Mr. Brooks entire career is based on lies ( see, e.g., everything he wrote about the Iraq war in the National Review) yet he dares to claim the culture is just like him. Unlike Mr. Brooks I, and the liberals, progressives, leftists and Democrats he has long derided, live in a realty-based culture where the things that surprise Mr. Brooks are well-known and accounted for. He should try visiting here sometime, maybe Paul Krugman could show him around.
85
I've noticed a theme that permeates the comments section of this and other commentaries by Mr. Brooks. It goes something along these lines: "Yes, I agree with you, David, but remember, it was the Republican Party and your support of it that got us into whatever cultural, political, or social malady affecting this country. You're too late in apologizing." Can we cut Mr. Brooks some slack? Are we never to take Mr. Brooks at his word when he says, for example, that the president's actions are repugnant, as he does in this essay? The nation is badly divided, and we need to support forward-thinking people even if they are late in arriving at their enlightenment.
1142
@James K. Polk
Maybe if Mr. Brooks might repudiate some of his conservative Republican positions we might give him some slack but he doesn't do that. Yes, he doesn't like Trump but that's just recent. He's been a Republican a long time.
There are two doors and behind each door a different Brooks walks through. I think it's the latest book that he reads that shapes his view of the week because generally speaking he has an apt quote or three that he cites to legitimize a particular fantasy.
134
@James K. Polk
Does he still vote for and espouse the Republican ideals?!
Hypocrisy doesn't get slack forgiveness.
103
@James K. Polk Agreed, but you shouldn’t be a cheerleader for the capitalist economic system and then wring your hands over how destructive our “meritocracy” is.
105
The biggest howler is if you work hard and study hard you will get what you want. Someday.
Or if you live an exemplary life, deny all pleasures, save yourself from temptations and yada, you will end up in heaven. Or Mara Lago.
We have the biggest liar in the history of mankind in the most powerful position in the universe and he is a lazy, malicious, ignorant jerk, who never did a day's work in his life, putting the lie to all norms and values.
Who maligns and belittles those who do hideous, hard work for pennies and would deport them for being 'illegal', or, if not illegal, then he abuses human beings for being the wrong color, the wrong gender, the wrong political party.
We have a government that denies many of us health and without health you have nothing. The GOP denies women equal pay, would take away their rights over their own bodies, and lies, cheats, and steals to gain more wealth and power for themselves yet derides poor people as takers.
Make America GOP-less again.
197
My husband and I heard David B. after publication of his last book at the 6th & I Synagogue when we lived in Bethesda. Now in LA area & all I can say is I really, really hope he’s coming this way on his book tour for his newest book🙏.
This article resonated so much for me—will forward to friends as well.
5
I guess, for your current age, if you selected the wrong career, and that you continually made unhappy choices, and that your individual journeys turned out bad, and that you never found any inner truths, and that you only tried to be rich and successful, then your life may not be well. On the other hand, if you loved your job, or you made several happy choices, or several journeys turned out well, or that you found at least some inner truths, or that your wealth was good enough, then you may actually be happy despite what this writer says. Notice that the first sentence is all "and's" and the second is all "or's". I can go on about the confirmation bias in this article, or that the author's view of his or even my world is despicable, but why would I want to do that? Onward.
4
There is a sixth lie, Mr Brooks.
"It's the same on both sides!"
6
Brooks has some interesting insights but there are easy swipes and many simplifications in this op-ed. No proverb, book or aphorism is going to encapsulate the complexity of reality. All these “lies“ are true... to a point. We do travel life alone, we do get ahead based on our effort, we do place a higher premium on people contributing value over those who don’t (are you more inclined to help your single mother friend going through hard times or your mooch uncle who borrows money never to repay it?)
Dr. Seuss didn’t set out to write a watertight map for success; he wrote a book that children and adults would enjoy about a life. “Do unto others...” is good shorthand advice. What makes these things “lies” is the lack of mindfulness and nuance as we mindlessly repeat them and apply them wholesale. You can poke holes into anything, the art is in drawing the right lesson from an imperfect proverb/saying. Heck, if you apply the same simplistic standard Brooks uses here then this article too is a lie.
3
David, I absolutely don't agree with the recent criticism that suggested you were sanctimonious. I think it is the right column at the right time. I've done over 40 documentaries for public television and my graduate study is in cultural anthropology. I only mention this to say that I've studied various cultures over long periods of time and that I've thought deeply about the rise and falls of cultures. I do believe we are at a cultural crossroads. After a trip to Cuba two months ago I wrote a blog entitled, "Is is possible that Cuban's are happier than Americans?" In my extended time there I stayed in people's homes and often ate dinner with them in their kitchen. I stayed in three different private homes. In each place the people had extended family at the table, had a sense of community, and seemed to have an internal joy about their improving lives. As a broadcaster I believe that TV, the internet, and publications celebrating "stars" have propogated a shallow culture of "material meritocracy." In Cuba, there is, very little access to TV or internet. People know their neighborhood because few people have cars to travel widely. I can't say Cubans are "happier" than Americans, but I can say, by and large, they are more soulful - closely connected to family, community, and their place therein. Thank you for your "Five Lies" column. I don't think we are doomed. But it is time to stop and reflect on our chasing superficial goals and come home to family, friends, and community.
8
The professional class was trained to seek fulfillment in managing the wealth and emerging interests of the elites.
3
Great column, if you have never listened to Van Morrison's "I'm Not Feeling It Anymore" you should. Great song that I think captures the main point of your column. Especially when you listen to last 1/2.
1
Although, I do dis- agree with much of the sentiment of the article, I also think it is simplistic.
If you have a certain type of personality, career success if fulfilling. Imagine yourself without a vocation, pretty pathetic actually.
Only you make your self happy. Circumstances can define a life struggle but the wisemen know that true happiness is achieved despite what happens to you. It come from within.
Life is an individual journey. An individual can change the course of history. It takes motivation but it happens. Just look at historical figures, everyone from Mosses to MKL to Trump. Motivated individuals shaping people and history.
The term merit used to be a moral category or at least one with moral implications. As in Milton's description of Satan: "By merit rais'd to that bad eminence." By Adam Smith's "Theory of Moral Sentiments" (just about a century later) that had shifted to something closer to our current meaning of talent within a socio-economic context, but Smith believed in the power of social approval more than other invidious distinctions. The trade off is social mobility. Milton lived in the wake of a revolution. A world of strivers makes for unpleasant company, but no one likes rich people telling them to accept their lot in life.
So much truth. Great piece, David. Thanks.
2
This thought process needs to be looked at by all.
We have become the very culture we fear, the culture of selfishness and about my own.
It’s not always easy to help the people within your community, but encouragement to do so (which is not happening where you find most people) helps.
1
From an Existential perspective thanks to Victor Frankl, humans need meaning and purpose to live. I ascribe to these tenants. Brooks definitely does not speak for me. Education polished me in ways I cannot Ben express. Any every acclamation I have received, humbled me. To know others recognize and give credit illustrates to me that these individuals they have gone there and most likely beyond. The decisions I have made were all heart felt. Two little babies are alive and well thriving in this world. No panacea. I do not ascribe to “what society says.” Based on my understanding, and knowledge, no matter how flawed, I draw conclusions from this. We are individuals, and no two are alike. Similar, but not alike. I favor variances. Unpredictability makes living exciting at times. We are born a blank slate, tabula rossa. Heredity, influences, desires, dreams, and talent contribute to the species called “human.” Love, linda.🌹
"Meritocracy"...Hmmm. That word implies MERIT. Not marketability. I think the two have been conflated for a long time--in the very same way that "profit" and "prosperity" have.
As a high school teacher, I see my students navigate these cultural lies every day. Thank you for thoughtfully and concisely capturing some of what’s wrong and pointing towards a better way.
3
#4 is one-sided. "The reality is that values are created and passed down by strong, self-confident communities and institutions. People absorb their values by submitting to communities and institutions and taking part in the conversations that take place within them. It’s a group process." What if you "submit to" a community or institution that is corrupt and evil? I hope you will have the independence of mind to remain "outside" that kind of community. In dismissing our "individualism," Brooks comes perilously close to dismissing the ideal of thinking for yourself.
3
Thank you, Chairman Mao. When do we begin culling intellectuals and those wearing glasses?
42
Well, finally a Brooks column I can agree with.
51
Three names:
Theodor Adorno
Max Weber
Émile Durkheim
If you don’t have time to read, go to You Tube.
23
Thank you, David.
6
All five of these are pillars of the GOP. So why are you still a Republican???
76
This is a good essay. Emerson, I believe, would approve.
16
David, I think you have to be a gay man or woman to know how wrong some of your arguments are for some of us about the merit or lack thereof of making oneself happy, or embarking on an individual journey or finding our own truth. Speaking only for myself now I found family and local community from whence I came suppressing my life potential, and tradition and religion literally soul-crushing and life-destroying. At age 62 I can say with some confidence that while I certainly don’t want to be the proverbial island, I had to find my own path. Sometimes it was helpful to consult with others but quite often it was necessary to tune them out. So ok, your little book of rules undoubtedly works well for some people but propounding them for everyone is just hubris.
54
The problem with our society is the lack of intimacy.
16
My husband Dennis and I rarely had “two nickels to rub together”. But we had friends, family, laughs and love! We always talked about how RICH we were! D’s best - “I truly am rich, I’d just like two hundred dollars of ‘walking around money’ “
19
In 2019, the word "successful" is substituted when what's really described is "wealthy". Do you need to understand anything else about capitalism, American style?
52
David himself must realize how fractured our society is when his simple — and wonderful— opinion piece about the lies we live with can instantly draw such venomous comments.
O tempora, o mores!
24
There is hope on the first four, But number five — good luck with that one, for the majority of men have always served mammon, and I imagine, always will, and consequently they will always value the wealthy man over the poor. You ought to be a poor woman married to a rich man with children. The children always side with the money.
7
"Cultural" lies at the heart of political problems? Let's see. Our politics today is full of lies, deceit, and hypocrisy; lack of compassion or even pretending to care; pride and paranoia. Cultural lie #1: pretending the truth doesn't matter; #2: believing the world is solely for our amusement, not our responsibilities to each other and to the planet; #3: too much credence that even our material success is a function of our own efforts, when in reality any field of individual opportunity exists because of what the community past and present have created the conditions for, not just our own striving. Truth is an individual pursuit, Mr. Brooks, not something to be handed down to others by you or anyone else. Elders can but point the way, and that is very important indeed.
18
A cozy bed, a sleeping partner to hold or to be held by at the end of most days, and at least one pet that hogs the bed, makes for a pretty good life. If it’s in a neighborhood of friends, even better. I don’t know how people can manage more than one home.
45
You can't have the cultural revolution Brooks espouses without having the political one either coming first, or at a minimum, alongside. We're talking about a host of factors.
Getting money out of politics, starting with Citizens United. The mega-corporations have far too much power. With that power comes the advertising that brainwashes the masses. No, you can't shop your way to happiness either.
Which accompanies addressing our pressing inequality. We're atop the list of OECD countries in that metric, or at least when one only considers those countries that have been members for close to half a century. The newer members who lag in that metric are what we should be running away from, not towards.
Which ties into a more equitable tax structure where corporations and the already wealthy contribute more. We did just fine in the Eisenhower years. Yeah there's more competition, but in no way does that argue for historically low taxes for Fortune 500 companies and the 1%.
Which ties into spending more on education and basic scientific research at all levels, so we can prepare the younger generations to succeed in the future and have companies providing jobs based on said basic research.
That ties into climate change, which if it's not addressed, makes much of the above moot- the question being not if, but when, society will collapse under the indifferent forces of Mother Nature.
All the above are things that David Brooks' conservative party refuse to acknowledge or address.
26
Isn’t the obvious corollary to Brooks’s last cultural “lie” that money will ensure “happiness “. Interesting why he did state this head on. Perhaps he remains the diehard conservative Republican capitalist?
5
More insufferable, self-important, double-talking sophistry from Mr Brooks, who now has the effrontery to tell us all how to live our lives?
Sorry, but a partisan columnist - and one known for being disingenuous, to boot -- has no business playing "philosopher king" and lecturing us about "lies," truth, or anything else! The sheer arrogance!
There are so many shallow truisms and sophistic propounded here, it's hard to know where to start. But perhaps my "favorite" is:
"In reality, the people who live best tie themselves down. They don’t ask: ... It’s the chains we choose that set us free."
Yeah, tell that to people working two (or three!) jobs to pay their bills and living in a "neighborhood" (another of Mr Brook's favorite faux concepts), where they're being priced out by "rich and successful people" and exploding rents or housing costs! I'm sure they "chose" those "chains" and feel SO "set free" by them!
"It’s the chains we choose that set us free"?
Sounds like a slogan for a line of overpriced, designer tee-shirts!
32
David,....
Does the expression, “ lt Takes a Village.” , ring any bells?
22
The day will come when David Brooks finally realizes he should be a Democrat.
25
I would advise David Brooks not to take an absolutist position on any of these issues. Everyone, rightly or mistakenly, pursues the life they think they want, are entitled to, can afford or can envision. And to judge someone for putting their work first or seeking self-sufficiency without knowing anything about them is unfair and wrong-headed. We all do what we can with what we have at a particular moment and when we die, we hope to depart with as few regrets as possible. But there is no one truth. Brooks has found what works for him. Mazel tov. Let us each find, to the degree we can, what works for us.
19
I agree with David Brooks here, and welcome this column. But Brooks probably embraces meritocracy in his own life more than an abstracted kernel of wisdom might represent. Did he ever hire interns who didn't come from great schools, or weren't super-achievers? Did he send his kids to public schools rather than to exclusive private schools? Where is his house (or houses)? Are they among communities of life's "winners"?
13
While I agree with much of what the columnist opines, he repeats one of the the biggest lies told by American society. That is that the USA is a meritocracy. We are not.
Success in the USA is not based on merit. It's based on what socio-economic strata you are born in -- the color of your skin -- your gender -- who you know -- where your parents could afford to send you to university, etc., etc.
The realization that the American Dream -- founded on a belief that the society is a meritocracy -- is a lie is contributing to the despair gripping Americans, particularly our young.
We need to stop spreading the falsehood. Before you can solve a problem, you have to recognize that you have one. We aren't a meritocracy -- that is the problem.
Next up, how do we become one?
27
Respectfully disagree.
I was born in poverty in the South. Had to use financial aid and work to go to college. Grades weren't good enough for scholarships. Worked hard. Twenty five years later, I have my PhD and I own a multimillion dollar company with my brother.
The American Dream is still real.
Our culture is built on lies, the greatest among them being that a virgin had a baby, that an innocent man was put to death to make you and me acceptable to the Almighty and that a dead man can live forever. With a context like this is it any wonder that most of us can't think clearly?
39
Brooks writes:
"The sociology of the meritocracy is that society is organized around a set of inner rings with the high achievers inside and everyone else further out. The anthropology of the meritocracy is that you are not a soul to be saved but a set of skills to be maximized."
This is a continuation of Brooks's earlier very long op-ed summarized in the last two paragraphs as “happiness” mountain and “joy” mountain climbed with mind and soul respectively.
There are actually three mountains - the third being the “pleasure” mountain climbed with heart.
I choose to call them three separate tracks on the same mountain. We need all three tracks - the heart, the mind, and the soul. They intersect and guide us while on a long journey of life.
Which track to climb on at a given time is up to the individual. The rewards - the pleasure, the happiness, and the Joy - accrue to the individual in the same proportion as the effort put in along the way on each track.
Politically, hyper individualism (of heart, mind, and soul) in a civil society is constrained by Mahatma Gandhi's principle: "In the well-being of ALL is one's well-being."
Pursuit of one's well-being at the expense of others and the nature (or the environment) is at the root of our global political problems. The constraints we need in the global economy are only two: an economy with social justice that assures well-being of ALL and an economy that is environmentally sustainable.
