05-16-2015, 10:51 AM
From "Another Roadside Attraction":
"He's a symbol junkie."
"A what?"
"A symbol junkie. People like him — that is, the majority — is strung out on symbols. They're so addicted they prefer abstract symbols to the concrete things which symbols represent. It's much easier to cope with the abstract than with the concrete; there's no direct, personal involvement — and you can keep an abstract idea steady in your mind whereas real things are usually in a state of flux and always changing. It's safer to play around with a man's wife than with his cliches…Laws are the most obvious example. Laws are abstractions. Laws symbolize ethical arts, proper behavior toward other human animals. Laws have no moral content, they merely symbolize conduct that does. These symbol junkies are always yelling about how we've got to respect the law, but you never hear one of them saying anything about respecting fellow beings. If we respected each other, if we respected animals and we respected the land, then we could dispense with laws and cut the middleman out of morality. Here in Washington the government has a slogan, have you noticed it, 'Drive Legally'. If this were a concrete, realistic (as opposed to a civilized) society, the bumper sticker would not say 'Drive Legally' but 'Drive Lovingly.'"
"What can we do about the symbol addicts?"
"Do about them? Marx, you do react to things in a peculiar way. Why, for goodness sake, should we do anything about them?" [Robbins, 1971, pp. 227-228]
Cheers,
Kirt
"He's a symbol junkie."
"A what?"
"A symbol junkie. People like him — that is, the majority — is strung out on symbols. They're so addicted they prefer abstract symbols to the concrete things which symbols represent. It's much easier to cope with the abstract than with the concrete; there's no direct, personal involvement — and you can keep an abstract idea steady in your mind whereas real things are usually in a state of flux and always changing. It's safer to play around with a man's wife than with his cliches…Laws are the most obvious example. Laws are abstractions. Laws symbolize ethical arts, proper behavior toward other human animals. Laws have no moral content, they merely symbolize conduct that does. These symbol junkies are always yelling about how we've got to respect the law, but you never hear one of them saying anything about respecting fellow beings. If we respected each other, if we respected animals and we respected the land, then we could dispense with laws and cut the middleman out of morality. Here in Washington the government has a slogan, have you noticed it, 'Drive Legally'. If this were a concrete, realistic (as opposed to a civilized) society, the bumper sticker would not say 'Drive Legally' but 'Drive Lovingly.'"
"What can we do about the symbol addicts?"
"Do about them? Marx, you do react to things in a peculiar way. Why, for goodness sake, should we do anything about them?" [Robbins, 1971, pp. 227-228]
Cheers,
Kirt