1. Back in November, there was a general consensus across the internet that social media is over and it’s never coming back. Somewhere between Elon Musk’s takeover of Twitter and Facebook removing religion from people’s profiles, a dam of criticism has burst. Dozens of fantastic essays and think pieces, particularly over the last three months, are forming a sort of internet autopsy report. How did we come to loathe and resent a powerful technology that has, in so many ways, changed the world for the better?
Add to the autopsy report the insights from author and writer Freddie deBoer. His intuitions about the creative class and resentment add a level of clarity to the internet’s default attitude of acrimony.
There’s a kind of person that plays an outsized role in the general tenor of ugliness and resentment that permeates online life … I’m talking about people, almost always college-educated, most gainfully employed, who have unrealized dreams in creative industries like movies, novels, journalism, music, essays, TV, podcasts. They have positions in the world that are, by international or historical comparison, quite comfortable. And yet they’re angry all the time, angry because of thwarted ambition and the sense that they were meant for more than comfort. … They are nevertheless possessed of a deeply-ingrained cultural expectation that they’re supposed to desire more than middle-class stability and the fruits of contemporary first-world abundance.
These people look out at a world filled with creators creating, look at the considerable benefits they accrue (in money, yes, but more importantly in status) and they want. They want what others have. And want breeds resentment, especially when it’s so plain that some of the people who have succeeded have done so despite no clear advantage in talent, worth, or effort. … They live in a digital culture that has obliterated the distance between the creatively successful and their audiences, allowing them to see all that the victors enjoy, over and over again. Crucially, they also benefit from the protections of, if not literal anonymity, then obscurity — the easiest way to avoid getting attacked online is to be so little noticed that no one would bother. Since no one pays much attention to them, unless they get very unlucky, they have no self-protective motive to moderate what they’re saying. And they have ample laptop and phone time — so, so much laptop and phone time — and are perpetually bored. It’s all a recipe for an entire class of people who spend their time taking out the resentment engendered by unfulfilled creative dreams on anyone who they see as an undeserving success.
From the cockpit of a guy who’s professionally piloted social media channels for over a decade, I have seen exactly what deBoer describes, and it’s especially true in the religious world. Much if not most of the trolling and vitriol online is tainted with resentment. It’s as if each mean tweet whispered “how did you get this position? I would be so much better at doing what you do!” alongside whatever other dunk the actual tweet contained. At the risk of oversimplification, many of Mockingbird’s past trolls have fit this bill — clergy or bloggers with a small reach aghast that their peculiar form of Christianity has not been embraced by the masses. Not that yours truly doesn’t occasionally feel the same way when he looks up the social media ladder himself! deBoer continues:
Ultimately, I think all we can do is further commit to a project we should be engaged in anyway: shattering the myth of just deserts. Reminding people that they don’t control their own destinies. Insisting on the truth that chance and path dependence play huge roles in our lives. Giving no ground to the myth of the self-made man. … It’s difficult for any of us to really grasp abstract problems like inequality or corporate domination, and the temptation to nominate some individual people as the receptacles for your anger is understandable. Understandable, but not helpful, least of all to the people who get perpetually enraged in this way.
To put it in spiritual terms, a big part of the resentment problem is rooted in the great Protestant boogeyman “works righteousness.” Which is to say, it is our default mode to think that the world runs on meritocracy and hard work. Practically, this means that if we believe that a certain author or podcast host ascended to an unmerited position (and if we secretly think we could do a better job than this author and podcaster), it would not just be a disappointment, it would be a grave injustice and a wrong to be righted. And yet, as Jesus reminds us, the rain falls on the just and the unjust, and the sun rises for everyone, everyday: both good and evil. God gives good things to all people regardless of deserving, and trusting in divine providence instead of our own resentments will ultimately leave us better off. Nothing like a healthy dose of grace to flush out the spirit of resentment.
2. It’s deBoer’s insistence that we acknowledge the role of chance (or providence, depending on your outlook) that explains the nation’s reaction to Damar Hamlin’s mid-game collapse. In case you missed it back on January 2, millions watched on live TV as the Buffalo Bills player had a heart attack and collapsed where he stood. EMS teams were giving life-sustaining CPR on the field before carting him off to the emergency room. As players knelt in prayer for their teammate and announcers prayed on live TV, the act of prayer itself was drawn back into public conversation. At the Wall Street Journal, Barton Swaim observes how the normal snark surrounding “thoughts and prayers” was absent in this situation.
Any legal or cultural prohibitions attaching to sporting-event prayers were, for the moment, rescinded. Players knelt, many plainly in prayer. Commentators, rightly sensing the need to go beyond conventional references to “thoughts,” spoke repeatedly of “prayers.” […]
Suddenly prayer — the ancient activity of speaking to God in the belief that he can hear and respond — was everywhere. Top-level coaches and players, former and present, posted appeals to “Pray for Damar.” The NFL on Monday night issued a statement advising only that its “thoughts” were with Mr. Hamlin and his family. A day later the league changed its social-media avatar, together with those of all 32 professional teams, to an image of Mr. Hamlin’s No. 3 Bills jersey bearing the words “Pray for Damar.”