9
Don't forget # 6
The check is in the mail
4
"Life is an individual journey." Of course it is. I do not understand how "What cool thing can I do next?" is different from "What is my responsibility here?" They both result in one individual experience or another. They are both the results of an individual's choices and decisions. Each decision, regardless of what it is, launches a new journey. And what if the "cool thing" is volunteering at the Special Olympics? And the "responsibility" is "to myself to maximize my fun"? No, liberals only go for silly things, Conservatives only for "serious things". Profiling at its very worst. Generalizations and assumptions without thinking.
And "Find your own truth". I disagree with the characterization of the human experience. Conservatives believe in a monolithic view of humans... people are all the same. You can train them to be Christians, or heterosexual, or whatever. I see nothing but individuality in the universe. No two snowflakes are exactly the same, no two humans are exactly the same. No matter what is tried, individuality will win out. Additionally, "one's own truth" manifests itself in how people act, what they do. It is not what they will say, or write, or aspire to. What they do. And everyone acts differently.
I enjoy reading what Conservatives think. But it is all theoretical generalized. It is so very different from the real world I try to live in.
4
There is another, additional level of lies in America: it's advertising. American are subjected to a barrage of ads, online, on TV, billboards, magazines, robocalls, whatever. This message overload distorts their vision of reality and sabotages the ability to distinguish true messages from false ones. Is Trump selling Trump or is he discussing rational policy? Are cheerios good for you because they contain no cholesterol? Where do Americans learn to distinguish between the two?
8
I'd be interested in knowing what David Brooks will do differently henceforth as a result of his newly acquired knowledge, and what regrets he has about specific actions in the past. Absent that, this column is not much more than a nice collection of vague and useless nostrums.
10
Simply being able to feel gratitude for the miracle of being alive, and sharing that, in as much as that is available through circumstance, culture, philosophy, or an appreciative sense of history that provides humility and a sense of connection to the past and future, seems the kind of experience upon which to build a life and a desire to insure that experience for as many as possible.
5
Lots to ponder here. Yes, let's bring back integrity, transparency, and a devotion to the common good. Let's focus on making communities safer, healthier, more joyful. Let's deplore greed and extol community service.
We need more ad-free media that isn't always trying to sell us stuff. We need privacy from the spyware in our homes that is trying to commodify us.
We need to give the next generation hope, not just offer examples of what nor to do. We need to make it easier for parents to be with their kids so kids can grow with guidance.
4
Are these five lies or simply five inaccuracies? Perhaps the social failing underlying the problems presented is that we relate to the idea of truth more as an absence of falsehood than as an abundance of accuracy, and anyone who became an adult back in the 1970's is quite familiar with the shortcomings of popular ideas. Back then it was the failures of postwar liberalism as seen in rising crime rates, rampant inflation and the humiliating end to the Vietnam War. The popular philosophies David Brooks wants us to reject were largely created back then and we have had over 40 years to test them and find them wanting as well. Young adults today face no more difficulty wading through these problems than young adults have had probably in every generation and the romanticism behind David Brooks' alternative suggestions also has been found wanting. I do not propose any larger philosophies of life because life is lived in the details and the accumulated empirical knowledge expressed as intuitive judgments as to how to approach tomorrow are worth much more than any simple generalizations I can think of.
2
I am retired now, but at one point in my career, I had several hundred people working for me and was convinced that I was destined for even greater achievements. At the same time, however, I was not happy, had no time for my family and was under incredible stress.
Eventually, a merger ended that job, but it took years for me to understand and appreciate how lucky I actually was that I had not continued down this path for much longer. Had I not been forced to change, I could easily have ended up divorced, alone and dead at an early age.
In later years, when helping younger employees manage their careers, I always stressed that their number one priority had to be themselves, followed second by their family and friends. At most, their job should be no higher than their 3rd priority, and perhaps even lower.
The pressure on young people to pursue and succeed in a career seems even greater today than when I left school. Yes, having a job is important, but we all need to recognize that for the vast majority of us, a job is a means to and end - to support ourselves and our families, and to live a life that brings both joy and meaning.
10
Approximatley 50% of the American public is rooting for the first to be last.
"The sociology of the meritocracy is that society is organized around a set of inner rings with the high achievers inside and everyone else further out. The anthropology of the meritocracy is that you are not a soul to be saved but a set of skills to be maximized."
Looks simple. Based on the algorythm, any coder should be able lay out the variables.
However, our culture observes that Humpty Dumpty fell from the wall and pride is supposed to be the deadlist sin. And for the more parochial, what about that Sermon on the Mount? The camel and the eye of the needle? And was it fate or just bad dumb luck that gave us this president and this congress? Certainly no merit involved.
1
Being older than Mr. Brooks, (and female) my take is slightly different. When I was coming of age, career took a back seat to fighting social injustice and upending a society that that promoted war, racism, and inequality in all of manifestations. College admissions was almost exclusively reserved for white males as a way of avoiding the draft. For everyone else, it was a struggle - not because of the pressures Mr. Brooks sites but bias, plain and simple. While I know that Mr. Brooks takes a rather dim view of the radical times to which I allude, I can't help but feel a certain irony the lies he highlights.
5
Brooks uses the word "meritocracy" a lot, not seeming to realize that everyone else stopped being naive enough to believe in that concept decades ago. It oddly dates him.
9
It'd be good if they told us stuff like this at the beginning, wouldn't it? Instead, we get Santa Claus and The Easter Bunny and materialism and capitalism and striving and achievement and, sooner than later, self-help and yoga and Prozac. All in the 'pursuit of happiness'. Something is wrong with this picture.
7
"The whole country is going through some sort of spiritual and emotional crisis." --David Brooks
What evidence do you have that supports this statement as it applies to each and every individual in the "whole country?"
I am not in some sort of spiritual and emotional crisis. I venture to guess that I am not alone.
5
@Surreptitious Bass
"I am not in some sort of spiritual and emotional crisis"
But what if your fellow citizens are? Does that even matter to you? Getting outside of yourself and taking others' perspective, becoming empathetic, can lead you to learn about what others are going through. Believe it or not, that helps you evolve. Unless you want to remain static?
1
This may sound trite, but happiness lies in being comfortable in your own skin, whatever that may be. Do not long for things that others may have- be happy for that which you have. Love yourself, your body and everyone else you meet. Think first about others, not yourself. Work, and be happy in the mere fact that you work and accomplish something, whatever that may be. If you are able, have children, they are the greatest joy in life. And remember that life is short- do not waste a second of it consumed by hatred. Enjoy the time you have as best you are able.
18
Considering my age, my life is certainly drawing to a close. My life experiences have persuaded me that the most pernicious of lies is the one Dr. Seuss perpetuated and you cited: "Life is an individual journey."
We are clearly social beings, and, as G.K. Chesterton once noted: "We are all in the same boat...and we are all seasick."
We are also a people on pilgrimage through history, people living in community with others that are "seasick," and we have a responsibility not only for ourselves but also others on pilgrimage with us.
As Mark Shields, a commentator on PBS with you, Mr. Brooks, is fond of saying: "We all drink from wells that we did not dig and are warmed by fires that we did not build."
Life is NOT an individual journey. No one is on the journey alone. We are all in solidarity with one another, regardless of whether or not we believe that to be true. Our personal failures and successes not only harm or benefit us individually but also all those "in the same boat" and on pilgrimage with us.
11
In reality, communities exist in tension between the individual and the community/institutions. The total focus on the individual is a path to self glorification and many ills, when you think your happiness is more important than others; but those 'strong community institutions", the collective, whether it is a religious group, a community, a government, where society is a 'collective' and the 'good of the whole' is what matters (think about China and its government), you end up with oppression, you end up with group think and quite frankly, horrible abuses, because the individual doesn't matter, and it does. Moral truth is something that evolves over time, there are very few 'absolute truths', the fundamentalist Christians who claim that in scripture, the Catholic Church in its teachings, communists with the writings of Marx, all make that claim and fall flat on their face in the light of the spotlight, they are all group think that ends up looking foolish, and that is because individuals challenged them and that created a new kind of thinking. The idea of 'universal truth' has often been simply a means to control and power, and it is individuals who challenge this, other than that we would be in a perpetual dark ages in terms of morality and learning.
4
For the most part, I agree with you. I must be one of those rare birds. I actually achieved a bit of success, though the status symbol of money has alluded me. I am an expert in my field because I diverted none of my attention to what others found in friends and family. I found happiness as an individual in a profession, engineering, that eats its young, and where engineers are cast aside early by the callousness of business managers as they slow down from old age. I am comfortable in my own skin, thank you very much: if my talents aren't needed by you don't call for free advice later when I'm solving other people's problems.
I don't miss family and the few friends I have value me as an honest bellwether. I will die alone, which doesn't bother me a bit as an atheist. All men are forgotten within a decade no matter how well attended the cemetery plot.
8
a telling question with a telling answer for me: who would want to be Mark Zuckerberg or Sheryl Sandberg? in the chase for the almighty $, they have lead an organization that, for the most part, has had a destructive effect on society IMO. Fake news, Russian bots, studies showing that young people feel poorly about themselves when they compare their "lives" to other posters, and people only listening to narrow casting of information that shares their world view. I would not want that to be my legacy no matter how many buildings have my name on them.
7
The only person who can make you happy/serene is YOURSELF. To rely (and expect) someone else to tell you what you are or to do it for you is to avoid being your real self.
That said, to expect that only YOU alone by focusing on your own (selfish) needs will provide you meaning in life is equally deceptive.
(See _The Chapters of the Fathers_/Pirkei Avot 1:14, "If I do not do for myself, who will do it for me? If I care only for myself, what am I? And if not now, when?)
I am also reminded of two books of Robert Putnam, about "social capital" _American Grace_ and _Bowling Alone_ which address the importance of community life--one about social clubs the other about religion. We find meaning when we're part of a larger group.
3
Mr. Brooks, please, consider moving to the Wall Street Journal where this kind of reflection isomer sorely needed.
6
As I can relate to only a few of the lies given my bohemian nature, the greatest value of this piece is helping me grasp what it is that drives the confusing behavior I see on the occasional glance at reality TV (or the White House)
4
A very significant cultural lie is the one inherent in the term "meritocracy," a term no less reeking of privilege than "aristocracy." The privileged in our society are not necessarily the meritorious. They are the fortunate: in their birth, and/or in their families, and/or in their education, certainly in their opportunities and in the missteps and embarrassments they have managed to avoid or conceal. Are Trump, Adelson, Roger Stone - just to pick three examples at random - "meritorious?" Not in my opinion. In reality our society is, to coin a term, a "Tychocracy," rule by the lucky. No doubt some of the successful are indeed fine people, but surely very many are not. The latter are just lucky. And the term "meritocracy," if applied to them, is another stroke of luck: it flatters their complacency with the world as they've found it, while at the same time encouraging the pernicious belief that they, in some moral sense, "deserve" their success, and the less fortunate "deserve" their failure. It is not so!
9
David, you overlook the biggest Grosse Lüge: That advertising is necessary. It is not necessary. Helpful, yes. Nor is advertising free speech; rather it is too often totally unregulated psychological programming.
And advertising is full of lies. "Chocolate bars" that are made mostly (≥50%) of sugar come to mind, along with all the lies that justified the creation of the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau.
3
In my experience, the difference between self-dentified conservatives and liberals in the old sense comes from the last paragraph of #4: that truth is a group endeavor, grounded in established traditions. Truith IS a groups endeavor, but our insistence on defining what makes a group is, I believe, a hang-up. Consider Kurt Vonnegut's idea of a "karass," a group of people you are on earth with to do... something. And you don't know who they are, or what the thing you were supposed to do is. An educated guess is as good as you can get. Institutions and traditions have value, but they are not the only group that holds truth. Sometimes they have built up whole rulebooks on grounds that, it turns out, have fundamental flaws. Sometimes new light, new truth, really does turn old assumptions and truths upside-down. And sometimes the truth you're looking for is not what you think it is, or what your fellow group-members think it is.
Prepare to be surprised and proven wrong.
2
@Ingrid: Independent establishment of provable beliefs reveals truth.
What do you call what we had before there was this terrible thing David calls a meritocracy?
POLITICAL AND CULTURAL REVOLUTIONS
We are experiencing two revlutions,
one political and one
that's cultural. Althugh the latter
is a more deeply serious matter,
in a conflict that's not won
by means of quite delusionary solutions
outlined by nearly every politician
to win most battles by proposing
to those whose worldviews srongly clash
with their opponents' ways to smash
the the culture that they are opposing,
beneath contempt and not above suspicion.
Whereas delusionary solutions neaarly always win political
battles cultural ones are mostly won by being hypocritical.
1
Well written and conceived. Let me ask: What political philosophy or theory of socioeconomic organization, political party, or wing of a political party currently embodies these ideas or has the best chance of repelling or dismantling these “lies” you lament? Hmmm?
5
RM. Thank you for your comment. Not too many conservatives would agree with David Brooks on this.
I'll swallow my pride and confess that I recently read the first few chapters of a biography of Hugh Hefner. Suffice it to say, Messrs Brooks and Hefner express opinions of direct opposition on all points mentioned in this article.
Hef says that in his wildest dreams he could not have imagined a sweeter life (than his).
40
@Heckler I'm writing this without invalidating Hefner, to be clear, but his circumstances were extraordinary ones.
9
@Heckler
He lived a life chasing one empty pleasure after another. He may have felt some happiness, but clearly lacked contentment and devalued women in his quest for personal satisfaction. He can claim it was a great life, but it seems incredibly sad to me.
20
In other countries in Europe children are taught what things are for the common good usually by parents and also in school (secondary when I was growing up). Children need to be aware (as children that is their formative years) that society is a "joint" effort -- for the betterment of each of its components.
Also, in Spain -- in the secondary (both private and public schools) when I was growing up-- In the 60's -- there was a class (part of the national curriculum of HS). The curriculum was the same country-wide. Anyway, there was a class called something like civics-which included how to behave in public (let seniors enter before, etc. etc.) It should be taught in the US--in my opinion.
I live in a multi-cultural location ( people from the South Pacific, Middle East, Far East, Native Americans , large Latino population alaska Eskimos . The whole Earth Planet represented. If you take public transit, one can expect anything--from people getting up to someone with a cane to those who refuse to give a seat to the blind. immigrants to the country as in Sweden, German etc. should be taught manners of collective behavior etc.
Likewise, high schoolers should also be taught social psychology or civics or sociology.
The American notions that is you are monetary success equates morality is PLAIN WRONG. In many cases it is - Bill Gates, Steve Jobs, etc. In many others is PLAIN WRONG.
--- MOST SERIOUS FLAW in the American psyche.
6
While I agree with David's basic points, we have often been led astray by these myths.
I wonder, however, how he can square them with the policies and ideas he's promoted as a conservative spokesman for so many of the past years?
What he's espoused, and the resultant policies he's promoted, seems to me to be fundamentally opposed to these five lies, as he calls them.
I'd like to hear if he's changed his way of thinking and is now ready to buy into progressive policy, which more generally promotes the common good while making it easier to pursue nobler goals, or has just read another new book.
4
Mr. Brooks, you aided and abetted when you could have been suspicious of and alert to a political/social philosophy that demanded freedom and liberty but made no mention of responsibility, personal or political.
3
Mr. Brooks has a very superficial understanding of culture, and a simplistic take on community.
Culture is not a monolithic national thing nor are economic and political beliefs and behavior separable from culture. It is holistic, mental, unconscious, and organically arises from human psychology and the contexts of human lives. Nor does it somehow monolithically change from "not a problem" to "a problem", particularly in a short period of a few years.
Communities do not easily form because of the degree of sharing and stability they require. Most are organic and not created. This is a common American misconception. America has very few genuine communities, and getting more isn't a matter of will.
Mr. Brooks fancies himself a social scientist, but he needs to read more widely.
4
You’re making this more complicated than it is. Since the beginning of recorded history, man determined that happiness is not about “me”; it is about “us”. Philosophers and religions figured this out thousands of years ago and came up with the appropriate set of morals and values. These morals and values put a check on the basic human desire for self-satisfaction and replaced it with the importance of recognizing the needs of all. For the most part, religion set the rules, and most people followed them.
Today there has been a large move away from religion. Many people still abide by the historical morals and value standards, despite the lack of an overarching religious presence. But what has happened today is a significant move back to our primitive desires to maximize self-benefits. Our President is a narcissist, and he is followed blindly by half of Congress. Is it any wonder that many people are now following the lead of these new role models?
