30 March 2011

Leaning to authority or loyalty or honor

The West defines the secular, political order as the ground of authority (and hence duty) and autonomy for every member of society while the other dimensions of the greater self, the dimensions that fall under the rubric of membership – family bonds, religious affiliation, ethnic, linguistic, geographic, etc. – work, in some way, in tension with the secular ground of authority in a political, state-based, national social organization and collective. 
The West is that social organization that privileges this secular ground of authority; the Rest bases its social organization on the other dimensions of the greater self, those that come under the rubric of membership, what we would identify as loyalty and honor. 
It could be that the US is leaning to authority while Europe is leaning to loyalty and the Middle East to honor. The apocalypse could well mean the end of authority and autonomy in either direction, either because honor has overwhelmed it or because loyalty has. 

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