Former quarterback Dan Orlovsky, discussing the game with two panelists on ESPN, did the until-now unthinkable: He bowed his head and actually prayed — with two other commentators, reporter Laura Rutledge and former Dallas Cowboys defensive end Marcus Spears, bowing their heads in reverential accord. The prayer concluded, each said “Amen,” and you felt they meant it. […]
There is something natural and beautiful in the desire to entreat God to aid a gravely injured man, however that entreaty may be uttered. “Somehow I have always had an inner and unaccountable conviction that any religious expression of truth, however bizarre or uncouth, is more sufficing than any secular one, however elegant and intellectually brilliant,” wrote the great British journalist Malcolm Muggeridge. “Animistic savages prostrating themselves before a painted stone have always seemed to me to be nearer the truth than any Einstein or Bertrand Russell.”
Damar’s injury made prayer culturally palatable for the past week and a half, and its worth exploring why. Some of it, I think, has to do with the misfortune of Damar’s injury. The family hasn’t confirmed it yet, but many doctors and news outlets are reporting that the injury was likely commotio cordis, a heart attack caused by a sudden impact to the chest. It’s an incredibly rare occurrence — 20 or 30 instances per year — and it normally occurs in boys and young men aged 8-20 playing projectile sports like baseball or lacrosse. While the NFL has struggled to reduce concussions and head injuries, Damar’s injury appears to be more of a fluke than a lapse in safety protocols.
This is why I would venture that prayer was not only welcomed, but encouraged. A surprise bad thing happened to a person. Unlike the political arena, where prayers can be interpreted as willful inaction, or the culture wars, where prayer can be interpreted as an act of social dominance, watching an athlete collapse on TV is truly a reminder how powerless we are. The sporting world, for all its athletic prowess, was forced to recon with true human frailty on January 2, and the result was a nearly universal cry to the transcendent for aid.
3. The Golden Globes kicked off award season this year, and you’d be forgiven for not knowing or not caring. The complaints about grandstanding and virtue-signaling have been lodged, but even a free $18,000 jet ski isn’t enough to cut down the self righteousness of the season. It begs the question — why do we watch awards shows anyway? This year’s Golden Globes offer a few insights, as Shirley Li pointed out in the Atlantic earlier this week:
These didn’t feel like typical awards-show speeches, all gratitude for agents and inspirational sound bites for those watching at home. These felt like confessions — and they didn’t come from just actors. Steven Spielberg, after winning Best Director, told the room about how making The Fabelmans allowed him to honestly observe how “nobody really knows who we are,” and “the fact that everybody sees me as a success story.” Ryan Murphy, who received an honorary Golden Globe, used his time onstage to champion some of the biggest stars of his shows and movies, including Billy Porter and Michaela Jaé Rodriguez. […]
But last night clarified, inadvertently, that such functions can be invaluable platforms for genuine storytelling. Sure, those precious seconds onstage before the play-off music kicks in are meant to be used to thank every colleague ever, but the most memorable winners offered speeches that weren’t just about their own project. They spoke about uncertainty, about regret, about the kind of apprehension that can overwhelm anyone trying to fulfill a dream. Hollywood can seem like a glamorous, inaccessible business — particularly during black-tie fetes populated by A-listers — but in these stories of worry and angst, the industry doesn’t feel so remote.
To prove the point, did you know that the actor who played Short Round in the 1984 Indiana Jones and the Temple of Doom, Ke Huy Quan, just won for best supporting actor in Everything, Everywhere, All At Once? Check out his wonderful acceptance speech below and try not to appreciate the trembling joy in his voice. Here is a man blown away by the grace given to him for second chances and fresh starts.
4. Lots of laughs this week, with a few hitting particularly close to the bone. McSweeney’s looks for a geographic cure, proclaiming that “Moving To This City I Idealized Will Surely Solve All My Problems.” The Hard Times has a spiritual encounter: “I Met My Higher Self and Wow What a [expletive] Know-it-All.” Reductress offers “The Best Master’s Degrees to Give You Two More Years of Purpose” and also dares to consider “This Might Be The Best Version of Yourself.” But this parent of two appreciated the New Yorker’s takedown of the parental advice industrial complex, “Hey New Mom, Have You Considered Relaxing?.”
Hello! I see you are a young mother caring for your young children, and for some reason you seem a little stressed. Perhaps it’s because your three-year-old just shattered a jar of enchilada sauce, and you are now kneeling on the floor of Aisle 3, frantically trying to pick up the shards of glass before your toddler puts glass shards in his mouth, all while wearing your three-month-old. Well, I am here to tell you, as a parent of adult children, that I was like you once—worried about every tiny thing that happened with my children, be it missing a violin lesson, omitting half the white sequins on my daughter’s homemade “Swan Lake” ballet costume, or letting my kids go in the ocean before teaching them to swim. But I want to impart to you the most important lesson that I learned in motherhood: just relax.
