Rescripting some myths (Notice everything^[1])

Oedipus (a communication failure) I (BMcC[18-11-46-503]) had a lot of text here about Oedipus, which can now be found at: DeadMaterial.html#Oed. Make one change to the Œdipus story and I propose it changes everything. I am uncertain what these consequent changes would be, but just do it and figure them out for yourself[2]: The very instant Œdipus learns of the prophesy, he stops whatever he is doing and immediately orders a t-shirt which he wears, exposed to public view, 24/7/365.25. He never removes the t-shirt or hides it under other clothes. He buys extras to use when one wears out or has to be washed. And, yes, there is obviously an Oedipus complex: Fathers want to murder their sons to keep the younger generation from overthrowing the ruling old man (the "paterfamilias"). We see this not only in the Greek legend but also in the Bible in the story of Abraham and Isaac. In Sigmund Freud's misinterpretation of the Greek version, the evil fathers, of which, of course, Dr. Freud was himself one, even cook up a motive to justfiy their criminal intent: they attribute to the son the desire to fuck his mother. Blame the victim. Lemma Oedipus's father wanted to murder his son because he feared the son might kill him if the son lived. Granted that the father believed this, he needed to do the job thoroughly, not half-assed by hiring hit men. He needed to drive a spear through the baby's heart and out its back 10 times and then incinerate the dead baby and watch the fire until the problem had turned to ash. "You gotta do it yourself, if you want to get anything done." (Popular song from the 1940s) I naver heard of Dr. Freud dealing with fathers' Laius complexes, nor with sons' repressed fear of being murdred by their fathers, or did I miss something? hO, hO. Henry story: The pathetic of the Magi (another communication failure) Not all myths are from ancient peoples. I believe there is an O. Henry story (1905CE) about a male who shows his love for a female by selling his gold watch to buy her an ornament for her hair, while, in parallel, the female sells her long hair to buy an ornament for the male's watch. Similar to Œdipus, this is an instance of massively destructive communication failure: Had the two confided their intentions to each other before acting on them, they could have both savored their ethereal love and also retained their worldly treasures, instead of lamenting enjoying their overarching curse blessing in commiseration. ("You, jerk, are a spoil-sport and a kill-joy! You would make life meaningless for everybody! Satan get thee hence!" "Thank you for the high compliment, Sir/Madam. I appreciate the honor of being dubbed a kill-joy: a person who exposes the putrescence of sentimentality to the disinfecting light of reason, just so long as you do not try to effect 'consequences', your Second Amendment rights or other, upon me."[3]) There is a broader issue here: altruism. If do unto others as you would have them do unto you, if each person sacrificed themself for another, everybody would self-destruct (self-sacrifice) and no good would be done for anyone because there would no longer be anyone to benefit. How about this instead: For each person, get your own human needs met and then have so much to be grateful for that you will want to give back your surplus of blessedness to benefit others? That would be a win-win, and everyone would be elevated. I have quoted a magisterial statement by psychoanalyst Melanie Klein on this point elsewhere: here. The parents of the two characters in this O. Henry story are indicted in The Hague on the charge of brainwashing children (aka: sentimentality). How do they plead? Not guilty, by reason of themselves having been childreared (ref.: Alice Miller's books, passim; a variant of insanity defense). +2022.12.04 I have added a One Act play about this: here. ⇒ This item moved J'Accuse! A close call: a communication failure that didn't go all the way I read that this Abel Gance movie has been compared with Jean Renoir's "The Grand Illusion". It has a communication failure. Long story short: An officer comes home from the war to find his wife with a child and his competitor for her love. He is about to kill the lover when, at the last minute, the woman confesses she had been raped by the enemy and the child was the result of the war crime, not the suitor. A man almost dies because a woman is ashamed of having been the victim of a crime! Politeness kills!. (This movie goes on from there: Sentimentality City.) Oedipus's loving adoptive parents had been childreared to be ashamed of being adoptive parents. This woman had been childreared to be ashamed of being raped. was cildreared to be ashamed of almost everything, especially healthy sexuality. Such a so-called society needs to shape up or be ashamed of itself! "Long black veil" sentimental song "'Long Black Veil' is a 1959 country ballad, written by Danny Dill and Marijohn Wilkin and originally recorded by Lefty Frizzell. It is told from the point of view of a man falsely accused of murder and executed. He refuses to provide an alibi, since on the night of the murder he was having an extramarital affair with his best friend's wife, and would rather die and take their secret to his grave than admit the truth. The chorus describes the woman's mourning visits to his gravesite, wearing a long black veil and enduring a wailing wind. In 2019, Frizzell's version of "Long Black Veil" was selected by the Library of Congress for preservation in the National Recording Registry for being 'culturally, historically, or aesthetically significant'" (Wikiipedia) Each time I think of thie sentimental rubbish where a man dies for some kind of "honor", I get more disguasted. The bitch should have been decent and stood erect before the judge and said: "We were fornicating at the time of the murder. The man is innocent. And so what about me screwing with my husband's best friend? We were consenting adults. BFD, Your Honor!" "Case dismissed!" Sentimentality is the root of much trouble in our veil of tears, or, for sentimental people: crocodile tears: Boo, hoo....

