mess. I want there to be a Why, but that surely doesn't mean there is one, or that one is even necessary. Religion, anyway, purports to give us a Why; the problem is that it does require the proverbial leap of faith - and too many people, upon taking that leap, find themselves in a swamp of sticky dogma. But the bulk of humanity stays in the swamp for fear of the Great Willy-Nilly who looms on the bank. Ambiguity is generally avoided like unwanted relatives.

On the other hand, there are those who, being playfully bold in a new-age sort of way, take the opposite tack and embrace not mere ambiguity but actual chaos. For several years now, chaos has been all the rage among some of the trendy folk, and you, too, can be a part of this exciting movement. For starters, there's a slew of glossy, expensively produced books about chaos; you can buy them and toss them into your Greenpeace knapsack along with your books on mindfulness and inner-childishness and global consciousness. If you're really pretentious (our cynic might add), you can claim to understand how chaos works - not that there aren't people who do understand it, of course, but for the most part you probably won't find them at your local esoteric guild or metaphysical learning center. Anyway, if you're clever you can use your "understanding" of chaos to support whatever philosophy or treatment or way of life you're hawking.

Towards this end, don't be afraid to invent big, scientific-sounding words. English is a flexible language, and most people won't even ask what those huge words mean, for fear of seeming unintelligent and not up-to-date...Oh, but don't get me started on the language issue. Neal Gabler said it better than I can when he wrote, "George Orwell told us there would be days like these...days when language would be denatured of all meaning; days when the foundations of knowledge would begin to crack..." I'm quoting Gabler out of context too - for the record, he was writing about the O.J. Simpson trial and its effect on our epistemology, and he, by his own admission, was citing Orwell out of context - nevertheless, the Orwellian reference applies equally well to the new-age/self-help culture's ravishment of the English language. They have euphemized and jargonized the mother tongue to the point that I worry about the future of language as a legitimate means of communication.

There is, at any rate, a pretty wide range of "things we do to forget we're doomed," in the words of the eloquent social commentator Joe Bob Briggs. And whether we dance with chaos or march to the beat of the Ten Commandments, it's apparent that humanity as a whole still hungers for the Why, and hungers even more when contemplating all those threats (real and perceived) that seem more ominous as we lurch towards the end of the millennium. The apocalyptic viewpoint doesn't seem like mere pessimism anymore, and we can't be sure if that loud pounding in our ears is the sound of our own hearts or the thud of hoofbeats. Is it any wonder that some of us look to the Star People for salvation? Here we are, whirling through space on this noisy and crowded rock that we bipeds have made such a fine mess of; isn't it a natural that the old deus ex machina is looking better and better all the time?

Not surprisingly, there's a hefty portion of capitalism behind all this too. I'm not one to knock capitalism - after all, I'm not giving this book away - but it does sometimes make strange bedfellows with the mythic and the arcane. Look at the current rage for mythological images. In the past few years a booming business has arisen in magic stones and sacred feathers and all manner of shamanistic accouterments. Indeed, the collective unconscious has been ransacked by new-age yuppie capitalists. The myths of the world have become downright trendy, the sacred images picked clean. Everyone's who's not a Zen master is a shaman these days. The Native American contingent is pissed off about this, and small wonder: we've stolen all their land and now we're trying to lay claim to their religions too. So much of it comes back down to boredom and, possibly, to the Decaying Empire syndrome. The point is that a lot of money ends up exchanging hands. There are those who are getting wealthy off this stuff, and most of them are not Indians.

Besides the exploitative side of capitalism, the New age phenomenon in particular has also given rise to much silliness, and so much of it is unnecessary, even when viewed from the entertainment angle. Dolphins, for example, are perfectly fascinating in themselves. They smile, they play, they're clever, they make those cute noises, and some of them will even have sex with humans. I read that in Penthouse so I'm sure it's true. I certainly do not advocate inter-species sex, of course; my point is it's not necessary to believe, as some fringe elements do, that dolphins are a race of enlightened alien beings who are sacrificing themselves for the greater good of humanity.

