NOTICING the Internet Greek Chorus
Missing the sweetness of democratic, salutary connections
That’s it. Enough is enough. It’s time for politicians and business leaders who serve the altar of Wall St. to be held accountable. Their affect on our lives suggests that things are gravely out of whack. Mr. Musk, Mr. Bezos, and Mr. Zuckerberg made gifts of millions of dollars to the President-elect’s inaugural parties. “Kiss the ring/Bend the knee/Obey in advance/….Not that complicated,” tweeted Marc Elias.
Consider the President-elect’s men. His proposed cabinet is worth a combined $340 billion. These unelected mega-rich backers are tapped for positions giving them power to cut spending on public services and weaken national security. “The level of corruption happening before our eyes has never before happened in American history,” says Anne Applebaum.
As for business leadership, the spotlight on for-profit healthcare now is the result of intense public reaction to the murder of chief executive officer, Brian Thompson, NationalHealthcare. Nearly everyone has a personal, family, or friend misery story about health insurance. A Department of Justice investigation for insider trading and fraud by UnitedHealth Group (the parent company of NationalHealthcare) owes its visibility to the instant glorification of Thompson’s alleged killer who etched on the shell casings, “deny,” “defend,” and "depose.” The DOJ investigation includes Thompson.
We are awash in bad behavior. And everyone is talking about it. But is any of that talk changing for the better what is so obviously wrong?
I turn to the ancient Greeks who used drama for entertainment and civic engagement. Why? Because stage performances have a force and reckoning like none other.
The role of the Greek Chorus was to comment on the action of the primary players, the nobility and the wealthy of their day. The Chorus explain, wonder, expostulate, and warn.
Today, Internet citizens act as a Greek Chorus. Each in their own silo respond to our primary players whose contrived dramas serve to distract us from what they do, and to suck all the air out of the room of this democracy.
I question if the Internet Greek Chorus is as effective as they think themselves to be. The tweets and podcasts from wise to blathering fools looks like a dead end to course correction. Primarily because the talk is online instead of in person. Screens notoriously make us anxious, if not a bit stupid. Screens are thieves. They steal intelligence.
In person, you never know what someone is going to say in conversation, or what flash of insight will bolt into awareness. An important aspect of freedom, observes Timothy Snyder, is the freedom to be unpredictable, which at the least offers the possibility of not repeating the same old, same old. Unencumbered in-person conversations can be about real stuff. An unwanted pregnancy. Taking care of an ill parent while desperate for childcare. Reading banned books. Imagine the drama of it.
I’ve had some experience talking with folks I don’t know. Months before the November 5 election I designed the Cup of Sugar cards to use as a device to give me courage to begin one-on-one conversations. The existence of Project 2025 was barely known and the consequences of Project 2025 would be devastating. The card’s graphic design made an unexpected connection between people choosing recipes they liked and the Project 2025 blueprint for our future. The card compared recipes to the ingredients of laws and policies that make up the rule of law. The contrast caused a little jolt of surprise, followed by recognition. “I’m politically neutral,” one woman at the park said. “But I like the recipe idea. It really makes you think.”
Since the election I continue to search for new ways to add to democratic activism. Familiar strategies lost the election. Could we, citizens us, adopt the responsibility of the original Greek Chorus by taking the Chorus offline and comment on a stage?
We do not need professional actors. One proof of compelling non-professional acting were the brilliant culminating student performances produced by (Out)Laws & Justice, History on Stage. Public school students bored by textbook tedium saw those textbooks replaced by educational drama. The subject: the conquest of the American West. Suddenly, they were alert. Did outlaw-hero Jesse James really rob from the rich and give to the poor? Was Billy the Kid a devil or a saint? Using primary sources, students wrote plays, which they performed. The performances for audiences of peers and families demonstrated breathtaking comprehension of power and powerlessness. In effect, they became a Greek Chorus observing who took over the American West and those who contested the taking.
I propose that communities from the redwood forests to the gulf stream waters create, stage, and perform Greek Choruses across America in churches, mosques, synagogues, living rooms and backyard decks. Instead of getting swept away by diversions and shocking behavior, our Greek Choruses role is to help people to see and to hear how real needs—getting paid for overtime or securing social security—are blasted from view by the diversions of threats, horrific laws, and promises for more horrific laws. Because performers and audiences are family, friends, colleagues, employees, employers, clients, customers and neighbors, sweet connections and beneficial conversations would happen.
We can pivot from the bitter politics of grievance and revenge driving the Republican project. We can decide to counter the planned destruction of the American experiment with fierce, pragmatic, and salutary new recipes to make happen the democratic country we want.
When doubt slams in, as it always does, we could look to murmurations in the skies and be encouraged by what coherence looks like. Any community can produce a force and reckoning.
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Notes:
X:
https://x.com/marceelias/status/1868081315150807522
Anne Applebaum, Autocrats Inc.: The Dictators that Want to Run the World, Doubleday, (2024)
YouTube:
HUGE Mistake Tech Bros! Cozying Up to Trump Will End BADLY (w/ Anne Applebaum) | The Bulwark Podcast
https://www.healthcarefinancenews.com/news/brian-thompson-named-lawsuit-alleging-insider-tradingone-new-york-shot-killed-murder-homicide-investigation-ghost-gun-weapons-bullets-ammo
Timothy Snyder, On Freedom, Crown (2024)