Musings of Maaia – Justin

I recently took a seminar through the National Consortium for Teaching About Asia, funded by the Freeman Foundation. One of the ideas that most struck me was the way in which Confucius knew that socialization was the only way to effectively govern a nation, especially a large one like China. Napoleon said, You can do everything with a bayonet except sit on it,”and I think this is essentially the same idea. The truth of these ideas is well-supported; namely, by the fact that every successful empire has used some sort of socialization. What have these socializing agents been throughout history? And what are they today, in a world where secular nations seem to dominate the political arena?

In China, it was Confucianism as it developed out of Confucius’ ideas. In the late Roman empire, it was Christianity that was the socializing force. Rome eventually collapsed, but reemerged in some sense because of the socializing force of Christianity. The barbarian tribes that caused Rome to fall soon needed a socializing force for their empire, and Christianity again became that force. We call the result Christendom. Of course, the Islamic empire of the Middle Ages had a relatively high level of tolerance for other types of thought, but they were also eventually defeated Perhaps the strongest empire is the least tolerant one? Today, the United States and China provide two examples of large nations that are united without a philosophy or religion as a socializing factor. How is this possible? One might argue that China’s communism is a worldview that has the same socializing power and charisma as a religion, but shouldn’t the United States, with its similar religious tolerance, fall victim to the same fate as the Islamic empire of the Middle Ages? What is the socializing element used by these two nations?

Pictures of Tibet and Korea provided me with an answer. As a watched Jina Kim’s slideshow of Korea during the Japanese occupation, I was struck by the appearance of department stores, billboard advertising, and all of the other indicators of a capitalist consumer economy. I was so overwhelmed because of both the earliness of this phenomenon–that such a consumer culture existed so early in the Twentieth Century, and its quickness–that an invading nation could so quickly assimilate people into a new lifestyle. Similarly, one can see the rapid assimilation of Tibet into the consumer culture of China. Where not so long ago one could find only temples and open-air markets in Tibet, one can now see flagship-style stores like Gap. These two cases have led me to propose that the latest means of socialization, used to great effect by China and the United States, is that of consumerism.

Consumerism is not so much a philosophy or religion, but a non-philosophy. It does not replace Confucianism or Christianity with a competing set of beliefs or ethics. Rather, it keeps people occupied in the production, sale, and buying of massive amounts of goods, accompanied by the advertisement of these goods through television and radio. This constant occupation with buying things and watching TV keeps people from engaging in any type of philosophical or religious thinking that might get in the way of the socialization process. While consumerism does not provide an alternate belief system, it does provide universal rituals. These rituals of making, advertising, selling, and buying–of consuming–are what unify people. They either keep people from philosophizing, or else they make room for any philosophy to which people might gravitate. Resin Buddhas line the shelves of Chinatown and Evangelical Christian books are perennial bestsellers. Religion since the Axial Age has been a response to the human condition of alienation (whereas before that, religion was more about survival and fertility and conquest). People respond to alienation through prayer, or through love and relationship, or through running away from the problem through any number of distractions, including drugs, alcohol, and now, consumerism.

Could one make a case for consumerism as the socializing force of the 20th and 21st century? It sounds sarcastic, but it seems to be everywhere apparent. And what happens when this seemingly all-inclusive socializing force meets with opposition? Can the 9/11 bombings provide a clue to that question? What is the antidote to the ill-effects of rampant consumerism?  I think it is what Thomas Merton called “contemplative living,”  a concept that can only be explored by each of us in our daily, momentous (moment-to-moment awareness) living.  These are issues that I would like to pursue when time and money permits. For now, I will research whether anyone else has explored these ideas.