Relax, instead of calling for a grocery-store employee to help you wipe up this oozing green liquid which your child is licking off the floor while screaming, “Too spicy!” Relax, and just let it go. Let it all go. The fact that school is once again cancelled because Lucas R. got covid and you have no child care and have to attend a meeting this afternoon seated next to your child who will be watching “Bubble Guppies” on the couch but you’ll pretend that you are alone in your home office so that you don’t get fired. Cherish this moment! Cherish every moment! Cherish it now! These moments are fleeting, so you must enjoy them all. Also, while you’re at it, you should really take a moment to enjoy people telling you to relax and enjoy these moments.
Be grateful for my sage advice, otherwise I will assume you are an uptight, cold, heartless mom who both works too much and spends too much time with her clingy children, somehow. If you aren’t flinging your laughing kids into the air, smiling, but, rather, spending your time trying to rebrand fish sticks as “French-fry fish” just to get your child to eat something, anything, for dinner, you’re not parenting correctly. Who cares if they eat! But that’s just my opinion. Mama, don’t listen to other people’s parenting advice. Ignore them! Except me. I’m correct in saying that you’re a good parent only if you’re putting in absolutely no effort but standing in silent awe as your three-year-old turns on the stove burners, using a Barbie camper van as a stool, because what creativity he has! Life is too short to stress about these things.
5. The last word today goes to Ryan Schellenberg’s reflection at Christianity Today on the relationship between sin and crime. It turns out, in the eyes of the Bible, sin and crime are the same thing, which makes the forgiving grace of Jesus even more scandalous. Here’s the introduction, and when you find your interest piqued, click over and read the rest of the article. There’s plenty there to challenge even the most ardent preachers of grace.
For most Christians, “legalism” is something to avoid — except when we’re talking about the law of the land.
Consider how we usually tell the story of Jesus and the woman caught in adultery (John 8:1–11). This woman was obviously a sinner. She had broken God’s commandments. But when the scribes and Pharisees brought her to Jesus, he did not condemn her. Instead, he exposed the self-righteous hypocrisy of her accusers: “Let any one of you who is without sin be the first to throw a stone at her.”
The moral of the story? Mercy triumphs over judgment.
True enough. But when we set aside our religious jargon for a moment, we find ourselves telling an even more surprising story — a story, it turns out, about crime and law enforcement.
I had read this passage countless times, but it was only while preparing to teach a course in prison that it occurred to me that this woman really had broken the law. Adultery may not be a crime in our world, but it was in first-century Judea — under both Jewish and Roman law. To put it in modern terms, the adulterous woman was a criminal and Jesus helped her evade punishment.
“Let any one of you who is without sin be the first to throw a stone.” As I thought of my students in prison, Jesus’ words took on a new layer of meaning. The grace Jesus offered did not just challenge the legalism of her accusers. It also challenged my own attachment to the retributive logic of law and order. Here was a story of God’s boundless love for sinners, yes — but also a story of God’s redemptive grace for those we call criminals.
Just imagine replacing adultery with a different crime, one that violates our own laws, and notice how troubling the story sounds. A man caught dealing drugs, a woman charged with credit card fraud, a teen who stole a car. “Has no one condemned you?” Jesus asks. “Go now and leave your life of sin.”
He does not say, “God may forgive you — but according to the law you must be punished.”
The longer I thought about it, the more surprising this passage became. Here was a story stranger and more challenging than I had ever suspected, a story that cut to the root of how Christians engage with issues of law and justice. Why had I never noticed this before?
Strays:
- Big news for real life: our Orlando Conference arrives next week, and registration is now open for our gathering in NYC this April. We’d love to see you in person down south or up north! Details here.
- Joy Clarkson of the Speaking with Joy podcast sat down with David Zahl to talk Low Anthropology.
- The Cycle-Breaking Creativity of Forgiveness
- Mbird friend Matthew J. Milliner is over at Hedgehog Review, filling in the gaps of imaginative reformation art and its relevance to contemporary art criticism.
COMMENTS
3 responses to “January 6-13”
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Incorrect link for the second Stray
Thanks Ken! It should be right now!
David, and Bryan…just listened to Joy Clarkson’s interview with David and it was SO good. I encourage others to listen to it and here’s a part of what I pulled from it, with a few of my own personal additions. Thank you!
What if I am an imposter? What if I’m not as smart as I think I am? Or not as athletic? I’ve invested so much energy in being this imposter, in keeping this façade of righteousness and sophistication and athleticism and artistry and fill-in-your-own endorsement. How much time am I putting into avoiding being “found out?” We’re chasing after credentials and it can be oppressive. It doesn’t mean that we give into this attitude, but it gives us a foundation that others are just like us, we’re all limited and conflicted and there is this dark side to human nature. So, that foundation offers a foothold for sympathy and understanding instead of judgment and condemnation. If we don’t have this understanding of the dark side of human nature, we’ll be baffled by human behaviors in our friends, spouses, kids, fellow associates, ourselves. It’s an attitude that produces patience. Most importantly it leads us to Jesus and away from the thinking that I can do this. True change only occurs thru the Change Agent, God.
Sanctification is a journey about our deeper dependence on God and not about our doing more, getting better. Love travels on the rails of low anthropology.