3
The Isolation you describe is a consequence of the Cartesian assumptions of post-Enlightenment culture. It is both misleading and too great a part of who we are to be a mere mistake. We need to see ourselves as defined by our relationships, both to the world and to each other.
https://www.academia.edu/11949548/The_Embodied_We_The_Extended_Mind_as_Cognitive_Sociology
1
How sad is it that the richest country in the world is actually having a battle for the right of the 99% to exist? You can have all the Sunday dinners you want with family all around BUT if the family is struggling then what? The real problem is this USED to be a country where if you worked hard you were OK. Now people work 3 minimum wage jobs without healthcare and retirement. Slots in Ivy League schools are being bought. A president is found innocent yet the report needs severe redacting. I think when you see what's in our White House on an hourly basis on Twitter is it any surprise ?
7
You, David Brooks, have contributed to the "culture based on lies" that you are criticizing. Remember all your columns crowing about the gold-plated resumes of the Obama administration? Your book The Social Animal that celebrates the disciplined habits of the already-privileged, and that makes it sound like those who are born on third base hit a triple? It's very rich for you to contribute so loudly to the dominance of the amoral meritocratic elite that caused much of our financial crash, and then sanctimoniously bemoan the emptiness of the culture that you helped create. Many of us have observed these qualities in American society long before you did.
5
Thank you -- I thought this column was pretty insightful. We seem to be in a post-truth society now where objective facts have become subjective, where the person with the loudest voice is always the one heard no matter what they are saying, and where money can buy an idea's acceptance. I am a firm believer that the remedy for harmful or false speech is more speech. Your column is a good start for a conversation about societal norms that need to change.
1
And why have we built our culture around these lies? If for a common good, would that good be for the sake of good old free market capitalism? When "life is an individual journey" no need to take personal responsibility of what role that individual might have played in the body count left behind on the trail. And I agree that values are passed along by the communities and institutions we live with, but throughout our American history we also know these same institutions we built on foundations to coerce, to bend others to the common will--which usually has to do with monetary gain.
3
No, the roots of our political problems are egotism, and the lack of self understanding that this word implies. Mr. Brooks is a nice person, but superficial in his analyses. The problems of war, anger, greed, etc. are found in every culture, so our "cultural roots" cannot be the problem. Self-interest rules (often, and especially with those people who seek power over others). Perhaps Mr. Brooks could write an article on the relationship of the notion of "identity" to self-interest and the consequent political problems.
1
While I don't disagree with most of these, the irony is that while I can't question David's belief in what he writes, he is writing as a conservative who have embraced so many of these 'false notions'...they have turned glorifying the wealthy into a religious mantra (not the poor are blessed, but the rich), they talk about the rugged individualist going it on their own (ie the Ayn Rand Drivel), self reliance (David Mccullough,the historian, snorts at this, says "show me the self made man, and I'll show you at least 10 people who have helped them"). It is the conservatives who sneer at the arts, especially their base, who talk about anything not related to 'practical things', including pure research, as 'a waste'.
"The reality is that values are created and passed down by strong, self-confident communities and institutions.". While that of course is true, it leaves out the abuse of those 'communities and institutions", when you imply the individual has to 'submit' to them, it is the road to abuse, because individuals are at the heart of dissent to injustice, it was individuals who stood up to the abuse of the church, it was individuals who stood up to the abuse of kings, moral institutions require a conscience, and that doesn't come from the group, it comes from the individual. The lack of rights for women and minorities and LGBT people came from 'strong institutions', it was individuals who changed the community mores and overcame the oppression of those institutions.
8
If David Brooks believes that these are myths, he should not be a Republican. The Democratic Party is the party of helping others, social supports for those less fortunate, and placing the brakes on excessive wealth at the expense of workers and poor people.
3
David Brooks is responding to what he sees as a glaring shortcoming in our culture and I would agree, although obviously it in no way can be comprehensive, just a provocation that has value and should be considered. The older I get the more suspicious I become of so called truth and the more I value experience (which is also a form of knowledge). Without rejecting Brook's points, I do see value in seeing ones life as an individual path, that one must walk as best one can. The truth/value is found in the journey, in walking the path, it should involve others, but not always. There is no reward at the end, just what you have learned and shared along the way.
Take a look at a wonderful children's book, The Trouble with Alaric (Williamson, Jane. NY: Farrar, Straus & Giroux, 1975), in which a dog makes the mistake of romanticizing humans.
As a member of and mentor to the meritocracy, don't fall into the same trap with respect to everyone else.
1
It seems irresponsible to launch a topic of such layered depth in such a short essay. The topics here would take years of research and discovery to understand fully and offer a solid opinion on a path forward.
I agree the cultural revolution needs to proceed and is more important. I also believe you neglected to call out one of the biggest lies we've told ourselves that's currently and painfully being uncovered: the power of organized Religion to help save us.
2
Each of Mr. Brooks’ statement is not true. I don’t even add qualifiers: these are simply lies. They may be true for a subset of the population but certainly not for everybody. Success does not bring happiness? From personal experience: yes, it does. Ask any scientist, artist, painter or musician whether they’d give up their talent for “thicker” relationships (whatever that means), and they’’ll say “no”. Money does not bring happiness? From personal experience: yes, it does. I am much happier having enough money to do what I want than when I was poor. Life is not an individual journey? From personal experience: yes, it is. So will Mr. Brooks try to convince me that my happiness is somehow inauthentic? Story I’m not buying it.
2
It took retirement from the workforce to find all those things that are meaningful and drive me: 1) Noting that personal events that are highly unlikely are the work of God's hands; 2) Appreciating that the human eye and the human brain make no sense as accidental occurrences; 3) connecting to others in person, in blogs and in memoirs; 4) Growing in love towards God and my spouse and 5) Slowing down.
I have found it very interesting in watching videos of some foreign places where people have very little materially and yet they can seem obviously very happy, smiling, laughing with family and friends. Materialism does not engender happiness much less meaning or value. It is what is inside of us that does.
7
@Mary
Yes!
It's not that complicated. There's conception, birth, life and death, and it's all LUCK! If one is lucky, and I have been, then enjoy.
1
I can never comprehend the human need for happiness. People across the world suffer hunger, illness and lack of freedoms. And yet we only care about our own comfort and security irregardless of others' pain. I would rather leave a miserable life helping lift at least one's life. Happiness should not be the utmost desire of humanity. Instead, the peace of mind that we have done everything we possibly could to lift others should be the overriding goal.
David Brooks says a cultural revolution is more important than a political revolution. But a cultural revolution cannot occur without an economic revolution. And an economic revolution cannot occur without a political revolution.
Ridding ourselves of Donald Trump could be the beginning of a political revolution.
5
Funerals offer us the opportunity to reflect upon a life. I've noticed that the best eulogies include little mention of the deceased's work life. For those that do, career success seems fairly inconsequential. (Isn't there something meatier to talk about?) It's really the human connections that jump out in the summation of an individual's life.
1
I think many of our emotional problems are based in the fact that we are living in a fishbowl of our own making. News is 24/7 and so is social media. Nothing is certain because everything is subject to change. What is so ennobling about being a person when the world seems to be dominated by forces far beyond our control? What has value when everything can be measured and categorized?
Does the world need people to function? Not so much anymore. Machines, ubiquitous computing and communication devalue tiny human beings who can only think as fast our comparatively little brains can allow it.
Is there a way to adapt to all of this? Maybe. So far however, we do have all those teen suicides and opioid deaths.
1
Much respect to Mr. Brooks. It’s not always easy to see past the societal snare that is ‘conflict theory’, but lifting that veil is a powerful experience.
“If we possess our why of life we can put up with almost any how. — Man does not strive after happiness; only the Englishman does that.” -Friedrich Nietzsche, ‘Twilight of the Idols’
"We talk a lot about the political revolution we need. The cultural revolution is more important."
Political revolution is about trying to do the best with the gene pool you've got. Cultural revolution is about changing the gene pool.
Change the politics and hopefully the culture will follow.
2020 is the next opportunity. Replace the mendacious, cruel, vengeful, incompetent, thin skinned, gasbag with almost anyone, and the culture will move up a notch.
2
What you encourage is what the Democrat party recognizes and strives for. Yet when you speak on Brook and Shields you fight against these same policies/outook.
Welcome to humanity, you still have a lot to learn (and atone for).
3
Sorry to disagree, but career success can be fulfilling. If you have a calling, a vocation, for a certain career, and you heed the call, you should have a fulfilling life. Two personal examples follow:
My father was called to the priesthood at age 35 with a wife and two kids, and after ordination was an Episcopal priest until he died of old age. He refused to be elected bishop because his vocation was to be a parish priest.
I went to college thinking I would study math, but in my junior year I took a course called "Constitutional Interpretation" which introduced me to the law. I loved it, went to law school, and have been a practicing lawyer ever since. My career may not have been terribly successful monetarily, but it has allowed me to do what I love to do (lawyering) while living where I love to be (Rio de Janeiro).
Career success can indeed be fulfilling, if your career is your vocation.
4
Sounds like David is advocating a socialistic culture, lol.
1
Who would give their land back to tribes divested by Jackson in 1833?
Bingo....
Thanks, David.
1
Now it's the "cultural revolution" that is important. I suppose Mr. Brooks came to this conclusion because everybody has been rejecting his take on the political revolution.
Overall, this essay is simplistically black and white. No room for nuance. Apparently, according to Brooks, if you believe that a career can be fulfilling, that you can choose to be happy, that the journey of life is what makes life interesting for you, that you can dare to have your own thoughts ("find your own truth"), or if you think less of parasitic bums than you do of rich philanthropists, then you are living a lie.
Yeah, whatever.
1
Another lie is that conducting yourself with honor is going to make you happy. The reality is that society is full of cheats, liars and bullies who will steal from you for their own benefit. The reality is that, from middle school to the grave, society values and rewards these cheats, liars, and bullies.
"The problem with the rat race is that only rats can win." - Unknown sage.
5
Brooks hid the lede. His first book was patently untrue tripe, so he sets about to sell us his current one as if he has discovered these "lies".
2
Guess who is starting like to sound more and more like a Democratic Socialist and less and less like a hardcore Buckley/Reagan conservative? Being a BoBo must have become fatiguing.
I’m pleasantly surprised that Brooks managed to write a column blaming Both Sides for the fraying of our communal fabric.
Brooks went on a sabbatical from the Times, and traveled around America to meet real people who lead different life-styles than his own. Since then he has blathered on about his epiphanies about human nature within the American experience, condescendingly lecturing and admonishing us about the values and ways that the rest of us "should" be living in our lives.
But now he tells us that "Life is a journey" is a lie, and that people shouldn't "rack up a bunch of experiences." Huh? If you hadn't done your walkabout and experienced the lives of people different than yourself, your mind wouldn't have been opened to allow for your epiphanies!
We shouldn't "find our own truth?" If you hadn't gone out to find yours, you'd still be spouting the lies of the corrupted Republican-Conservative movement (which built your "success" before your awakening)!
You dis "meritocracy?" But it was precisely the meritocracy and privilege of your job at the NYTimes gave you that afforded you the time/money to go on your sojourn to find yourself. Most real people with real jobs can't afford that luxury! Their "chains" are real, and they're usually imposed on them rather than chained by their own "choosing"; and they most certainly don't "set them free."
And maybe you felt "like...nothing" from the success of your first book. But it was precisely that meritocratic success which gave you enough street cred for you magnanimous patrons to give you the opportunity to write and publish another book.
3
@Paul-A We didn't read the same article. Brooks writes about how meritocracy wont fulfill you, experiences for their own sake wont provide happiness, and that "find your own truth" wont bind us to each other. We will float like atoms instead of United We Stand, Divided We Fall. It's the change we choose that sets us free.
1
As a critique of American culture and/or cultural lies and illusions I find your opinion piece rather self-pitying. American culture has been created, innovated, and borrowed from the very best around the world.
After your pity-party please try to stop being a sorehead about the election unless being a first-rate second-rate is mostly satisfying for you.
1
I'm tired of reading these same preachments over and over in David Brooks columns. I definitely don't plan to read them again in book form.
3
Saving this one David
Lies? not so much.
You do have to make yourself happy. No one else will do it for you. They won't be as motivated.
Live is an individual journey. We all die alone.
You do have to find your own truth. Again, no one else will do it for you. If you don't, you're a slave to someone else's truth.
2
Lie #5 is bigger than the four other lies combined.
You forgot the most important lie that overwhelms all the others - "Money is everything." We are a money-focused culture, and whatever we do to get it and get more of it is deemed good. Anybody who doesn't live that way is a sucker.
2
Five Lies (Among Many) That David Brooks Tells:
"By planting themselves in one neighborhood, one organization or one mission, they earn trust."
- Whose trust do they earn (beyond their own close-minded sphere)?
"No wonder it’s so hard to be a young adult today. No wonder our society is fragmenting. We’ve taken the lies of hyper-individualism and we’ve made them the unspoken assumptions that govern how we live."
- Oh, it was so much easier to be a young adult in the 1950s.* (*As long as you were a white, Protestant, straight male.) The "fragmenting" that Brooks bemoans is actually just the breaking down of old paradigms of privilege and hegemony, which is a good thing (unless you're a white, Protestant, straight male).
"Each person goes on a personal trip and racks up a bunch of experiences, and whoever has the most experiences wins. This lie encourages people to believe freedom is the absence of restraint."
- Huh? Your conclusion isn't based on your premise at all!
"It’s hard to see other people in all their complexity."
- But wait, how can you see and understand people's "complexity" if you haven't allowed yourself to have experiences outside of your own close-minded rootedness?
"Values are created and passed down by strong, self-confident communities and institutions."
- However, many self-righteous communities also create and pass down lies.
Brooks's biggest lie: That he knows better the rest of us (and deserves the right to lecture us on how we all "should" live.)
4
A good start to this "cultural revolution" would be to fire every pundit at this paper and end the apparent life tenure & celebrity status given to the likes of Brooks and Goldberg, Stephens and Friedman etc. et al. It's a job for a year and move on, you are stale product.
That anyone would think that rereading the same body of rotating know-it-alls for year after year, as though they understand the world so much better than many dozens of other fine writers, is just evidence of the degrading influence of the pundit class with it's celebrity status.
Next up, end vast inherited wealth. From colleges to waterfront property to art auctions to planning boards the moneyed class takes presumptive control over all good things and when you get to know some you find they aren't smarter or more moral, they are just richer. I recall in freshman orientation in college in the 70s I was getting along with nice girl, then she popped the question: "Do you have a trust?" "A what? What's that?" I replied, and ended that budding friendship without even realizing it.
Finally do something to equalize the high & mighty, the "holders of the secret knowledge" - the strata of doctors and lawyers and well-connected executives that never pay the price under our systems of justice or social order that the little guy has to pay and can't afford.
Society will be fine if you just put the elite problem children on some sort of container where they watch us instead of us watching them.
5
I tend to be sympathetic with what Mr. Brooks writes (and occasionally in agreement), in part because of the way that some folks, seemingly mindlessly, regardless of what he writes about, continually try to shame him for his past sins of supporting Republican policies. That's one thing, and another story.
Specific to this push about two mountains though, I find these ideas a bit annoying and simplistic. One only learns about "the second mountain" after they've accomplished their goals; after they've gotten to where they meant to get and found that actually, getting there didn't really satisfy them. The thing is, you can't know that unless you accomplish those goals. Or in other words, mountain climbing is recursive: it's not a progression but a necessary process. That's awesome that Mr. Brooks has discovered this, but everyone is on their own schedule. The second mountain is only an abstraction, and really, is just a reiteration of things that "religion" discusses better. Mr. Brooks is a wise man, at times, but I'd be much more interested in a column about what he got wrong and how much he doesn't know than the approximation of wisdom aimed at a secular audience. Lay down and let the wolves eat you, Mr. Brooks. If you really want to make a statement about the sickness of our culture, then I suggest making a real sacrifice. As I read this, this is just a marketing scam aimed at your target audience.