• Table of Contents • Oedipus • O. Henry's Magi • J'Accuse (Abel Gance) • Long black veil • Helen of Troy • The Tower of Babel • Abraham and Isaac • In the matter of Job • Adam and Evil • King Midas's touch • Ave Maria • Joy to the world! • Review

Helen of Troy, the first trophy wife

Why didn't somebody just shoot the damned bitch and put everybody out of her misery? Was she any more worth fighting a World War over than Archduke Ferdinand in the early 20th Century CE? Did she write the Iliad? Was she Pericles? Thales? Archimedes? Hannah Arendt? Georgia O'Keeffe? Or just a pretty face and/or a nice figure, a dumb blonde? Suitors = the auction block. No woman who lets herself be sold to the highest bidder can be worth much, can she? Old joke (source lost; Hennny Youngman?): "Your money or your wife!" "Take her!"

Noncombatants are always getting all sentimental and patriotic over miscellaneous stuff, and their maudlin faux-heroic selflessly selfish pseudo-emotions cause trouble for innocent third parties. For instance, in 2022, I have no interest at all in Mr. Alexei Navalny who gave up a safe life in The West where he could have ranted to his heart's content about the current Russian political regime, after Vladimir Putin once almost succeeded in murdering him and we saved him. He has a burr up his ass about Mr. Putin and he wants to elicit sympathy from bleeding heart liberals 💗 here in the West by getting Mr. Putin to harm him again. Why not let him get what he wants? But please, all you selflessly selfish people, leave me and anybody else who wants no part of his martyrdom masochism out of it. Have fun bleeding your soft hearts 💗, but don't share your wealth with persons like me who don't want to shed our blood for your personal predilictions. Keep them to yourselfs: Go play a video game and shoot down pixelated death stars or whatever.

The Tower of Babel^[6]

+2023.03.01. The Tower of Babel has been moved to: new, separate page

Patriarch Abraham, war criminal

There is also the story of Abraham. G-d decided to sit down for cocktails at the Harvard or Yale Club with his bosom buddy Satan and the two made a little gentlemanly bet – no, that was Job^[4]. Back to Abraham: G-d, sort of like the Catholic Church Inquisition was later wont to do, decided to test Abraham. G-d commanded him [Abraham] to murder his son. Abraham passed the test but G-d had the decency to cut the experiment short before the poor little boy would have prematurely met his Maker.

I see two crimes here: (1) G-d should not have tested Abraham that way. That's GPU / Stasi / CIA / etc. stuff, unworthy of Omnipotent transparency. But (2) Abraham flunked the test of being fully and honorifically human (in the 21st Century CE, United States Republican senators would fail a similar test from their less-than omnipotent Deity). Abraham could have responded to his G-d: "G-d, Sir, as a commissioned officer in the human species (rank: Patriarch), I respectfully submit that I cannot obey your unlawful order. Thy Will be done, on earth as it is in Heaven. You will do with me what You will. I apologize to You, who I know made me and everything else. But I will not be a traitor." Who knows what would have happened after that? It certainly would have taken "guts" on the part of "our boy". In our time, the Chairman of the United States Joint Chiefs of Staff has stood up to his (POTUS №45) rTump (albeit even had (POTUS №45) Trump fired him he would probably still get his pension and lecture fees and a consulting gig somewhere -- unless (POTUS №45) Trump tried to get him tried for treason, i.e., disloyalty to (POTUS №45) Trump). What do you think, here, my reader?

Genesis 22:16-18

And the Angel of the Lord spake to Abraham a second time: "Abraham! You wretched man! God has tested you and you have failed the test. You obeyed an unlawful order. You are not fit to lead your people. Know that, upon your death, you are going to Hell forever."

In the matter of Job

One fine afternoon in Heaven, G-d sat down down for cocktails at the Harvard (or was it the Yale?) Club with his bosom buddy Satan, and Satan proposed a little gentlemanly bet, say, to pay the bar bill for the day: Satan called G-d's attention to the righteous man, Job, and bet that they could make Job curse G-d if they tormented Job sufficiently. G-d liked the little experiment, and said to Satan that it was a deal. So poor righteous mortal Job got tested.

Unlike the Biblical story, this Job wasn't having any part of it. Just in time before he lost all his worldly goods, Job hired a lawyer. He petitioned for a restraining order, and sued for punitive damages for theft, mental cruelty and other felonies. Ah, my reader, you are right if you here think: But what court could Job appeal to, since G-d is the Chief Judge of the Supreme Court of All Creation, and He is immune from indictment so long as He holds this office, which of course, is forever? I agree with you. And so this rehabilition of the myth of Job ends here, with poor Job no longer disposing over the means to be righteous, covered with boils and in other ways afflicted. Sancho Panza said: There is no pain to which death does not bring an end. Question: Who won the gentlemen's bet?

