Displaced belief (exemplum)

Displaced belief (exemplum) : “Do you believe in god?” “No, but I go to church to keep the children happy.”

I think Slavoj Žižek describes it correctly, but is wrong about the dates.

Displaced belief is the basic compromise of 'modernity' which goes back into the late paleolithic. Well before Žižek’s example of Luther, well before Bruno Snell’s Discovery of the Greek Mind. And the doubling down on it is just as old (into dogmaticism) but certain social conditions allow it to fester more than other times. Imperial over-reach is one.

“Lip service” is the norm, anything else is over-wrought and dangerous. Even ‘cultural christians’ do this in their worlding efforts. The fact they can then dogmatically double down on lip service is then no surprise. Even small “o” orthodox Peter Thiel does so when he has a non-narcissitic moment.

It’s not lazy, but its no great effort either.

We don’t need stories to believe in for some great individuating need of spirituality. We need stories to world in compromise with others doing the same. There is no great need for religion, that’s just influencer bullshit.

(Unless advertising and marketting is a illness) there is no pathology here until we dogmaticaly double down and make perfection the enemy of the good, or the wise.

Happy New Year! (Now there is a story)

Crossposted from substack.com