1
Yeah, sure Dave, it’s all Dr. Seuss’ fault.
What a silly accusation.
Attacking Seuss?? Have you know shame?
DAVID BROOKS FRO PRESIDENT
David, are you still a Republican? A small-c conservative, maybe, but you're sounding more like a socialist at heart every day. And the two have more in common than you think.
22:50 EDT, 4/15
I'm glad to see you've given up on the mertocracy. So when are you going to tell us you're a Democrat?
2
Contrary to what Brooks fears, this is no recent crisis.
People have been seeking meaning to Life at least since Buddha and then Jesus, milennia ago.
Sure, Facebook, Twitter, and Netflix on mobile have super-charged this quest, but it remains the same as always.
For my own sake, a few words I saw on a Buddhist poster seem to help me hang together, our needs, the search for meaning is really about :
*Someone or Something to give Love To
*Something To Do
*Something To Hope For
4
@Ramesh G
Ha, I've seen these words too, and think they are wise.
On a bad day, I just hope for something to do and someone to love : )
So David: you're ready to jettison Capitalism, and the Republican party which fetishizes it so much, in favor of a communitarian search for meaning with other like-minded people?
I didn't think so.
4
False choices, blurred distinctions, values transformed into exclusive absolutes. I am not impressed.
1. It is true, but not the only thing that is fulfilling.
2. We are communal, tied to others, but still individuals.
3. Just like 2.
4. What does this mean?
5. Success is not the same as being rich.
Brooks has too much cotton in his brain.
1
I would like to add one more lie--that if you really try, and don't give up, you'll succeed. You'll become the actor, athlete, writer, entrepreneur that you've dreamed of being. I want to see some news articles about all the people who did really try, and failed, or achieved limited success. Are you supposed to tell yourself your failure was your own fault for not trying hard enough?
1
I believe racism comes from our need to find self worth. By believing one set of characteristics is better then another and self identifying with those characteristics. Those among us who struggle to find self worth fall back on denigrating people who are in a different group so that our group seems better.
The education and dare I say, the secularization of David Brooks (aka the Bobo in Manhattan) continues.
People/interconnectedness/relationships/those tangible, personal interactions and living a life filled with empathy and self-awareness and service to others. It isn't so much that our culture lies is that some folks get the mix wrong and some find out later than others that avarice, greed and the lure of easy money - while always intoxicating, more often than not leaves you devoid of true personal happiness. Sounds kinda crazy I know, but twenty years later, he's coming around, albeit slowly.
3
Let's try a list of three:
The French believe in liberty, equality, fraternity.
The Swedes believe in liberty, equality, security.
Americans believe in life, liberty, and the "pursuit of happiness."
What's wrong with the American picture?
2
It's nice that Mr. Brooks, who has had a successful, individualistic career and writes as if he is a modern day Aristotle, can tell us that everything he has done is a lie. Hopefully he will find happiness in his relationships, now that he has remarried.
3
Certainly true re meritocracy. Witness the crowds adulation of Tiger Woods as he walked off the 18th hole after winning the Masters on the weekend. He is a celebrity and we reward his accomplishments. What would the reception have been if he finished last? Still the same person.
Well said! (I think this is only the second time in my
life that I've agreed with David Brooks.)
The political revolution is a result of the cultural revolution. The "culture"of trumpinistas has transformed Republican politics. You say that "We’ve created a culture based on lies." Just who is the we here.
2
Notice that the first few paragraphs are basically book promotion. Perhaps the publication of this second book will bring a sense of internal pride to Mr. Brooks. If not I wonder why he continues to publish.
“5 Lies”interpreted though his eyes seems more of a statement of how he has now realized something that wasn’t on his radar until recently. Maybe that’s true for a lot of people who needed the horror of current America to shake them up.
The institutions that we turned to for solace have revealed themselves as corrupt and morally reprehensible in many instances. A Catholic Church hiding sexual abuse for decades, many “Christian” churches promoting judgmental hatred of anyone outside of their fundamental boundaries are not places to look for comfort. We can no longer trust America’s Constitution to keep our current Politician’s power in check, so we watch as children are put in cages, murdered in their schools and lies and hatred spew from the President’s mouth.
I propose that the only way to true happiness is through personal choice. It is really an individual’s commitment to offer love and support to their family, friends and community and that can be broadened by experience beyond the limited bounds of institutions. The more experience we have with those different than us, those with less, those with different skin, those with disability, those without power and those who seek to make our world better the more we have to give back if we do chose.
1
I am reminded of something that Woody Allen wrote in one of his early short stories. I don't remember it exactly but it's something to the effect of: money may not buy happiness, but you can't walk into the butcher and say i have a great tan and don't get colds and expect to walk out with a steak. All kidding aside, you can't be truly happy when you are cold and hungry or ill. because you are too burdened with fear. That said, I have absolutely no doubt that strong, long standing relationships are the key to happiness and satisfaction in life. Real, true happiness is worthwhile only if it's shared with someone who cares about your happiness. Otherwise, you're talking into an empty room. You're the tree in the forest cut down without anyone knowing. So, maybe you weren't really happy after all?
1
@Naomi
<< Real, true happiness is worthwhile only if it's shared with someone who cares about your happiness. >>
I disagree. To say a person cannot be happy without sharing that happiness with a loved one means the person must develop "long standing relationships" BEFORE s/he can be happy.
Yet I find that if I make myself happy, I attract relationships. If I look for relationships when I'm not happy, those bonds are much harder to find.
1
Each of the lies has some truth for some people. Perhaps Mr. Brooks could find no sense of accomplishment in writing a bestseller, but that is not true for many people. Many of us find worth in our jobs, whether it is remembering customer's names at a convenience store or inventing the transistor. It's the Ikea effect.
Of course most people also find happiness and satisfaction in nurturing personal relationships.
The US is famous for promoting individualism over group cohesion and action. Really that is not how most of us live our lives, yet the idea corrupts our politics and government.
as usual, mr. brooks is spinning the "you can't have anything so be grateful for what you have" lie. the big lie of our culture and society is that *anyone* can achieve success and wealth and importance if they just work hard enough and save their money and invest it wisely. we are an unequal society and have always been... but we have come to a point in our country where there is no real upward mobility for most people, there is no justice for those of color or religion that is not "mainstream" and there is no security for those who worked hard and saved money, since the bankers and brokers will find a way to take it away from you. look at those who worked for sears and were promised a pension. where is that? all gone -- basically stolen while CEOs make millions. no wonder young people today are cynical and don't strive for homes, which lose value while you still owe the original cost, for cars that lose value when you drive them off the lot, for savings that are taxed and penalized and then stolen, for social security contributions that are threatened at every turn by obscenely rich senators and politicians. i still have a way to go before i am able to retire (if ever) but i'm glad i 'm not starting out in today's america. i feel really sorry for my nephews and nieces and their children...overworked, poor and poisoned by their own environment.
1
Mr. Brooks, I agree with your critique of mainstream American cultural values and the lies it teaches. I want to add that unconscious psychological factors, like attachment disorders, also play into the external cultural messages. Just as Drs. Bowlby and Ainsworth demonstrated in infants and young children, adolescents and adults can withdraw and detach from family, friends, and partners because our need for love is so often betrayed. For example, when we resist the cultural rules for being good girls/women (dependent, selfless) and good boys/men (emotionless, self-sufficient), we often experience rejection and abandonment by parents, lovers, friends. We learn to protect ourselves from this loss of emotional connection and trust by shifting our attention from relationships to objects (and objectified people) as a more reliable source of security and at the same time resign ourselves to loneliness and loss of pleasure. For a better description of these psychological drivers of materialism, read Professor Carol Gilligan's books, such as "The Birth of Pleasure" and "Why Does Patriarchy Persist?" I feel sure you will appreciate her research and ideas.
2
Virtually always agree with David Brooks. One point that cannot be shuffled aside is the culpability and the guilt of the Right. I fully expect a public apology from conservatives and all those who supported Trump. This is not about shared responsibility. The Left certainly has and continues to make mistakes, but none of them rank with what this administration has done. I do expect that and I expect a radical change in their behavior and their language.
4
Life requires skills, the skill of living with all kinds of pain, all kinds of limitations, and all kinds if circumstances beyond one's control. The skill of believing in God, living consistently with Him, and taking God at his Word is the bottom-line to all other life skills. Jesus said, "I have that they (you and me) may have life and have it abundantly." (ESV Jn10:10) What Brooks' article explains is that the life skills that we were promised do not work except in minimal conditions. I can testify that the life skills that are developed by faith do work miraculously and completely. This is not to say that all "Christian" believers and all believers in general have developed and demonstrate their faith skills. But I am saying that faith in Jesus, knowledge of His Word, and consistent living not only protects one from the cultural lies. It satisfies internally the soul of man. I have had cancer, lived through the losses from Hurricane Katrina, an unwanted divorce, and a good dog that died just to name a few of my struggles. Still I recommend Jesus to each and everyone who want more than the lies of our culture.
3
When Mr. Brooks tells us to "submit" to our community or organization, he says more than we might think.
Part of submitting is "not going against." If you feel uneasy with the values of your community, you should not be the one to take the conversation in a different direction; let others do that. But don't encourage it. "Values" are only values when a community adopts them without question.
We should take the time to make a list of what is truly priceless in life.
Health is priceless. Though many take it for granted putting smoke and drugs and bad food into it the human body, a kind of self sabotage.
Your Parents are priceless, you will never meet anybody in this world who will love you like these. Who will care about you like these. When you lose them you will understand this clearly
Childhood is priceless. Who among us wouldn't give all that they have to be 10 years old again.
The understanding of the beauty found in art and nature is priceless. To look at a sunset with and appreciate in awe and appreciation is priceless
The face of your child is priceless
enjoying a peach on a sunny day with the juice running down your chin is priceless
having spirituality is priceless. To believe in God and to have a path and a purpose is a blessing.
music is priceless
All else is nothing but what Hitchcock labeled the McGuffin-that thing which moves the plot along and has no real worth or value, all that rushing about trying to attain and accumulate things that even if we lost it all what not stop us from enjoying anything on the list above. In watching a Hitchcock movie you come to understand that the only thing that mattered in the end was the life of the characters themselves.
2
One of your profoundly best. Thank you. I am grateful to say that my spouse and I embraced all of these values. We had highly satisfying but not hyper performing careers. Instead they left ample time for developing our personal lives together with a growing circle of friends. We also were fortunate enough to be able to afford a a second house in a small community. There over several decades we became involved in town issues and served on local boards; some of our most rewarding of life‘s experiences subsequently have enriched us. Our retirement years were therefore not seen as a challenge to figure out what to do with the rest of our lives. We have just dedicated ourselves to more volunteer work. Finally, we have become increasingly spiritual. We attend both temple and church and take from each tremendous meaning and soul lifting guidance. I look forward to reading your new book.
1
This column was foreshadowed already in ancient times, and the ancient source even mentioned the foreshadowing.
In Ecclesiastes, Kohelet writes that there is nothing new under the sun, and after describing many futile attempts at satisfaction, comes to the conclusion that in the final analysis one must fear God and keep His commandments for that is man's whole duty.
Values and culture cannot be understood or changed apart from the social structures that support them. The community that cares for one another the way Mr. Brooks describes is not supported by unfettered "free markets" --but it is the kind of community that many so-called 'socialists' want to help build. An economy permits, even encourages, the gross inequality we we have today sustains the cultural "lies" and malaise Mr. Brook describes. If you are searching for answers to these problems, you might want to re-examine your politics, sir.
2
I find it undermining that the photo to depict this column is a (white) woman sitting alone at a table with no one around. As if the blame is subtly turned to the women who over the course of the past few generations has progressed most in these lies, all the while destroying whatever substance of family/community "America" had. It should be a white male, after all they've had the largest hand in the progression of our demise.
Which I want to add as an additional lie, there is no identifiable American culture. Over our brief 243 years of existence at best we've had a quilt patch of collective cultures coexisting.
Mr. Brooks is incurably class-ist. He shares the impediment that all others at or near the top cannot escape - the inability to see the world through the eyes of others on the lower rungs of the socio-economic and racial hierarchy. The cultural lies he identifies are only the bane of those in his social sphere,. For visceral evidence of my claim, see the newly released film about Aretha Franklin in "Amazing Grace.' I hope Mr. Brooks does.
4
The lies narrated in the article are true but that is only part of the picture The effect of misplaced priorities of individuals on the society, politics, and government hurts us tremendously. Most importantly, we have become so selfish that we don't care about our own loved ones, let alone the community and the country. In our democratic and capitalist country that spills over into business and government. Selfishness is the root of the problem.
1
David Brooks is a columnist for the New York Times, which is arguably the apex for thought leaders in the United States. He has worked long and hard for this position of influence. I appreciate his attempts to unlock and define our culture. He seems to be evolving before our very eyes. I still think the one thing that he will never quite get is the tedium of work unrelated to philosophy and sociology and "big think" type stuff. Most people, not all but most, hate their day-to-day employment. It is soul-crushing. They are numb for a third to half a day, every day. They just grind. There is no answer for that. Dave, do you recall when Jimmy Carter addressed many of the maladies that you are obsessed with AS president of the United States? The search for meaning? I hate to make this political, but Republicans lived for the next 20 years on Jimmy's "malaise". Tax cuts and trickle-down economics was the answer to all our problems. And yet here we are?
2
I disagree to this extent. My father came to this country from Italy as a teenager. He was gifted working with masonry but he worked his entire life in a tailor shop using his hands. He may have loved masonry but he took pride in what he did as a tailor to earn a living for his family. There are not a lot of jobs anymore where the worker can take pride in what they are doing. Why?
2
Mr. Brooks left out a lie: "People with above average intelligence are worth more than people with average or below average intelligence." And boy will they be rewarded more richly. We don't reward people for being kind or empathetic, or caring for others, the way we reward people who can master a body of knowledger like the law or medicine or computer engineering. The lowly "service" jpb won't keep you and your family alive--but who's supposed to care for the young and the elderly and the helpfles?
1
I once was engaged to a man who often said, "All I want is just to be happy." I never said it but I thought, "Well then, BE happy! I've found that the most important thing is to decide to be a person who IS, rather than one who focuses on what is wrong, or thinking there are always things you SHOULD be doing. There is no book somewhere with your list. Simply be a kind person, a moral person, and recognize that there are always things to appreciate, every day. If you're on the green side that's your first good thing already.
2
Many thanks for this, David. I only wish I'd consciously realized these were lies forty years ago. The last I knew to be a lie back then, but not yet the first four.
The real problem about life is that nobody ever gave us an instructional manual when we were born. My Car comes along with a maintenance manual, why not the human being? And the stuff they teach you in school doesn't help you with life, life is a series of horrible events in which you just cling to the hope that one day it will all turn around and get better. The biggest lie is that there are moral rules, that being a good person will translate to a good life. Ha. Life is hard, because man makes it that way. The powerful desire only more power....everyone else better fend for themselves...because in this world..especially the United States of Trump, it's sink or swim..we're on our own...and that's no lie.
155
@Lonnie. This life is a test and ONLY a test. If this was a real life you would receive instructions as to where to go and what to do. Remember the old emergency broadcast system PSAs from the sixties?
6
@Lonnie
A by product of modern society. Hilalry said, "It takes a village." Had one been born in a village, the norm for humans for millennia, one would have had as good a "manual" as life gives us. We are so much more isolated now, much by choice, and the choices we can see on our own are more limited.
14
@Lonnie it used to be called, "The Bible". But somewhere along the line we decided that it had too many rules that were mean and cruel, so we stopped paying attention to all of it, based on our aversion to the parts we didnt like.
14
These points are generalizations. There is only some truth in what you write, Mr. Brooks.
My only chance at a happy and healthy life was finding out how to make myself happy, and that I had to create my own journey. I'm sure there are many like me, who were brought up in a dysfunctional family. My version is a narcissistic mother, addict/alcoholic sister and enabling father, who wanted me to do everything to please them and see the world through their eyes, Those are points two and three.
