Positive visualisation and moral disambiguation

I've kept thinking about two scenes from an Adam Sandler film. In the first he parks a green pickup truck in two parking spaces and in the second he walks along the beach and beneath some stilt houses. I did remember the stilts, but not the Ferris wheel in the background, otherwise I would have recognised the location from Spielberg's 1941. Anyway, I found a website called IAMNOTASTALKER and they actually had photos of the pickup truck taking up two parking spaces and that way I was able to identify the film, that is by searching for "filming location" and "two parking spaces", and ever since I've watched Bedtime Stories it struck me as being most peculiar and pertinent.

Peculiar, because of its depiction of the hotel chain owner Barry Nottingham, who in his fear of germs resembles both Karl Stromberg and, if Alex Jones is to be believed, Donald Trump, yet comes across as a really nice Father Christmas kinda guy, and then, by extension, it taking a stab at Jared Kushner by Guy Pearce's character Kendall, whose thunder is stolen by Russell Brand of all people.

Pertinent, because it gives a clearer understanding of the reason for the regression of the prevalent form of narration, from the high form, as I called it, to the childish one. I described the childish form as being arbitrary, not describing reality, but inventing it. And, considering Aqua's Barbie Girl as an example, I figured that the reason for this regression is boredom, which, in that particular case, it is.

Bedtime Stories digs deeper by not concerning itself with the real world, at least not overtly, but the needs of children and in particular the need for a happy ending. It then shows, very accurately, how this need lets Adam Sandler make the facts fit the fiction, in particular who the fairest maiden in the land is.

Taking a step back and applying this thought to the real world we can state that moral disambiguation, the replacing of grey tones with either black or white, is a means to create meaning and as such the more in demand, the less meaningful life is.

But it is of course pathological. Man's moral sense resides in the individual. Hence good faith towards him is needed for it to affect the world. But good faith can be misplaced. It is critical for a free society that it is discriminating enough to tell the differences between different tones of grey. In particular the pillars of our society, officials, doctors, lawyers, the media and bankers, are neither heroes nor saints, but people whose job it is to keep things running. Of course the state has an interest in strengthening its institutions and hence it will dole out stories that highlight just how beneficial they are, the occasional hymn praising judges, police men, activist lawyers, journalists and of course soldiers. While gratitude for the services of the less handsomely paid ones fits, giving them discretion deserving only of saints doesn't, and the most heroic of them, the soldiers, actually have the least of it. In particular doctors don't work out of a heavenly inspired desire to do good, but for profit, and when, in a state of poor health, one decides that one might just as well seek their help since not doing so doesn't look so bright either, this is in no way to be confused with a declaration of unconditional trust. It is important to be able to see these differences, these different degrees of relinquishing sovereignty, or one ends up with spineless weasels chipping away at one's flesh, or, to sum it up it in a less dicey sentiment:

Trust authority, but don't venerate authorities.

The land of Walt Disney is in a bad shape. When only angelic authorities provide a venue for further ethical progress, that is if you have to assume they're angels in order to be able to keep believing that you're improving the state of the world, your desire for a happy ending will let you do so. And that is a trap. How did Russell Brand put it, when he interviewed Alex Jones? On the one side freedom and on the other... mutual concern? Something to that effect. But the concern is merely a meaning providing fiction, just like the fairest maiden in the land.

There is another way to see Bedtime Stories, one that focusses on belief. And it is tempting to bring the Revelation into it. But the Revelation is not an example of a childish narration, though your divine will tell you so. There is great fondness for the creation of meaning by way of moral disambiguation among the pharisees. It is easily understood and only produces results that hallow the factual. And while New York determines the factual, Los Angeles hallows it. True belief is the basis for the factual, and while the belief in a happy ending is a true belief, all the other ingredients, the things that spell out happy, serve the sole purpose to trick you into thinking that you're on your way to it or have already reached it and thus stop longing and praying for the real thing. The Revelation suggests that eternal clarity will make you happy. Who would be tricked by that to think he's happy when he's not? Or differently put, who needs the Revelation to deceive himself like that? Clarity is the joy of reason and we are creatures of reason.