Drama Kings and Queens

We live in the era of shal­low dra­mas. Any polit­i­cal state­ment has the poten­tial for earth-shattering rev­e­la­tions (though not really). Tak­ing offense at the actions or state­ments of some celebrity cer­tainly qual­i­fies as fuel for the con­tem­po­rary episode — what­ever it is. This phe­nom­e­non was pre­dicted a cen­tury and a half ago. A cer­tain Dan­ish philoso­pher said that the day would come when bold announce­ments of great feats would be made. How­ever, the actual events that would get all of the atten­tion would be shal­low and even silly — but treated as ulti­mate. Wel­come to the world of triv­ial pur­suit! (Which politi­cian has the most hair and how he or she might wear it…)
It has to do with how we try to fill the empti­ness of an overly-controlled world. We see our­selves as mere cogs in some great social machine. The face­less­ness of it all begs for some­thing orig­i­nal. Hav­ing aban­doned our own sense of worth, we focus on “celebri­ties” out of our actual life con­texts. Our con­ver­sa­tions have much to do with peo­ple we have never met and never will. These are pre­tend con­ver­sa­tions — mere exchanges of social myths. The empti­ness becomes even more pro­found, so we act out our views all the more, hop­ing some audi­ence is pay­ing atten­tion.
Once the individual’s per­sonal, inner life is aban­doned all that is left is some social stage on which to play dra­mas of pref­er­ences. We become known by the movies we pre­fer, our polit­i­cal choices (made in the dark­ness of sound bites), and our social tastes. The inten­sity with which we play this game is what makes us drama kings and queens. After all, the only proof of per­sonal valid­ity in con­tem­po­rary life seems to lie in being rec­og­nized by oth­ers. Bet­ter to be hated or admired than ignored!
Over the years, I have come to really appre­ci­ate the anony­mous life. I need not be val­i­dated by some spe­cial drama. Yes, my life has all of the mate­r­ial for some sort of comic but tragic drama. I respect its indi­vid­u­al­ity, but I do not have to get national atten­tion to be affirmed. Life in a small town has all of the recog­ni­tion nec­es­sary (and even more than enough). By the same prin­ci­ple, life in a monastery would suf­fice. Ulti­mately, the audi­ence is God — not other peo­ple. The essen­tial drama is for our­selves alone. Any­one can be applauded by a crowd. It is the stage of our own capac­i­ties and expec­ta­tions within that mat­ters most.