Ghost Writer

-- By MeronWerkneh - 19 Feb 2016

I: How did we get in?

“Culture [is]…a mere training to act as a machine…Your very ideas are but the outgrowth of the conditions of your bourgeois production and bourgeois property…”

Social theorists and philosophers have devoted much of their careers to identifying the factors that influence society. Karl Marx asserted that the economic structure of society—controlled by the ruling class—provides the base from which society’s moral and cultural values are born. Additionally, in distinguishing class from status, Max Weber contended that it is a group’s status—their common “style of life”—that gives them authority and cultural influence (Smith & Riley, 2009). The two perspectives intersect at the following point: a group creates culture, and society reflects that culture. The alternative theory is that culture reflects society, and it is possible that, to a certain extent, the process is a reciprocal interaction. Nonetheless, the contention that society reflects culture is the infinitely more accurate theory.

In The Folklore of Capitalism, Thurman Arnold discusses some of the commonalities of social organizations. The third element, of particular importance, is a set of “institutional habits” that allows men to work together “without any process of conscious choice” (Arnold, 1937). This could have been broken into two separate factors, listing both the presence of “institutional habits” and the absence of “conscious choice,” but their amensalistic relationship joins them enough to be listed together. “Institutional habits,” then, suggest that the actual patterns of practices prevalent in society are not that of society, but of the “institution.” This is done through a repeated process of “habit and acceptance,” where the habit is created, acceptance is covertly compelled, and dissent is ostracized (Arnold, 1937).

The phrase “conscious choice” is also laden with immense implications. Foremost, Arnold suggests that these institutional habits become normalized without the knowledge or admission of man—that much is clear. Even more curious, however, is the very construction of the phrase “conscious choice.” It seems redundant, because it is expected that any choice that is made will be made consciously. Are unconscious or subconscious choices, choices at all? In constructing this paradox, Arnold illuminates the concept of the illusion of free will. This ‘illusion’ is the hazy and hazardous area that separates and distinguishes the right to “the pursuit happiness” from the right to “happiness”; that separates the right of having a voice from the right of being heard; that suggests that, at the very core, man need not have an active choice, but be able to believe that he does. That much, we are entitled to. That much, we are guaranteed.

This all leaves us in a pretty bleak place. We are trapped in an institution we did not create, perpetuating beliefs that are not our own, robbed of any genuine opportunity to be active, and are completely unaware of it all. The question that follows, then, is self-evident.

II: How do we get out?

“A hibernation is a covert preparation for a more overt action.”

Visibility, in regards to agency and action, is not a binary condition. It is not restricted to either being visible and active, or absent and inactive. Visibility occurs on a spectrum with varying and uncorrelated degrees of agency. At any given moment, one could be invisible and unseen (Ellison), hyper-visible and exposed (the ‘eccentric’), or pseudo-visible with an expertly crafted mask (The Spook Who Sat by the Door). The condition most relevant here is invisibility (or the parts of pseudo-visibility that focus on a degree of absence). In short, in order to recognize and reclaim your individual agency, you must, at some point, be absent.

‘Individual liberty,’ ‘individual sovereignty,’ and ‘individual freedom’ all have a single word in common: individual. The dictionary defines ‘individual’ as distinctive, lone, or singular (dictionary.com). In order to assert yourself as an individual, you must act like an individual; in order to act like an individual, you must think as an individual; and in order to be able to think as an individual, you must learn to be alone. To be invisible. To forge out a space either mentally or physically (or in many cases, both) where you are able to reintroduce yourself to your own mind, beliefs, and your own visceral and essential needs free from the contamination of “institutional habits” and cultures. The conclusion is paradoxical but quite simple: in order to see yourself, you must become invisible.

Without this space or time, you will not be able to distinguish actual rights from illusory rights. The right to have, from the right to chase. Making a ‘conscious choice’ requires consciousness, which is bound with reflection and genuine self-awareness. To surrender this would be to surrender your agency, which is, whether conscious of it or not, an indispensable part of what makes us not only individuals, but human.

Arnold, T. W. (1937). The folklore of capitalism. New Haven: Yale University Press.

Ellison, R. (1995). Invisible man. New York: Vintage International.

Greenlee, S. (2002). The spook who sat by the door: A novel. Chicago, IL: Lushena Books.

individual. 2016. In dictionary.com. Retrieved February 18, 2016, from http://dictionary.reference.com/browse/individual?s=t

Marx, K., & Rjazanov, D. B. (1930). The Communist Manifesto.

Smith, P., & Riley, A. (2009). Cultural theory: An introduction. Malden, MA: Blackwell.

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