My difference with you on the last point comes out of this experience. Your description infuriates me. From where I sit, it looks like the people who have climbed to the highest rung, the uber-wealthy, are doing everything they can to gain more and more control of everyone else by spreading these, and other lies. Their wealth gives them access to the knowledge of human foibles so they can exploit people, and then they buy the media to promote those lies. Recent NYT articles (fact based, I assume) report exactly this situation for the upcoming presidential election.
Please think a little more carefully, Mr. Brooks.
1
@Slow Took
Thank you for that. I'm also one who had to find my own path to happiness and I'm happiest taking that journey individually. I have wonderful friends and many community involvements, but I need my alone, safe space and to call my own shots. One size does NOT fit all.
If American culture can go in four years from a "decent shape" to one of "spiritual and emotional crisis," then Brooks is not talking about any deep truth about America, but at best about surface currents that seem to flow in one direction or another, depending on who's in charge. In four short years, Brooks himself has shifted his attention from individual character to broad social problems. Most likely, despite his conservative credentials, he was pleased with the moderate character of our then-president, and frightened by the personality and programs of the present one.
I, too, have come from a youthful enthusiasm for career achievement and independent-mindedness, to a perception in old age of the dangers of excessive individualism and of ironic detachment from institutions. There have to be beliefs and practices - rituals, even - that bind us together as a society and as a culture. I can only hope that the anger we Americans currently feel at one another for our differences is as evanescent a mood as the high that Brooks felt in 2014, while Republicans were busy burrowing away at undermining whatever Obama had accomplished - health care; a restored economy; a willingness to compromise; racial and sexual inclusivity; and a tone of civility.
If we're lucky, then Brooks is doing no more than the slight adjustments of the tiller that a sailor makes on his boat - a little to the left, a little back to the right - to keep his vessel on a straight course.
2
I think I may be channeling Mr. Brooks thoughts. I worked in the world of science for a lot of years, with some successes, not all. As I got older, with aging parents in mind, I retired early and moved home. I was fortunate enough to find a patch of ground suitable for growing some things and for taking care of a growing number of rescued dogs. Along with that, rescuing dogs and puppies from off the reservations close by and getting them to safety, shelter and good homes has been a much more rewarding endeavor. Cultivating relationships with individuals that can call anytime for rescue, cultivating relationships with people at shelters has created a small community of like minded people. It's been three and a half years and we are still in the development state. It's only getting better.
1
It would be appreciated if Mr. Brooks could insert "I think" or "perhaps" or "maybe" in his hypotheses on lies. These are, after all, just his opinions. There are many ways and paths.
@Irene
Never thought I'd defend a David Brooks column but
the fact that this article is in the Opinion section,
it's assumed that his statements are in fact his hypotheses.
Accurate assessment of our culture today except that the divide and disdain for others is not rooted in “we”. It was perpetrated by specific individuals who began to feed lies to the American people about the role of government in life. Think Reagan. If those who the people entrusted to govern couldn’t be trusted, then people could only turn to themselves.
2
Individual happiness is fickle and inexplicable and yet the promise of aggregate happiness is one of the main drivers of our national economy and politics. Products and policies sell better when they bring happiness or at least alleviate unhappiness.
David Brooks, I’m genuinely surprised and delighted by your recognition that meritocracy is conditional love that rewards maximization of an individual’s skills at the expense of their humanity. I believe our market driven society has not realized a way to motivate individuals without a meritocracy, and I agree the challenge is to form a community that draws people in from broad ends of the spectrum (economic, racial, religious, gender, etc...). A country like China would look at America and ask “how can you have a functioning society if everyone is so different and cannot agree on anything”. Our duty as Americans is to show the rest of the world that we have an answer. How do we motivate people to share a culture that is broad and inclusive, to recognize each other’s humanity while continuing to support individual and collective achievement?
1
Relationships take a lot of work. And good relationships are no exception. We tend to devalue the importance of getting along with others and investing the time in understanding them.
What scared me the most as a young adult in the workforce was watching people who devoted themselves to their job, finally leave their job. They got a party, a cake, a thank you present. They left, and within a matter of months if not weeks, life at the office continued on without them.
What a sad commentary on the better part of someone's existence.
We need to 'invest' in our relationships and communities, even more so than in our careers. And it's got to be okay to do that. It used to be, until the 80s.
4
The problem is this - these days - everyone is told they have the "right" to be happy, they have the "right" to not be offended, they have the "right" to do or say whatever they want. No one understands that life is full of highs and lows, and you must learn to weather the lows and appreciate the lessons learned from them, to be able to enjoy the highs. There is no guarantee of happiness and contentment generated from the world around you; it comes from within.
3
"a cultural revolution"
The moral wars are over then? Good, now we can focus on greater holiness on the mountaintop. Are gods up there somewhere, or are we still doing sociology?
1
"We’ve taken the lies of hyper-individualism and we’ve made them the unspoken assumptions that govern how we live.
We talk a lot about the political revolution we need. The cultural revolution is more important."
David, as long as you keep writing this, I will keep on reminding you that our society today is the product of the Great Reagan Lie, about "taxpayers" instead of "citizens", about talking about "a personal relationship with God", rather than living under Jesus' teaching of humility and thrift.
Keep it coming, I'm always waiting to remind you.
David,
This is all good stuff. But you continue to circle the real lie. That the core values we all grew up with in a capitalist society with rugged individualistic tendencies is flat wrong.
We live in a society with material abundance that can offer fulfilling work and support to all. Yet we still create and require unnecessary struggles for people in the name of God, country and moral rectitude.
We still rationalize by saying that the poor like being poor; people of color are, well, lots of negatives there; and people who aren't like us have morality of lifestyle problems. We reject simple ideas like human beings are connected and are responsible not only to themselves but to each other.
If the next version of our society and culture does not consist of understanding the contentedness of people rather than the contentedness of each of us to our "thing" there'll be version after the one we occupy now.
You are getting closer, David...much closer.
1
David, all these things were true 5 years ago, yet you missed them because the surface looked smooth. Look deeper to see what you might still be missing. You could go further with 3: life is an individual journey. One of the most damaging lies in our culture is that of the "rugged individual." Blinding ourselves to the help we get in our lives, from family and neighbors to our government, keeps us divided about helping each other as a society, whether that's universal health care or child care or guaranteed basic income. It costs lives every day.
1
How is it possible to spend an entire column attacking the meritocracy and saying that "values are created and passed down by strong, self-confident communities", yet nowhere discuss income inequality, extreme concentration of wealth, or the importance of basic material safety and well being?
I agree that humane values and strong communities are important, but these values are also inextricably linked to food, shelter, and human dignity. Neighborly love is a wonderful thing - I say that sincerely, thinking of Japan and other cultures where people bond together as a matter of routine - but if, as in America, one "neighbor" is super rich and spends his time traveling the world and throwing extravagant parties while the other 99 neighbors, many of whom work at the company the one neighbor owns, don't have steady jobs or healthcare and have to worry about being evicted if they miss one paycheck, is that really a healthy neighborhood, or is it a feudal serf system? If all the serfs spend meaningful moments together trying to ignore their lack of healthcare and dignified labor, is that really a solution to our nation's deepest problems?
Mr. Brooks is saying that a cultural crisis is the most important problem we face. But where is this cultural crisis coming from? It seems logical to me that huge wealth inequality contributes mightily. Let's smooth out some of this inequality. Once we are all more equal in material terms, I bet those neighborly values will flourish more freely.
1
Some of this analysis is accurate, some not so much. Certainly there is a good case to be made that too many people have "followed their own truth" to their and many others' chagrin. My concern is not the analysis itself. It is the premise it is based on that I don't agree with.
Happiness does not come from a single source. That said, our careers (something most of us spend most of our waking hours doing) have an outsized voice in determining happiness. Like it or not, having a career we consider fulfilling and that uses our talents and abilities goes a long way to that contribution. I can honestly say there have been times in my life where it was the *only* thing that was a major contributor.
Not everyone raises a family or even comes from a functional one. Not everyone belongs to a church group. People can and do have different lifestyles and most of these are in fact by choice - Why? because they tacitly are recognized as lifestyles that contribute to happiness.
And yes, only YOU can make yourself happy. If you don't agree with that, perhaps some soul searching as to what happiness is is in order.
1
I'm a Catholic and a graduate of a Great Books program. Brooks's thinking here is very familiar to me. Call it old-fashioned if you like, but Brooks is squarely within the traditions of western humanism, before "humanism" got co-opted by the materialists and individualists.
3
Surprising to find myself in so much agreement with Brooks, but to push to the next level, all these illusions he lists and analyzes are the message of markets, what is required of us to function in markets first and most. At the one end a way to bring strangers together to exchange what they have efficiently and effectively seems pretty good, and now, at the other end, the only thing that makes the marbles in the bag stick together is the highest bid. What's next, when it is market that dissolves community?
1
Thank you for your clarity in defining the "five lies" which may be viewed as fear driven to maintain a strong ego.
As a Zen Buddhist Priest, I find bringing this awareness to the public creates perspective amidst the many challenges we face in this time.
With gratitude for your insights ,
Kanjin
5
Brooks writes accurately that we should be asking ourselves, not "what cool thing can I do next" but instead ... "What is my responsibility here? They respond to some problem or get called out of themselves by a deep love.
By planting themselves in one neighborhood, one organization or one mission, they earn trust. They have the freedom to make a lasting difference. It’s the chains we choose that set us free."...
Our culture instead upholds "hyper individuality" as the highest good, not "how can I serve others." That and "you can find your own truth" are the two biggest lies Brooks is so right about. No wonder our culture is so much in turmoil.
3
I cannot be happy knowing that we are killing this planet more each day.
I find myself in a constant state of low grief, even knowing that I, as an individual always tried my very best and DID succeed, maybe not with acquiring money but mastering a very difficult art form.
As I watch the billionaires play catch with their rockets and the uberwealthy try to find anew planet to escape to, having taken their fortunes from us, our work, I can't help but think:
" Why don't they use those resources to try to save this beautiful place where we all evolved instead of showing off how clever they are and putting even MORE carbon in the atmosphere?"
4
“The reality is that values are created and passed down by strong, self-confident communities and institutions.” – Yes, and as Mr. Brooks points out, our so-called “leaders”, in government, business and pop culture are not doing such a great job, pointing to values and in directions that are eating away at our society and our planet.
“It’s easy to say you live for relationships, but it’s very hard to do. It’s hard to see other people in all their complexity. It’s hard to communicate from your depths, not your shallows. It’s hard to stop performing! No one teaches us these skills.” – Actually, there are people and/or schools that are teaching these skills. They are not necessarily in the limelight, but they are there.
“We talk a lot about the political revolution we need. The cultural revolution is more important.” Perhaps with a cultural revolution, the political will naturally follow. We need both.
2
This is one of the better pieces I've read from Mr. Brooks. Yes, hyper-individualism is glorified and anything to do or associated with "social" ism or community is looked down on. Career and financial achievement is the pinnacle. Remember "Greed is good"? Unfortunately, this view is mostly though not exclusively coming from the right side of the spectrum. Winning at all costs. "If you ain't cheatin' you ain't tryin'"
We have a president who calls people, losers. Born into wealth and privilege people like him see those who aren't millionaires as 'less than'. He validates lying and cheating at every turn.
We value and reward cut throat sales people and denigrate teachers. A few years back Fox made a point of trashing the teaching profession. The Right belittled Obama for being a community organizer.
We have progressed so far technologically and materially in the last two hundred years but we have become a superficial, ethically bankrupt society that could mostly care less about their fellow citizen. The character and fabric of who we are as a people seems to have declined precipitously in the last 50-60 years. Perhaps all empires decline eventually from the inside out.
God bless America. We're gonna need it.
3
Mr. Brooks,
With all due respect, who is the purveyor of this cultural wasteland of money as success, career as everything, narcissism as a path, truth as belief, and performance as love???
Are all parts of our culture promoting this equally or are some parts of our culture promoting this more than others. What political parts of our culture have weaponized this path?
To what purpose? I will eagerly read The Second Mountain to see if my questions wrestled with in the book.
3
I wonder if we shouldn't be examining the part that monotheism has played in also encouraging egocentricity in mankind.
1
The biggest lie we tell ourselves is that we are free of a "dark" side. With that lie, hypocrisy, self-righteousness and unwarranted certainties flourish. Until we honestly and unflinchingly confront that lie, the "cultural revolution" which Brooks' champions is a pipe dream, especially in this hyperconnected era where the contradictions between what we practice (and/or secretly desire) and what we preach become ever more glaring.
2
The nuance brooks misses is that the capacity to reflect and learn from experience is a crucial individual act of creating meaning. It is not anathema to social coherence. Moral indoctrination is a religious mechanism that seems to insist that something is better than nothing, even if that something diminishes a person's moral instinct. Trump-culture depends on a set of collective lies.
It's not enough that Trump supporters admire his defiance & bluster, that he uses a tone of common sense that seduces folks into imagining smart thinking is at its' root...that the problem is simple if you just rely on your gut. His lies are that complexity - which makes us struggle- is the problem. Like Reagan's trope that 'government is the problem'- Trumpsters embrace the quick fix of demagoguery.
Thus the lies of the cultural tsunami of Trump's nativism, xenophobia, racism, TV style sales hype, short term transactional policies that decimate the environment/infrastructure/global alliances and democratic institutions- these lies count on individuals feeling so overwhelmed that they become fanatics around against a single issue: abortion, gun reform, national health insurance, scientific expertise & diversity.
A little more muscular sanity & individual savvy could provide a flood wall against the current paranoid wave.
1
David – You do realize that the "secular" principals that you’ve highlighted have long been available through the unique truths presented in both the Old and New Testaments. As Ravi Zacharius frequently mentions “our origin as creatures made in God’s image is the only thing that can give our lives meaning and serve as a basis for ethical living."
2
I feel like we are getting a "cultural revolution" but not the one Brooks is prescribing.
1
David's become a hippie! The cultural revolution he preaches sounds like the one urged as a cure by the counter-cultural, so-called hippie movement of the 1960s for America's emotional and spiritual sickness secondary to its materialism, consumerism, greed, cutthroat capitalism. Alas, a new or renewed cultural revolution will not succeed any more than that of the hippies.
2
Who is this "we"? Platitudes and cliques are common from "successful" people.
1
You forgot the lie that the Christian coalition that backs Trump is Christian. There are a few more lies in there.
3
This article is clearly making broad statements that are as intellectually dangerous as the "lies" he is railing against.
Has the author ever met a poorly paid school teacher who is fulfilled? What about a wealthy person who is as well? His statements are far too rigid.
Mr. Brooks rails against these "lies" yet creates falsehoods in his own writing. In the first paragraph he writes of his bestselling books and that he felt "nothing". Maybe he shouldn't write books anymore then, maybe that is not what fulfills him, he should maybe teach in underserved communities about writing . Or maybe he understands that the NYTimes bestseller list is actually a game publishers play for money.
The people that I am friends with want to make themselves better everyday, so they can help people, and become wealthy.
Work and effort is the foundation of self-esteem. You can't be given it...you have to earn it and only you know if you deserve it. Beyond a chemical imbalance, it is on the individual to figure it out.
It is not a game of all or nothing. A nurse may not be fulfilled but playing checkers with her grandmother does that for her/him. Work can be about money...and that is ok. It is a problem if they are people who only care about it...duh. By the way, parents like sending their kid to college so they can put a sticker on their car.
It is an internal dialogue...not anointed by a school or author.
The tricky thing here is that all this can sound like the revisionism of a person who has benefited from the self absorbed meritocracy, and now feeling the heat of cultural change is reinventing themselves into a proponent for family and brotherly love. For most ordinary or under privileged people there is not the financial, material or professional platform to entertain conversations of common good when they haven't tasted much good yet. Encouraging the rebels to be their better angels keeps the status quo safer.
1
@Jen What are examples of good not tasted yet?
What even is this article? It read like a college sophomore's philosophy homework assignment. Not your finest work, David.
All of these arguments are posed in a really idealistic and/or dishonest way.
1. Yes, career success isn't the ONLY key to fulfillment, but how fulfilled can you really be if you don't/can't make the kind of money you need to live a fulfilling life? You don't need a Maserati, but okay food and a good home would be nice. Kids are expensive too. Money doesn't buy happiness but it provides the basis for many of the things in life that might make you happy.