And (moving on to more mainstream silliness), multi-culturalism is a fine concept, but it becomes a sham when it is presented at the cost of trashing the contributions of Western/European civilization, which, after all, was chiefly responsible for giving rise to a society that affords us the leisure time to dream up multi-culturalism in its present form. Such a sophisticated worldview does not, it seems, come naturally to our species. All cultures, from the most "primitive" to the most "advanced," are inclined to put themselves at the center of the known universe. How about all those Native American tribes who referred to themselves as "The People?" Doesn't that say something about how they perceived everyone else? We all cut our teeth on warped histories. Leonard Cohen (whom I just can't stop quoting), wrote, "History is a needle / for putting men asleep / anointed with the poison / of all they want to keep."

If that is true, then this is also so: to awaken from our sleep and seek a larger worldview is an anomaly in human experience, and it is also a luxury afforded mainly to those who have the advantages of education, time on their hands, and technology (or - pardon my political incorrectness - servants) to take care of the grunge work.

And take this inter-connectedness notion. Not only is it applied to the global consciousness/seamless-web school of thought, but it is further used in an attempt to bring the arts and sciences together in a huge group hug. Now, it may be true that to see how music and mathematics and sculpture and physics are related to each other is to understand the world a little better. Indeed, the quest for that "silver thread" of connection between diverse concepts or paths or people is always a worthy one. But I've found that in new-age culture, things often get carried too far and the whole mess becomes a mushy and unrecognizable soup. It's not enough that poor old science is hauled out and waved around like a trophy to prove the existence of God or to verify the claims of quartz-crystal hawkers. No, the disciplines and traditions of all the arts and sciences are pulverized and thrown into the communal pot, with the explanation that everything is related. In some cases one detects the unspoken hope that if enough ingredients are thrown into the soup, the chef's lack of skill and knowledge can be cleverly disguised.

Or maybe that's just my "stuff." Perhaps, for example, if I had a true understanding of quantum physics (as all the new thinkers seem to), I'd be able to apply the belief-is-reality principle to my own life, thereby creating a whole new world of prosperity and abundance - or at least a house with an extra bathroom.

Many new-agers have alleged that science is too rigid and stuffy and that it needs to loosen up, that scientists need to learn how to talk to each other and to the rest of us. There is truth in the latter allegation at least - I too think the geeks should come out of their labs and let the rest of us know what they're up to - but the frantic drive to interconnect-ize the world is no more useful than a hostile or elitist separatism. Soup, indeed: Silly Soup.

Although I have been targeting the new age with my invective, this doesn't mean that I think the new age movement has no value. It is, if nothing else, a symptom of our culture's restlessness with the old Judaeo-Christian spiel (and, again, a sign of our profound boredom). Certainly it is an indication of the depth of humanity's hunger for the mystical, and even I can't deny an affinity for mysticism. At least it's safer than most drugs.

But I can push aside my own mysticism enough to see that it is not absolutely necessary to give the world a mystical framework in order to find it a place of endless wonderment.

And, I hasten to add, my lambasting of Aquarian-age phenomena does not mean that I'm letting the fundamentalists off the hook. It is certainly not my intention to give the born-agains any ammunition, because I have, if anything, an even stronger quarrel with them than I do with the crystal fondlers and UFO "experiencers." Cowardice alone keeps me from making the religious right the main targets of my satire (oh, how I long to lampoon that Christian men's group Promise Keepers, and may yet do so); unfortunately, so many religious types have a tendency to react rather intensely to criticism in any form. They are really not very good sports, whereas new-agers, by and large, are. But I think it's safe to say that in many cases the evangelical set is more interested in political and social power than in helping people experience God; furthermore, despite their righteous claims to the contrary, I do not think those who have Found the Lord hold the key to reversing the crash of the empire. Given a choice between folks who thunderously proclaim that AIDS is God's punishment to homosexuals, and those who actively support education, prevention, compassion and the search for a cure, I'll take the latter group, thank you.

And since we're on the subject of born-againism...I strongly feel that any public official concerned about education should protest not only low SAT scores and math illiteracy, but also the Creationists' efforts to dumb-down science and literature textbooks in the schools. Right-wingers are wetting their pants because they see evidence of new age ideas infiltrating the schools. Now, this is certainly something to watch out for, what with the random silliness and the tyranny of eco-political correctness; P.C., no matter how well-intentioned, is at best an instrument of obfuscation and at worst the Thought Police. But I'm much more worried about all those born-again censors and creation "science" advocates. What are we to do about the loud righteous factions who, in the name of the Lord, would ban Kurt Vonnegut and The Wizard of Oz and John Steinbeck and Maurice Sendak? What's going to happen if the science texts are finally overtaken by those who, also in the name of the Lord, insist that the earth is only 10,000 years old and that dinosaur remains were planted here by the Creator to test our faith?

