In the New Age idea of “harmonic convergence,” there are a few “power centers” around the world. Near the beautiful cliffs surrounding Sedona, AZ, for example, people are said to experience converging forces of spiritual energy. But another convergence is taking place and it has nothing to do with stunning red-rock landscapes or mystical feelings of harmony. Far from it. Instead, I have noticed an extraordinary set of outwardly unrelated indicators of increasingly chaotic societal trends in the U.S.A., cascading throughout the world. And they appear to be converging.
Random Anomalies?
A recent Homeland Security report* concluded that “sovereign citizens” are perceived as a greater threat by law enforcement than are “Islamic terrorists.” Of course, it’s hard to even find an Islamic terrorist in the U.S. – racist targeting of any Muslim aside. But the Cliven Bundies are definitely out there and growing in numbers.
The extreme individualist anti-government meme has taken hold for a growing number of people. But these folks usually don’t understand the source of the dysfunctions of the governmental they hate. Of course, their hyper-libertarian ideology itself is seriously dysfunctional. It sees all problems as inherent in government itself. But in politics the biggest problem for democracy is the widespread distortion of governmental functions by the corporate imposition of money and power.
“Stand your ground” legislation and its expression in morally unjustifiable shootings point to a growing cultural need to express personal power with violence. Bizarre “open carry” imbeciles marching into restaurants with their AR-15s appear to be expressing their twisted juvenile sense of manhood. But there is more to it than that. Instability breeds fear; fear breeds hatred; hatred finds its target, even school children.
Racist Congressmen refuse to act on anything proposed by the African-American president they find inherently illegitimate and “un-American.” They even reject his proposals that originated in Republican ideas. The obsessiveness of their loathing is quite astounding, though consistent only with rabid racism and the gut urge to bring down that “Other.” There is no “post-racial America.”
Automated programmed trading at hyper-speed by powerful financial institutions obtains market information nanoseconds ahead of ordinary traders. This allows them to make pennies a trade so fast that they skim millions of dollars from the stock market every week. What is a “free market,” really? Cheating is pervasive and tolerated in U.S. business and political culture, and markets are not free.
Cities are going bankrupt and are forced to raid their retirees’ pension funds because Koch brothers funded politicians legislate to serve their rich patrons, not the public. The people are an inconvenience. Who protects the public interest? Almost nobody with any power, actually. Corruption is rampant.
The “change we can believe in” president elected on an ‘end the wars’ platform, bombs wedding parties in Afghanistan and funerals in Yemen. His lawyers draw up secret legal opinions authorizing him to assassinate American citizens along with anyone else he deems a “threat.” His drone kills a teenage American boy visiting his grandparents in Yemen. In response to disclosures about the CIA crimes, he responds, “we tortured some folks…and it’s important for us not too feel too sanctimonious in retrospect…”
Absurd levels of secret “intelligence” spy operations capture nearly all the private communications of Americans. No particular reason or authorization is needed other than the stated institutional goal of amassing full-spectrum of information about everyone. You may “have nothing to hide,” and foolishly accept it. But spying on everyone by powerful agencies whether federal or local, has ominous implications for everyone’s political freedom. The NSA director lies to Congress and is tolerated. That alone heralds an emerging totalitarian corporate state retaining only a thin veneer of democratic formality.
The Convergence
Collectively, these ostensibly uncharacteristic and unrelated trends provide a context for understanding part of where the “sovereign citizens” paranoia comes from. They seem unconnected, though each is disturbing. But are they simply anomalies? I doubt it.
The personal, the social, the economic, and the political uncertainties we experience or observe today are real, if confusing. They are exacerbated by the recognition, sometimes subliminal, that we live in a society that is increasingly unstable and violent – a bad combination. As if that were not enough, the stability of the biosphere we are part of is itself is being placed at accelerating risk by our institutions and our way of life.
We look around and find little to justify a sense of security. Many escape into the smaller worlds of their everyday lives or stupefying mass media. We see the largest institutions, whether military, corporate, financial, or governmental, and notice the growing trend. Each is expanding its own surveillance/security programs. And in all institutional sectors, the security and secrecy measures are directed at protecting those institutions’ ability to control the population – us – in some way. Why? Because we know that as they grow more irrelevant and opposed to our needs, these institutions increasingly resort to force and violence.
Yet, those hierarchical control structures are themselves engaged in increasingly chaotic reactions to environments that they cannot control. The most powerful institutions in the world were not designed to engage conditions they never anticipated. It seems clear that we need a process of non-violent “creative destruction” to transform these institutions. But what we are getting is a growing process of destruction of humanity emanating from the institutions supposedly serving the public.
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* David Carter, et al, Understanding Law Enforcement Intelligence Processes. Report to the Office of University Programs, Science and Technology Directorate, U.S. Department of Homeland Security (July 2014), p. 7. Accessed at: https://www.start.umd.edu/pubs/START_UnderstandingLawEnforcementIntelligenceProcesses_July2014.pdf
Robert MacNeil Christie, Author 