2. "I can make myself happy." Not sure what your comment is here. That nobody is every satisfied? Maybe, but isn't that constant striving and one-more-milestone ambition just part of the American experience? For worse, maybe, but certainly for better. That spirit is what kept me going through this article!
3. I don't see how these two poles - "What cool thing can I do" and "What's my responsibility" - are at all exclusive of one another. Also I'd like to see more data to support your thesis in this part. There are certainly plenty of people who are fulfilled by an individualistic life of adventure, and many people who are made miserable by their boring, homebound life.
4. I think you're taking the "finding my truth" thing too literally.
5. That depends what you mean by "worth." I don't think anyone actually thinks that human life has different value based on the person's wealth.
2
C'mon, David, don't throw the baby out with the bathwater. Seek balance, as you do so very often in your writing. Consider how important it is to point out the seduction of believing sound bite wisdom, because it is usually monothematic and thereby unbalanced.
There are two big lies you build your culture on. The first is undoubtedly 'America is the greatest country in the world'. No, it isn't, for a plethora of reasons that anyone in an equally developed country could outline quite quickly. This is probably the one most fundamental to your problems, because it bars you from the necessary humility to make positive change. If you think you are perfect, why change?
The second is 'I am more important than anyone else around me'. No, you're not. You're no better than your poor, disabled, unemployed next door neighbour, and you have an obligation, as their equal and a human being, to think of them as well as yourself. This is where other democracies who spend so much time and effort and money looking after the 'lesser' of us succeed, where you are so focused on 'me, me, me'. You just can't see anything else.
The world has laughed at you, and your pathetic necessity to love yourselves above all others despite your culture and society being such a mess, for a long time. Only difference is now we are laughing in your face instead of behind your back.
2
Gosh, David, you’re sounding more like a liberal all the time these days. Not that I disapprove, mind you. Truth be told, I’ve found your work more consistently compelling than almost any of your nominally more liberal colleagues for years now. And if a long-time lefty like myself can say that, perhaps there’s hope for all of us.
1
@Art Turner He still recommends "submitting" to the values of your community and organization, not hoping to make better what is not good; and being "part of" the conversation, not helping to change it. He's still a conservative, deep down.
Not a bad article, Mr. Brooks, but I think it could be consolidated/edited into two:
1) The primacy of the self
2) People with more prestigious education or greater test-taking skills are more important than others.
1
In the current times America is a land of make believe, hypocrisy and tribalism. What meritocracy? Opportunities depend on the zip code one is raised in, the tribe on is born into. If by accident of birth, should one be born to rich white parents, the members of the (white) upper class tribe will open secret doors, whether getting admitted to Harvard, reaching the pinnacles of corporations, or appointed to ambassadorships. If our society were to be strictly meritocratic, the class of Harvard would look like Cal Tech; more Asian Americans than the ultra rich whites, the CEOs of corporations would be full of Asians and smart capable women.
Instead, like lemmings, we believe in the nonsense of so called equal opportunity, elect the same group of crooked politicians, think that we are so exceptional that we can pollute to our heart's content, live far above our means because we are "rich", anoint the mediocre members of the white male tribe to be the CEOs of our corporations and pay them far above the global levels of compensation.
As a society, we have lost our moral bearings. We have become the land of moral turpitude.
“The reality is that values are created and passed down by strong, self-confident communities and institutions. People absorb their values by submitting to communities and institutions and taking part in the conversations that take place within them. It’s a group process.”
Wow, Mr. Brooks! Stop and think. Remember how you and the rest of the conservative media excoriated Hillary Clinton because she wrote a book called “It Takes A Village”? How you roared and gnashed your teeth! Communism! Brainwashing children! Undermining religion! Oh, the sheer horror of this idea! But now, in desperation, you embrace the idea of community enforcement of values. After all, arrogant ownership of one’s financial success has been a conservative fantasy for years (I built this -me! Nobody else! Wasn’t that a huge element of Mitt Romney’s presidential campaign?).You need to give up on conservatism. The more we impose it on our nation, the worse things get. Acknowledge that Mrs. Clinton was right. Apologize to her. Shun the GOP for at least eight years. Maybe you can atone for your bad advice for so long if you do these things.
2
Mr. Brooks you are indeed a mythical writer, your words are the inspiration that enabled the rich white folks to get involved in an elaborate college admissions fraud because they have the quiet moments to reflect on all that they have and entitled right to get more.
The rest of us poor slobs who are going to loose health care period we don’t have time to reflect on why all of our family members are suffering thru no fault of their own but because of corrupt politicians and Wall Street corruption. After all it’s brown children who are being placed in cages, inferior schools exposure to measles because white folks don’t trust vaccines buy who cares that others are being endangered .
Rich white folks control everything on this country and there desire is to destroy everything democratic. Mr. Brooks does and outstanding job of writing and protecting white privileged, he writes about it all the time, white folks are validated via Mr. Brooks. Enjoy it while it last’s,
1
Maestro I love reading your columns but this one feels empty - in talking about what works in life (the reverse of the lies) you nowhere mention god, who is at least ostensibly a significant force in American life - if you really believe in God as I do you know that you are here on earth to be happy so there's really no trick beyond that - of course it's more fun sharing etc but without that fundamental knowledge or call it belief...
I find it odd for conservatives to be endlessly harping on the alleged evils of meritocracy with a Donald Trump as President.
Is Donald Trump's America even vaguely representative of an authentic meritocracy?
Of course not.
Just like Dubya before him, Trump is personally representative of the "born on third but thinks he hit a triple" mindset of the children of American wealth - a group that largely got where they are because of fathers (like Fred Trump) who demonstrated a unique aptitude for ruthlessness coupled to a extraordinary capacity for unsavory behavior.
David, when America finally become an authentic meritocracy, a nation in which the idiot children of the rich and famous do not enjoy an unfair advantage over the authentically gifted, while their fathers simultaneously use all their wealth and influence to keep less fortunate Americans voting against their authentic economic interests, then that will be the day that we can judge the impact of meritocracy on American society.
1
And Trump is daily showing the young that lying is the only way up the ladder. Lying to get richer of course.
Bah.
So you’re telling LGBTQ that they need to submit to community lest they be told they’re just “you being you”.
Nonsense.
1
The last lie we tell: it's always someone else's fault.
1
What is the four color lapel pin that Mr. Brooks wore on CBS news today? It looks like a cross but it is made up of 4 colored arcs.
Lie number 6: America is a meritocracy. You belie your own privilege with this fantasy you keep insisting that we have a meritocracy. Tell that to the people where I live in Harlem.
2
Societal lies - the sort DB expounds on, dead-end standards and mores and religion have always been around and planted in the ground as guideposts by "winners." Perhaps Dave ought to help us understand how/why do such lies become propagated and why we have become such suckers to follow them.
David, you spent a career building today’s Republican Party. Some kind of reckoning is in order.
1
Is cultural reform possible?
When the first paragraph has 2 links for your own books I tend to take what follows less seriously. Reading on see more links and touting of self.
What a cynical, miserable man.
I feel pity for him.
Many of us who love what we do, ARE happy and fulfilled by our careers. And yes, we ARE able to make ourselves happy. And we sure don't need the government to do it.
What a sad, sad man.
David makes these articles up to deflect from his chaotic GOP roots.
1
@kilika A very insightful observation on your part.
Some may think it corny but I’ve read this every day since I was young - if more took its prescriptions to heart the world would be a better and place. I’ve edited slightly for space and timeliness-read the original in its entirety @Desiderata - American writer - Max Ehrmann
Go placidly amid the noise and haste,
and remember what peace there may be in silence......
Speak your truth quietly and clearly;
and listen to others, even the dull and the ignorant;they too have their story......
If you compare yourself with others,
you may become vain and bitter;
for always there will be greater and lesser persons than yourself......
Keep interested in your own career, however humble; it is a real possession in the changing fortunes......
Be yourself. Especially, do not feign affection....everywhere life is full of heroism......
Take kindly the counsel of the years, gracefully surrendering the things of youth.....
Nurture strength of spirit to shield you in sudden misfortune. But do not distress yourself with dark imaginings. Many fears are born of fatigue and loneliness...whether or not it is clear to you, no doubt the universe is unfolding as it should.
Therefore be at peace with your God spirit however you conceive it to be,
and whatever your labors and aspirations,in the noisy confusion of life keep peace with your soul.
With all its sham, drudgery, and broken dreams,it is still a beautiful world.
Be cheerful.
Strive to be happy.
2
One of the best-ever columns by Mr. Brooks. Well done.
3
What are the lies David tells himself:
1. Racism wasn't structural and woven deep into the society from the very beginning until I officially said so.
2. Gays that don't threaten the sensibilities of cultural conservatives is what being gay should be about. Why? Because anything else scares me to death and I don't want to die.
3. Capitalism is glorious in all the destruction it can cause. Anyone who is not awed by the creative force of that devastation are people missing out on so much.
4. Tough choices painful choices need to be made about immigration. Xenophobia, racism must be part of the grand bargain. Why? Because the part of me that is like that should always be honored. Anything else is contemptuous and simple minded.
2
Sure, Brooks. Your side can have the worthless political power. We'll - meditate.
Good luck selling that one.
But the United States was itself founded on lies. "All men are created equal" -- so long as they were white males who owned a certain amount of property. "Manifest Destiny" and the "Empire of Liberty" -- lies used to mask the fact that the country was being created out of a genocide. What's happening today is reverse karma; Nemesis walks among us.
Here's the biggest lie in this country, You should play by the rules. This is what underlies all the other lies. We are taught to grow up and play by the rules, be fair. Well, lo and behold we grow up and find out that those that got ahead most often didn't play by the rules, or the laws, or the morals of a country.
We discovered our leaders across the entire spectrum cheat, lie, obfuscate, and blame others for actions they commit.
What's that old saying? Playing by the rules is for suckers.
2
The "Five Lies Our Culture Tells Us" sound like tenets of the Republican Party.
4
While nothing said here was wrong or for that matter even terribly controversial, it struck me as more sermon than column. David keeps edging towards the theological and ethical and seems to always have positive things to say about religion. Maybe it’s time for David to seek his true desire and head towards the theological/rabbinical seminary. No snark or misguided humor intended here. I am really starting to think that is where his heart lies.
"The cultural revolution is more important."
The fact that tens of millions of Americans support and cheer the most repulsive President this country has ever seen, proves your point.
But for a cultural revolution to proceed, we first need to remove the cancer from politics in 2020, and hope it goes into permanent remission.
2
I have long resented Brooks for things like gushing about the moderation of former Rep Deborah Pryce while blatantly ignoring how she voted. That was now long ago, but one of many examples of Brooks role in deceiving readers about the radicalization and growing depravity of the GOP. But Brooks is changing and growing as he ages. This is a first-rate column.
sounds like Terrance McKenna. "Culture is not your friend" I agree with you and he.
Good column David. Humans are social animals and need communities to thrive. BTW: Isn't "Oh, the Places You'll Go" the last book that Donald Trump actually read?
"..the race is not to the swift, nor the battle to the strong, nor bread to the wise, nor riches to the intelligent, nor favor to those with knowledge, but time and chance happen to them all." (Ecccl.) "he who dies with the most toys wins" (anon.) take your pick
I can take exception immediately to wtwo of these.
First, sorry Mr. Brooks, but life should be a journey. And no, that doesn't meet chasing after all the latest fads or trying to knock down everything on some "bucket list." In fact, the journey doesn't even have to leave one's home. (Think Marcel Proust). The journet simply means being open to what's around you instead of walking through it blindly. (Like holding on to the myth that Republicans really are inherently decent and it's only Trump who has upset the apple cart).
And even more importantly, number two: You have to find your own truth. So instead of tackling hard issues and actually trying to reason them through, we're just supposed to follow just blindly that which we have been told?
2
"Career success is fulfilling" is true for a lot of people. Millions of scientists, artists, lawyers and HVAC technicians get out of bed every day because they love their work and think it makes the world a better place. Getting a faux-sociological piece of political advocacy on the NYT best seller list is not fulfilling, ok, no surprise there.
"Life is an individual journey" is true too. Nobody is ever going to be in your head with you.
Here are some lies David Brooks and the NYT tell:
"Sexual activity is meaningless fun. Pornography, sodomy and promiscuity are just different orientations. There is no reason to do the hard work of keeping yourself morally clean and preparing for an honorable marriage based in the only legitimate marital act."
"Everybody is one big multi-culti family. It is wrong to be loyal to your own family, friends, town, country or religion. That's bigotry. Even people who want to kill us should be loved and supported exactly like those who spilled their blood to save us."
These are the lies that really destroy young people's morale.
Lie 6: The rich have the best interests of the poor in mind.
2
But you missed the first and most important lie: all men are created equal....
2
It took Brooks this long to realize this?
1
It takes a village?
2
Well done Mr Brooks!
As a perpetual critic of David Brooks' ironclad complacency and astonishing lack of "edge," allow me to say, Yes! Yes! Yes! What a great and good column. Come home, David. All is forgiven!
The personal is political and the political is personal.
We are all part of the body politic.
While I agree that we as individuals must bear responsibility for our personal actions, behaviors and complicity, not to mention our political affiliations, the facts are that our institutions have failed us because they are filled at the top with greedy, self serving and down right sociopathic people.
We see this from pedophile priests in an institution that proclaims its values from the almighty himself to, to a foreign born media mogul who spreads lies and propaganda unchecked by our legal and political system, to predatory and unregulated business and financial practices that steal homes and pensions from under the middle and working classes, to big pharmaceutical companies and doctors knowingly acting as drug pushers and creating addictions that have devastated families and communities for generations to come, to a congress that turns a blind eye to it all while it cuts funding for the most vulnerable amongst us and considers them lazy and to a president who is utterly shameless in his destruction of decency and civility and the dismantling of a compassionate democratic government for all Americans.
As the Italians say, “the fish rots from the head”.
2
Jordan B. Petersen said it better.
1
As usual, David Brooks gets halfway there but pulls up short before coming to any useful systemic analysis. Kinda ironic, given the topic...
1
The life you have lived for fifty to eighty years will inform the book you write about culture and politics. David Brooks's "Five Lies Our Culture Tells" makes it clear that, like so many Republicans, he missed the lessons of the Sixties Revolution, where we learned that being an uptight white Republican is a horrific and unfulfilling fate. "That which you own owns you."
David Brooks missed his chance at 40 days and 40 nights alone in the desert. He missed his "Walkabout." He shied away from "The Road Less Traveled" and he failed to climb his own "Second Mountain."
For three seasons (1972-1975) the TV show "Kung Fu" delivered the template for a life based on truth, justice and an empathy that is attached to the all-that-is here on Earth. I can attest that you DO have to find your own truth. "You must take responsibility for your own cure."
1
"president’s repulsive behavior is tolerated or even celebrated by tens of millions of Americans"
Yes, ten's of millions of Republicans, your erstwhile cohorts.
1
Lie #6: The opinions of NYT columnist David Brooks about psychological and sociological issues are based on more than his self-reflection.
I'm growing tired of David Brooks' repeated attempts to develop his brand. First he was a run-of-the-mill Republican. Now that he and his party elected a gargoyle for president, he wants to be the philosopher king of the NYT, pretending that Trump is an flaw rather than a feature, with his simplistic philosphical statements that anyone with any character learned in their teens.
2
Yes, millions of Americans are selfish and hate others, which is why Trump was elected.
2
Two items:
1. “It’s hard to communicate from your depths, not your shallows.” That’s what poetry is, or at least attempt—“communicating from your depths.” And yes, it can be hard to write, to find the language. Europe sometimes elects poets as leaders. A poet in the White House...?
2. “hyper-individualism”: Haven’t you just described capitalism? And now we have a full-fledged capitalist in the White House who mangles words.
I agree with all of it. But it is hard to picture a a Republican wearing a loincloth and spinning cotton.
1
One of Father David's better sermons.