Adam and Evil

I had not thought about reconstructing the Story of Adam and Eve/Evil, but a Wikipedia search for who was the interviewer on "Witness to yesterday" (a TV program with interviews of interesting dead persons) sent me to Steve Allen and there I found the wonderful above quote. Steve Allen not an ordinary suburban lawn-mower Christian? Another example of how I was deprived in my childrearing of what was good in America at the time (1950's) – a childrearing that taught me there was nothing worth anything (with a very few exceptions; one thing I was deprived of was the ability to much appreciate anything even if it was good). Also note that by "Eve/Evil" I am not implying that Adam's incestuous wife did anything wrong (nor that Adam and Eve's relationship was in any way wrong – their Deity set them up). I am simply connecting the Deity with Evil. The Deity mistreated His creations (Adam and Eve).

Artists and craftspersons do not generally deface their work (in the present case, Deity kicking Adam and Eve out of The Garden of Eden, et sequelae) unless they are frustrated about something. What else could the Creator of All Things be frustrated about except Himself? Ah! The story of Adam and Eve is yet another invisible elephant in the room, which normative ethno-childrearing causes persons to not see.

The solution for King Midas

The story of King Midas has a valid message: Be careful what you ask for becasue you just might get it. He wanted everything he touched to turn to gold but you can't eat a gold hamburger so you starve to death. But the story can also be used by mediocre people to feel less miserable with themselves for being mediocre and thus not foolishly asking for better things that would actualy be worse. More opiate for the masses.

The solution for King Midas seems obvious: He should have asked that anything he touched and then explicitly issued a verbal order: "Turn to gold, thing!" be turned to gold. The hamburger would have remained a hamburger and King Midas could have been both wealthy and healthy (happy).

Now, if you are really clever, my reader, you may demur here: But God might come up with a legal loophole to thwart King Midas after all. Fair objection! So this might have turned into a battle of dueling casuists: God and Midas. Good point, but in any case the story would have turned out differently, yes?

Some Spanish I almost understand

Ave María: Dios te Salve María, llena eres de Gracia, el Señor esté contigo, bendita eres entre todas las mujeres y bendito es el fruto de tu vientre, Jesús. Santa María, Madre de Dios, ruega Señora por nosotros los pecadores, ahora y en la hora de nuestra muerte. [Especially in the current time of Covid-19 pandemic.]

Latin:

Áve María, grátia pléna, Dóminus técum. Benedícta tū in muliéribus, et benedíctus frúctus véntris túi, Iésus.

Sáncta María, Máter Déi, óra pro nóbis peccatóribus, nunc et in hóra mórtis nóstrae. Ámen. [Ditto supra.]

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Let us go over all this again

What's the lesson(s) to be learned from all these myths? I think that our entire heritage of symbolic forms and symbols themselves needs to be seen/constantly reappropriated as a vast semiotic smorgasbord for individual/shared education and play (a place to study). "Take what you like and leave the rest."(Al-Anon dictum)

Maybe there is or maybe there is not a Santa Claus, but, in any case, we can consider him as semiotic raw material. Ah! We are adults and we do not believe in Santa Claus! What about circumcision, you august European/American university educated adult ladies and gentlemen?

The problems in/with the myths is that persons are childreared (or even: college educated!) into what – I just love this diagnosis – Wilfred Bion called shared hallucinoses aka social psychoses aka social customs. All social customs, be they evil or good – FGM or Congressional Medals of Honor – need to be ever again revisited and reappropriated (or done away with, etc.) because they are all just accidents of fate.

If an abolitionist had exited the birth canal in South Carolina, he might well have become a slave holder. Douglas MacArthur's CMH? I seem to have read that he was given it as a PR move to avert public discouragement after he [MacArthur] had botched managing the U.S. Phillipine contingent before the Japanese attacked at the start of the Pacific War (World War II). In June 2020, people seem to be fawning over the Reverend Al Sharpton. OK, but let us remember Tawana Brawley holed up in her garbage can [Correction: it was a garbage bag, not can] – if that isn't a piece of semiosis, what is? Oscar the Grouch lived in a trash can, but he was a good guy and also fiction and he didn't lie to get innocent folks arrested for putting him there. Reflection is the accident that overcomes accidentality. Reflection lets the cat out of the bag. Meow!

"Was man made for the Sabbath, or was the Sabbath made for man?" That is the question. I vote for the latter, for Matisse luxe, calme et volupté, not "Dulce et decorum est" and hurry up and get your gas masks on, boys! Been there, done that (ok, just "prep school"). I personally don't like it. Come out in the open, all ye believers in miserating social customs! Fess up and admit you are the real killjoys, and not only put us out of your misery but also get healthy and yourselves enjoy what time you have left on this side of the ground while you still have some! "But we have been mutilated ourselves and we are no longer capable of pleasure." That's genuinely unfortunate. Yes, you executioners are victims too. So, I speculate, also was Adolf Eichmann, and, for sure, Adolf Hitler, in whose childhood home the father mistreated everybody except the family's dog. Maybe science and philosophy (psychoanalysis, reconstructive surgery, etc.) can help you. We can try in our work/free time. Again, my reader, what do you think? And, again again, thank you for reading thinking.

+2024.02.16 v140
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