Having said all this, I do not categorically reject all new-age ideas and traditional religious sentiments. They stem from profound human needs, and besides, as I have to keep reminding myself, one should really keep an open mind about everything. The problem, of course, is that it's so easy to stumble over that sometimes-fine line which separates open-mindedness from credulity. The grief is that we too often fail to recognize hucksterism for what it is, because it often comes so nicely wrapped in a pretty package of good vibes and trendy jargon and big words or, for traditionalists, righteousness and salvation.

There is, however, a golden mean between nodding-head gullibility and sneering cynicism. Achieving this mean requires critical thinking and a good healthy dose of skepticism, both of which can co-exist with a belief in the deity of choice (though purists on both sides would argue this point). Anyway, whether we lean towards piety, agnosticism or atheism, we owe it to ourselves and our children to practice and encourage critical thinking and skepticism, even if Judaeo-Christian or other orthodoxies suffer as much as do new age ideologies.

The point is that we should never stop asking questions and should always pay attention to our doubts, even if they make us or those around us uncomfortable and threaten to shake our own or anyone else's complacency...the Baptist preacher's complacency, the astrologer's complacency, the rabbi's complacency, the crystal peddler's complacency. We need to openly seek the "yeah-but" in every argument. This does not mean we should be afraid to take a stand; it does mean that when we eventually do take a stand it will be based on something more than a transient passion or some quack's messianic ambitions. And maybe we shouldn't be so afraid to court ambiguity. We humans seem to have a genetic loathing for ambiguity, and when we see it floating around in the swamp, we try to ignore it. If we find it swimming towards us and we can't get away, we pick it up in horror, holding our noses, and fling it on to the bank where the Willy-Nilly lives.

This is a mistake, because ambiguity can be more entertaining than the Star People and the Ascended Masters and a wild-person weekend all rolled up in one.

One final note: There are certain basic rules about honor and commitment that apply no matter which path one chooses. Many of us have seen these basic rules grievously violated by new agers and traditional religious types alike.

So it pays to shop around. No matter how lofty that philosophy or "Way of Life" sounds when it comes from the mouth of some sincere, sustainable-world-advocating Toastmaster smoothie who has surrealistically white teeth and a power hairdo...it's wise to dig beyond the merchandising. Writer Ron Kaye advises that you look in their eyes, and if what you see there does not reflect what they say, stay the hell away. That's very good advice, and there is some checking-up you can do on a strictly pragmatic level too. If the philosophy/technique/way of life/religion does not support responsible - and moral - behavior, in the material world, on a day-to-day basis, you might seriously question its value.

And lest I wind up sounding as mystically abstract as a new-ager when I talk about "supporting responsible and moral behavior," let me clarify. There are many ways we can check up on people and organizations. Do they pay their bills? Are any lawsuits or other actions pending against them? Of course, the mere existence of a lawsuit is not necessarily a red light, given today's litigious climate and the huge number of frivolous suits, but it's wise to get all the facts you can before you make a commitment. What about any hidden agendas or undisclosed affiliations, such as being a front for some loathsome racist organization, or being owned by some obscenely wealthy church? This is the Information Age, and information, like spiritual enlightenment, is available for those who seek it.

Oh, yes, and a little knowledge of the metaphysical territory helps too; that way it's easy to weed out the garden-variety flakes who are serving up a warmed-over goulash of stuff lifted from the Kabbalah, the Kama Sutra and the Ukrainian Book of the Dead.

In the end, it really doesn't matter if we seek solace via crystals or Catholicism, colonics or charismatic Christianity or Confucianism. In the larger scheme, these things are all just so many bright shiny objects strewn along the road. Some of us are more easily attracted than others by bright objects, but all of us, if we're wise, will allow a part of ourselves to pretend we're dealing with Gremlins, and this will help us remember the three rules: First, we should keep our eyes wide open, for there are tricksters everywhere. Second, we should wear a sturdy pair of boots, because it gets messy in the swamps. And third and most important of all: we must refuse to abandon rationality, for rationality is what impels us to question everything - which keeps us from becoming nodding-head dolls when we find ourselves in the presence of piffle.

Copyright (c) 1991, 1996 by Connie L. Schmidt

Published in Cosmic Relief: Honoring & Celebrating The Global Paradigm Shaft

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