I would offer a sonnet by Wordsworth,
Nuns fret not at their convent’s narrow room;
And hermits are contented with their cells;
And students with their pensive citadels;
Maids at the wheel, the weaver at his loom,
Sit blithe and happy; bees that soar for bloom,
High as the highest Peak of Furness-fells,
Will murmur by the hour in foxglove bells:
In truth the prison, into which we doom
Ourselves, no prison is: and hence for me,
In sundry moods, ’twas pastime to be bound
Within the Sonnet’s scanty plot of ground;
Pleased if some Souls (for such there needs must be)
Who have felt the weight of too much liberty,
Should find brief solace there, as I have found.
4
This article reminded me that In 1950, the psychoanalyst, Dr. Karen Horney, published "Neurosis and Human Growth" in which she described the concept of "neurotic ambition," the drive toward external success. So, for example, you are a manager working at a large company and you invest all your energy into tirelessly seeking to have more individuals working for you, to obtain a promotion to the next level, to make more money, and to be noticed by corporate officers even though you really don't care (or dislike or even detest) the work you are doing. For over 30 years, I exhibited all of the above characteristics of neurotic ambition to the detriment of evolving as a human being; however, almost all of our cultural norms strongly encourage this behavior, and only a very small percentage of Americans have the fortitude and ability to follow the path described in this article.
2
These days David Brooks's writing shows great observation and introspection, as he adduces what challenges our sense of being, both as a nation and as individuals. His reflections are most welcome and well formed.
However, on occasion, like all of us seeking solutions to complex conundrums, his conclusions can be reductive. While his apologia in admonishing a balance between solipsistic pursuits and stronger connections to other people and purpose has merit, he is essentially are asking us to substitute on set of formulaic guidelines with another. The fact is that his recommendations can no sooner guarantee a fulfilling life than the habits he admonishes.
The British philosopher Alain de Botton wrote a remarkable book decades ago called The Consolations of Philosophy in which he holds up a series of philosophical trailblazers in easy and accessible prose, whose work and personal examples give real instruction in coping with or in enjoying whatever life may bring us. His chapter on Seneca would be particularly edifying for many of us these days. Botton did a great service in "breaking it down," so the insights of these great observers of life become useful tools toward better personal purpose and fulfillment.
Brooks's suggestions are certainly worth examining. But for all of his good intention, neither he nor anyone else can substitute one hard set of rules for another in this world as a key to fulfillment.
4
I believe one of the small changes that might help would be to stop describing prosperity as "success". Public-safety workers, clergy, craft workers, educators, or even parents are no more or less successful when living modestly. There are also certainly enough examples of prosperity brought on by succeeding at activities that are shameful. Let's call prosperity by its name, and let other forms of success come out of the shadows.
10
David - you are sounding more and more like a socialist but you just can't turn your back on the right and I don't know why. Which part of the political spectrum represents the go-it-alone, don't depend on anyone attitudes? Which part of that same spectrum supports government policies that help people in need, redistribution of wealth to the people that need assistance, displays tolerance to all races, sexual preferences, socio-economic groups, etc? On which part of that political spectrum do you find most (though, admittedly, not all) of your of your negative issues represented? I think you know the answer to that question.
9
No, Mr. Brooks, it is NOT the whole country which is "going through some sort of spiritual and emotional crisis."
Have you read your fellow NYT columnist today?
https://www.nytimes.com/2019/04/16/opinion/trump-omar-9-11.html?action=click&module=Opinion&pgtype=Homepage
Some of us see our country, and the motivations of our fellow Americans, very clearly. Put simply, Trump is Republican politics made explicit.
You are a conservative with a conscience, Mr. Brooks, and I for one am glad to see you struggling with what your politics and your party has wrought.
But please don't presume to lecture those of us who saw through the GOP's shtick all along. Our country now reaps what your politics has sown.
9
I basically agree with Brooks about the hollowness of external achievements prestigious colleges or careers. But I do think a person can experience a persistent sadness and lack of joy stemming from being under-realized intellectually and professionally. If you are under-realized professionally, and have the financial resources to channel your potential into volunteer work that really uses your skills, great. But most of us don't. I don't think it's true someone with a brilliant creative and mathematical mind can easily set aside a drive to contribute those skills to society and earn recognition and instead find fulfillment and joy in merely being the very best streetsweeper
241
I don’t believe Mr. Brooks is advocating against professional achievement. After all, he writes this piece in a professional capacity. And he has achieved a high stature in his career. Instead, I believe he is saying professional achievement without deep, personal connections is not fulfilling. He advocates an “and” solution, not an “or” of choosing one or the other.
48
@Charlene But of course professional achievement and a life devoted to family and community can come into conflict with one another, often do. It is a both and solution, but with a high premium on the community/family/obligation side
6
“But people looking back on their lives from their deathbeds tell us that happiness is found amid thick and loving relationships.”
I disagree. Having been a hospice nurse for many, many years, I have been at the bedside of many at the end of their lives. They don’t talk much about happiness. They talk more about missed opportunities to tell someone they loved them. Especially old friends who were there from the beginning, but who they lost touch with because they were busy raising families and making a living. They wax nostalgic. They talk about fond memories. They long for who they once were as individuals. We play so many roles that they often become us, but they aren’t us. We love our children and our spouses and our extended family, but honestly, some of that love can be a burden, a responsibility to love. And believe it or not, with the exception of leaving small children or teens and young adults, most people are sad about leaving their pets. Unconditional love is important. We don’t get enough of that in our lifetimes.
884
@Janice Badger Nelson I believe if you think about it, what you said here proves the writer's point that relationships are what matters.
60
@debra No, he said happiness is found there. Not always true. Relationships are complex and sometimes not about love.
41
@debra
I agree. By the end of her comment she is refuting her "I disagree" even if that loving relationship is with a pet!
22
I’m an angry old hippie so lets start by going back to the 60’s and answering all the civil issues that were first presented to us back then. Then and only then can we move on
5
David, you sound cynical and sad. Maybe it's time for a break. So much of what you say is true for many, but also untrue for many. There are spiritual truths that help many of us navigate the lies and reach a peaceful destination....
3
Overly simplistic, declarative and judgemental generalities that don't apply to all of the people much of the time.
5
Thank you Mr. Brooks for a thought provoking commentary!
1
We should try to learn something from the appalling, repugnant fact that Donald Trump is our President.
Trump has no interest in leaving the world a better place. All he cares about is money, fame, and adoration.
Trump’s presidency is holding up a mirror to our culture of materialism and narcissism. Trump is the ultimate grotesque fruit of our culture: the American selfie. What do we care about? Winning at all costs, me first and you never, my desires are above the law, don’t ever tell ME what to do.
This is Trump and this is America.
We’re all responsible for participating in a selfish, hedonistic culture - where even our elected officials refuse to be tethered by anything but their own careers.
We can’t just blame Trump and his supporters for the Trump presidency.
7
@SCZ, Hint: It isn't Trump.
"Four years ago" you published a book saying how American culture was in great shape. Now you're saying that this was wrong. I applaud your honesty in acknowledging your error. But why should we believe your social analysis now?
6
Meh. Pop psychology and folksy “wisdom” complicates what is actually quite simple. A malignant chaos-mongering narcissist occupies the White House. His illness has metastasized and taken over the Republican Party. Brooks thoughts on happiness and job fulfillment are irrelevant when Patient Number 1, our government, has contracted an infectious disease with no known cure.
8
David, I've been to 45 countries and the United States is the least communitarian of them all. I see that you deplore it but I don't see what you plan to do about it.
7
I have epilepsy. I have spent thirty years struggling to come to the surface. The surface of normalcy. The world we live in doesn’t have time for me. I get in the way of the lies it tells to sustain itself. An uncomfortable bump. Mr. Brooks has his finger on some of our self delusions that give structure to a world where self delusion is king. My epilepsy leaves no room/time for that. I believe I see with a degree of clarity that is truly uncomfortable as the world churns. May we be kind and aware of one another as we intertwine together the long journey.
4
What does "defeating self-sufficiency " mean?
I like David’s conclusion –– i.e. that our problems go way beyond the political. But I had trouble finding myself in David’s five lies. As one reader said, they sound more autobiographical than objective. Lie #1– Career successful is fulfilling: I don’t think this is a lie. But I would argue that career success alone won’t make you happy. Lie #2 – I can make myself happy: A half-truth. I think that happiness is partially an individual accomplishment. Lie #3 – Life is an individual journey: Another half-truth. Saying that life is an individual journey does not mean endorsing always being on the move. Lie #4 – You have to find your own truth: The statement is pretty vague. David’s description is more about values than truth. Lie #5 – Rich and successful people are worth more than poorer and less successful people: I doubt anyone would argue that this is not a lie. But the terms “rich” and “successful” need to be defined. And I wouldn’t lump them together.
4
Mr. Brook's lies are incomplete. The most important lie that is driven into the heads of people from the day they start elementary school is American exceptionalism. That lie states that not only is America different than other countries, it is better. Unfortunately, Mr. Brooks, and others primarily on the right but also on the "left" refuse to confront that big lie.
6
@William McLaughlin, Well, that goes hand in hand that all people are created equal. Their not.
Time to rediscover God and religion and the selflessness and charity they engender. We were never created to be this materialistic. Be charitable. Help the needy.Walk into a neighborhood beneath your social station and ask how you can help.
2
American culture has always been individualistic, success-worshipping, materialistic. But four years ago this recipe gave us Obama. Today we have the Trump dumpster fire. How did it all turn so toxic so quickly?
1
Do what you love and the money will follow is another huge lie.
3
I agree that 1, 2, 3 and 5 are lies, but not 4. My whole religion (Unitarian Universalism) is based on the necessity to find your own truth.
48
@Jason Galbraith What you flatter yourself is "your own truth" is almost always an amalgam of borrowings from other thinkers, and that is how it should be.
12
@Jason Galbraith
I think UUism does leave the discernment of spiritual and theological truth to the individual, but it's not quite the same as the hyper-individualism/libertarianism that Brooks laments; after all, the UU church still functions as a community, with some overarching norms that all members subscribe to.
17
@Jason Galbraith- how can truth be individual? Truth is universal, by definition it seems.
6
To be spared from shame for having success is a lot. If you didn't experience it , you can't know how miserable it is.
Let me add something to the list:
Everything and everyone has to be Awesome!!!
People aren't allowed to deal with real feelings, especially young people. Never feel sad or frustrated or confused because, you know, you're Awesome!!!
3
One sentence says it all:
"It’s the chains we choose that set us free."
1
@Mad-As-Heaven-In
Yeah, that one was hard for me to get my head around
would that one had two lives.
Recently watched a movie called "The Insider": story of Lowell Bergman and a bit about the famed Mike Wallace and how the latter caved in. It also showed how Mike then made peace with his own mortality and did the right thing.
Reading David Brooks' column made me wonder if David too is trying to make peace with his own ( and ours) inevitable outcome despite singing paeans to the stupidity of the Reagan "revolution" and following it through to its inexorable and outlandish aftermath, the present occupier of the White House. But, the Dems have blood on them too, starting with Bill, under whom, the left became just the mirror image of the other side of the aisle, same modus operandi, slightly different rhetoric. Also shame on us that let it happen.
1
It is no easier being an older person and seeing these lies being retold and retold after knowing they are lies and having lived through life believing them
“Career success is fulfilling.” That’s not a lie. Whether columnist, master plumber, or history teacher, we appreciate external confirmation that we’ve done good work. Unlike Brooks I enjoyed having a bestseller quite a bit. The key is enjoying success while knowing it’s not the only thing that matters.
“I can make myself happy.” True. I’m the only person who can teach me to engage the world in healthy ways, form deep friendships, and find fulfilling work. That’s the road to happiness, and we each need to find our own.
“Life is an individual journey.” Indeed it is. It’s also a journey we take with others. But the individual journey toward self-fulfillment and self-understanding makes us better people when we engage others. Dr. Seuss was right; he often was.
“You have to find your own truth.” If I embrace society’s or the community’s truth, I’ll end up with no truth. American society and it’s values are so warped that if I don’t find my own truth I’m in big trouble.
“Rich and successful people are worth more than poorer and less successful people.” That’s a lie but it’s not the meritocracy that’s selling it. It’s the oligarchy and Republican Party selling it with everything they’ve got. It’s ugly — and they’re really good at it.
Our society isn’t fragmenting because of Brooks’ “lies.” It’s one huge lie: that the top 10% should have everything and everybody else should be happy with scraps. Brooks is selling a deceptive narrative. I would only ask why.
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I’m unclear on the connection between “the five lies” and “the president’s repulsive behavior is tolerated and even celebrated by tens of millions of Americans.” It’s as if an important dimension of the widespread moral decadence is not addressed by “the five lies.”
It sounds a lot like you want us all to live the same lives, and telling us what we are happy doing and what won't make us happy isn't really helpful. Unless it turns out that some of the happiest times of my life were actually the most miserable and the depressing grind of holding down family life is actually something that makes me really happy even though it doesn't feel like it, you're wrong. At the very least you're wrong about me.
Also, the "meritocracy" doesn't exist. Donald Trump wouldn't be president if it did.
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"The sociology of the meritocracy is that society is organized around a set of inner rings with the high achievers inside and everyone else further out. The anthropology of the meritocracy is that you are not a soul to be saved but a set of skills to be maximized."
If meritocracy is a lie, then how can there be a sociology built around its existence? The lie of meritocracy is transparently evident, but the present administration. People of all ages are mocked for being intelligent. Kids (especially boys) are bullied for doing their homework.
There is, instead, a vast sociology built on a foundation of mediocrity. The "sociology of meritocracy" is simply a subset of the vast sociology of denial, something essentially Freudian.
Mr. Brooks, you make some good points but this is not a one-size-fits-all world. For every point you make I can think of people for whom your words make no sense at all. There are a lot of shades of gray here.
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America is a lost country. Sailing on a valueless sea headed no particular direction other than down. Or, America is a lost country waiting to be found by a leader that cares for all the people not just few.
At best we are sinking.
1
This sounds suspiciously like a philosophy of quietism, from a man who married into money, and who feels insecure around those who had to earn their own way.
First, success: If your career involves doing something useful for the human race, and gives you the wherewithal to support a family, success is fulfilling. If your work involves peddling stories that you know are false, success will rightly bring pain.
Next there’s happiness. An internal state of mind. But for happiness to be more than merely physical contentment, the individual must have some inner picture of what their memories and sense impressions ought to be. Their happiness comes from the comparison of the imagined with the real, and anyone with a normal childhood learns to imagine the happiness of others as part of their own happiness. Tell the truth. Do unto others.
Then there’s the need for life to be an individual journey, with each person finding their own truth. But this is how society evolves: through exploration and discovery. The way of Galileo, as opposed to the pope whose name no one bothers to remember. Mallory climbing Everest “because it was there.”
And finally, there’s David’s fifth “false truth”, that rich and successful people are worth more than poorer and less successful people. Yet why should we be shy about valuing a successful surgeon more than an unsuccessful one? Or admiring the tales of the explorers more than those of the stay-at-homes? Or paying a musician for a song?
1
Gee, that's funny. My culture didn't tell me any of these lies.
Mr. Brooks should look for a different culture.
He should also stop making the unfounded and incorrect claim that HIS culture is "our" culture.
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"The anthropology of the meritocracy is that you are not a soul to be saved but a set of skills to be maximized."
But this is exactly the economics that Mr Brooks has pushed since he became a Reagan "Revolutionary." In a society, that can't even figure out the medicine isn't some consumer product (read: Kenneth Arrow ca 1963), that's downed the cool-aid of "maximizing shareholder value," that's re-atomizing work into piece labor (the Gig Economy should really be called Shirtwaist Triangle 2.0) -- who's kidding whom?
The fundamental mythology here is that community can withstand the economic fragmentation that Mr Brooks and his friends pushed for 40 years.
We see the "philosophy" of selfishness promoted by a borderline personality truly realized in our President.
Here's a hint David, a capitalist society allocates its resources based on the relative bargaining power between its participants.
When you knee-cap the bargaining power of those with only the assets of their labor and amplify the bargaining power of those who can aggregate and grow their property, you end up where we are -- world wide, with variants of fascism everywhere, from the Chinese version (still amusingly called Communism) to the Me Firstism of the Republican Party.
I can assure you David, that you'd be alot less able to enjoy your "thick" community if you were constantly in fear of loss of health and livelihood.
3
Almost comical that David Brooks can write a column on "lies we are told" and not mention "Republican Party" even once. Brooks own Party, which has been lying for over 30 years to maintain its power, and delude, scare and incite hate in its base in seemingly endless campaign cycles.
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@Winston Smith, The Democrats have lied to to toe with them.
You have missed - not for the first time - the fact that when we speak out loud we are aware of the truth or falsity of our words. There is no colder comfort than having a lie you tell about yourself be accepted as truth by another person, because in that act of misrepresentation you acknowledge that you are dissatisfied with yourself. Any gains a liar achieves as a result of his lies is proof of his own inadequacy, and leads the liar to repeat and embellish and lie even further.
The expression 'coming clean' - meaning admitting truth after a lie - says it all. Lying makes one feel dirty. The more one lies, the more dissatisfied the liar becomes.
The one emotion which is reliably elicited by lying is fear. The liar lives in fear that the person to whom he is lying knows the truth...and that fear will eventually cause him to bring him to expose himself.
Welcome to the sane side, David. You’ve finally made it over. There’s only one quibble I have with this otherwise excellent column: your use and definition of the word “meritocracy.”
In truth, our species is organized along the lines of many patterns found in nature. One of them is the hive. Not all of us can be Einsteins. So the rest of us benefit from the merits of others’ genius. Broadly criticizing the concept of meritocracy is precisely what the Tea Party and its deplorable offspring the MAGA-populist folks ignorantly (and jealously) do. This is part of our crisis. I think you need to hone your distinctions. Maybe what you’re trying to criticize is consumer capitalism but you’re too afraid of going there just yet?
Be that as it may, congrats on moving toward the sane side. BTW, over here we’re weirded-out by the Politics of Victimhood too. But that’s another topic.
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These lies are the core of conservative capitalism otherwise known as oligarchic socialism. Hyper-individualism (rugged individualism), Manifest Destiny (lawless exploitation and ruination), Self made man (I built this), all militate against community. The revolution that is truly needed is not cultural or political in the main, but economic.
1
I'm sure I'm not the only one who will correct this passage as follows:
"The sociology of [capitalism] is that society is organized around a set of inner rings with the high achievers inside and everyone else further out. The anthropology of [capitalism] is that you are not a soul to be saved but a set of skills to be maximized."
Brooks left out a couple of lies:
If you're poor, you can pull yourself up by the bootstraps. (Yeah, right.)
America is a meritocracy. and has a level playing field. (It is if you're wealthy, and can buy opportunity.)
I just printed these 5 truths in block letters with a black Sharpie on a blank sheet of paper and taped them to the refrigerator door so that my two teenage daughters can read them every day!
another very insightful essay. Thank you David Brooks.
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Are you trying to encourage all of us to find religion again?
“This is my simple religion. There is no need for temples; no need for complicated philosophy. Our own brain, our own heart is our temple; the philosophy is kindness.” — Dalai Lama
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One wonders for whom this article is oriented: Ivanka and Jared as each individual is the product of this new norm.
Or is Mr Brooks delivering another sermon to the rest of us who, apparently, need a perpetual lesson?
Gads, I love the comments section. These readers actually read Brooks' column and take them apart piece by piece. On the face of it, his columns are some nice, bland pabulum.
But reading them alongside what is happening in our country since Reagan - extreme wealth inequality; efforts by GOP to dismantle remaining regulations that constrain greedy, cost-cutting corporations; efforts to destroy the remaining social safety net (much worse than in most rich nations); and ignoring both the crumbling infrastructure and the environment, his columns serve only as a deceptively literate opiate to quieten the populace as they are being fleeced and then destroyed.
Keep refuting David Brooks' medicine or we'll all be addicted.
2
I must confess, this column nails it. We are spiritually impoverished.
Frankly, I can't get myself to generate a great deal of concern over the circumstances of a few neurotic Bobos. To the extent we have a crisis of meaning in America -- and we do -- those who are impacted are the poor and the working class. And the readers of the New York Times are more than a little responsible.
To lower our cost of living [and increase the value of our 401(k)s] we shipped men's work out of the country. The result is that a large portion of millennial men are not marriageable. And women aren't marrying them.
That would be bad enough, but the women are going on to become mothers. The outcomes of children raised by single mothers are, on average, poor.
For most adults meaning comes from satisfying the responsibilities of motherhood and fatherhood. We have to bring men's jobs back and reinstate social opprobrium for women who have children out of wedlock.
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When the eternal zeitgeist is torn from the pages of The Protestant Ethic and the Spirit of Capitalism by Max Weber, this is where we end up - the pursuit of profit as a virtue, religious calling and end unto itself.
If we run out of culprits, we can always point the finger at John Calvin who continues to make vast contributions to American society and moral conventions.
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David Brooks !!!
Finally you get it!!!
Nuclear and extended family values and social mores and civic education have been destroyed by both current political majority parties in the USA.
NRA and penal system and drug policy for cannabis aided and abetted the problems with perception that you list here.
Our families are now in battle much as they were during our civil war.
This chaos allows the usurpation of our freedoms and our responsibility to our kith and kin.
Universal ancient truths involve intact families thriving or being conquered and being enslaved David.
We have that capacity here now because of the politics on both sides and Miller running policy for president clueless mob boss!!
Happy is the man who believes he is happy.
How was Brooks ever a Republican? These are all "it takes a village"-type sentiments, not the Ayn Rand-ish, "pull yourself up by your bootstraps" tough talk that the GOP has been putting out for decades. In fact, the gist of what Brooks is saying aligns well with Bernie Sanders' overarching philosophy. Yet another irony of these bizarre times in the U.S.A. is how Bernie, a secular Jew, preaches what is essentially the undiluted Christian philosophy, while Trump, a malignant and shameless narcissist, is fawned over by the most ostentatious "Christians" in the country.
One of your best columns ever Mr. Brooks. I agree wholeheartedly. I think I'll buy the book.
This article makes good general sense but runs a risk of driving into a black-and-white/zero-sum trap. Meritocracy is infinitely better than widespread structural incompetence - which also drives corruption (Russia is one example among a multitude of others). But yes, narrow competitiveness is stupid, mainly driven by emotional insecurity. Individualism as an ideology is certainly a narrow one - aren't they all? But individuality - or rather singularity - is at the same time the only real experience and the only one that deserves to be celebrated, as it is in the arts and in any field where creativity is at work. There is no such entities as "Christians", "Buddhists", "Muslims" or "Jews" who exactly share their coreligionists beliefs. There are only infinitely varied forms of experience, with extremely wide spectra of emotional and spiritual nuances, all of which incessantly evolving, transforming and interacting over time. This article is fundamentally right about the definite trashy narrowing that seems to be imposed on us by the likes of Trump through refraction by today's hyper-media and the natural gullibility of masses of people.
Re the first lie, that career success is not fulfilling. I’m afraid far too many have accepted this as a lie and then followed what seems like the antidote: follow your passions. Or at least what you think they are.
The result has been an overenrollment in film studies, queer studies, black studies, food studies and other pursuits that result in spending your young adulthood living with parents and burdened by student debt.
A better approach is do what u do well and follow your passion on the weekend. In practice that means if your passion is playing the saxophone but you’re really good at tax law you should be a tax lawyer. And if you have time join a band on the weekend.
What a sanctimonious screed! Don't tell us it's not about politics. Some 70.000 votes re-distributed and Hillary would be our President. Trump would be hawking his new network. The Country would be better off and I dare say Trump would be happier. So what would Brooks be writing about?
The biggest lie of all is that “all men are created equal”. From that singular lie springs every possible and actual failure of American culture and society.
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While I accept your good intention, Mr Brooks, this sort of Freudian setup is nothing new, of course, except that the self and the universal are intertwined.
To be fair, it is not a bad setup. People like Bill Gates traverse the path quite well. They start with the accumulation of wealth and power and end with the dispensation of wealth and empowerment. The tech world is singing the praise of the late Steve Jobs but he died a flawed individual. So your 2nd mountain - um, I wonder if Thomas Merton's Seven Storey Mountain has anything to do with your work - may perhaps be a good roadmap for your own self-discovery.
Speaking of Thomas Merton, he woke up early after an early life of decadence while Thomas Aquinas just before his death when he allegedly made his death bed confession saying his Summa Theolgoica is straw. While both are Catholic, it is not about the religion or faith but about their humanity and its actualization.
Still, your effort of deepening your own spiritual life is to be commended, if you choose to devote yourself to humanity, irrespective of race, faith or ideology. Here is the tricky thing. What if your ideology is the opposite of other people's ideology? President Obama is sounding the alarm of liberal democrats being too rigid. He is right. You should know. Your loyal opposition readers would attack you no matter what you say here. So you see, so even when people agree at high level can still have problems in particular. So, maybe respect is needed
When asked the secret of happiness Joseph Campbell answered “Learning something difficult.”
Where is education and a love of knowledge for its own benefit other than earning potential in our society?
When is the last time most of society turned off a screen and read a book?
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Gee, Brooks is starting to verge on Hegelian territory. In more frigidly academic terms, he is suggesting that individuals are "social constructs." Well, that should be obvious from the natal ward on. Problem is, Hegel leads to Marx. So far, so good. Keep pushing, guy! You'll eventually get back to ideology, just not he one you started with.
So David, you finally understand that it does take a village.
Welcome to the society of caring ,active, liberal humans: We few we caring band of sisters/brothers. Get used to being on the losing sidwith the rest of us.
Nobel prize winning physicist Frank Wilcez has a theory he calls Complimentarity, and I quote: “You can recognize a deep truth by the feature that its opposite is also a deep truth.”
I think the black and white, this or that, bad and good outlines here are a little simplistic. Also not taken into account is that most people don't live lives like Mr. Brooks or like he dreams we might. In fact most people in the *modern* world will have many jobs and several careers and likely live in many different cities if not countries. Which doesn't mean their lives are any more or less meaningful or indicate they are running away from something or other.
And actually we don't all believe that the "success" Mr. Brooks refers to ("New York Times Bestseller" plug) is the sort of success we are striving for. Many people consider success in life making a contribution to the good of the whole, not having to do evil work to make a living, fulfilling the responsibilities and promises of deep relationships.
Brooks always sounds like he's talking to some Yalie who could either run an international NGO or run an investment bank after his grand tour at the end of his extended education . . .
And one more, in many ways more comprehensive and destructive than the five you identified: We know what God wants of humanity.
Progressive thinkers have known all of this, all along.
David, as usual, tries to knock down individualistic values to promote communitarianism. We do not need to attack these “lies” but just add to them a little touch of well-chosen relationships (note the “chosen”, not imposed) and one will find real happiness, i.e., happiness shared is a multiplier. Career success is more fulfilling when shared with family and friends who admire you. You can make yourself happy, especially if your family and friends are also happy. Consider Tiger Woods! Life is an individual journey (you come to earth alone and leave it alone), but it is more fulfilling when shared with loved ones. Any travel is. You have to find your own truth which is much more fulfilling than to swallow imposed dogmas! Your truth, furthermore, may enlighten others when shared. Rich and successful people are not necessarily worth more than poor and less successful people, but studies have shown they are happier, and a Harvard study recently showed that when it comes to millionaires, they are happier only when the wealth is earned rather than inherited, i.e., if you made yourself successful and happy. (Donnelly et al. The Amount and Source of Millionaires' Wealth (Moderately) Predicts Their Happiness, Personality and Social Psychology Bulletin, May, 2018). Meritocracy should certainly incorporate interpersonal skills for love, which certainly makes success more fulfilling.
Agree for the most part. A lot of these lies are the result of self indulgence. I would quibble with career success. While career success may not be fulfilling in and of itself, the absence of success means life is problematic unless you inherit a bundle. I think there needs to be a distinction between the pragmatic need to be good at something that brings in the bacon vs self indulgent careerism.
And life being an individual journey is spot on. I don't know how many people I know who do things not because they're good at them or they like doing whatever it is they are doing --- but it's something to check off. Something to mention at a party. I've known people who've participated in marathons not because they like running or can run -- they simply walk. But then they can claim at soirees that -- well when I was in the NY Marathon a couple of years back...
And what about an over emphasis on taste? Yes, the arts are wonderful and good food is good -- but what about when it becomes snotty snobbery simply for show? And don't virtue signalling. Can't you enjoy duck dynasty and Don Giovanni?
Basically, people can be pretty annoying.
And that has nothing to do with Trump -- nor do these five lies.
I'm always hesitant to hear this kind of advice from wealthy, affluent people who have the opportunity to lecture us on what makes the good life. But, I'll admit that I agree with much of what Brooks has to say here.
That said, income inequality looms large here. When working people struggle to feed their families and afford a house in a safe neighborhood, that puts a great amount of strain on their lives and their communities. When, they are crushed by medical bills, they may be less able to be communal with others.
As for rich people, I don't know them, but I assume they are happier (if hollowly so) than people who are hungry and one accident from living on the streets.
David, maybe you could come up with a way that wealthy people like yourself could be more democratic about wealth and empathetic toward the poor. Being poor is not shameful, but it's not noble either. We can lift everyone up.
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Why doesn't Mr. Brooks mention that every item on his list is a variety of the snake oil Republicans have been selling for decades?
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I can’t make myself happy? No? Who’s going to do it for me?
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@Moby Doc Brooks doesn't say so, but there is a trope along the lines of not chasing, or attempting, to manufacture happiness but, rather, living in the present and finding gratitude for what and whom one has in one's life - and thus, happiness comes. I would like to think that's implied in this piece, although with its anti-instruction format, it takes a bit of digging to get there...
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@Moby Doc
I've arranged my life so that I'm content.
I don't know anyone who is happy all the time.
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@Moby Doc Brooks just means not all by yourself in the absence of interaction with other people. If you mean each person must learn to let happiness in when smidgens of good fortune arrive or are earned, you'll get no argument from me.
2
During his administration, Jimmy Carter said the country was in a state of malaise, that Americans were consumed by material pursuits and had lost a sense of higher purpose. He was roundly criticized for being a big downer. Maybe we need more downers like Carter and Brooks to set us right again. In a land of such plenty, suicide rates and drug addiction are a national tragedy and disgrace, to say nothing of mass shootings. Obviously something is missing in America. Thank you for trying to find out what it is.
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The biggest lie is that if we could just get back to a different and better time and place everything would medically be okay. This lie is a favorite if those who enjoyed unearned privilege and benefited from a hierarchy that kept them on top and everyone else in their place below. Isn’t that the lie that elected Trump?
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I have appreciated SOME of David Brooks’ columns of late. Maybe he personally may be on his ‘Second Mountain’. He sometimes seems more connected to the real world if Americans struggling to keep their lives together.
I feel a need to point out that David does appear to be telling us that, “It takes a village.” That’s a phrase I remember someone else using to make these same points.
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These are the lies of capitalism, which shape our culture. Start there.
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No, you can't blame Trump on these cultural factors. Trump and the current state of politics as well as the still increasing inequality and lack of material improvement for the majority are a direct result of the cynical decision by Republican politicians to exploit racism and religious bigotry to attain office and to advance big-money interests. This is done for the financial advantage of the politicians, not devotion to some "conservative" ideals. Trump represents another step in the process of increasing hatred and division. Writers who call themselves conservatives are still trying to conceal what has been happening.
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"It's not my fault." Also, "it's not my child's fault." These are the two biggest "individual" lies that we try to get away with. We are all in it together... it really helps to say "sorry" every once in a while.
1
Money is imaginary, and too many people organize their lives around the pursuit of it.
The biggest lie of all is that we should not question the central tenets of our society. Actually, this is what it truly means to be human- to think and decide for yourself.
We need the ethos of my father - a sweet, thrifty man of modesty and honesty, who never bragged or boasted about his family history, and never pushed me to achieve, but only to do the right thing. (He was pilloried at the Harvard Club, dissed on Block Island, and laughed at by the chattering classes in Manhattan for his lack of alpha male style.) Brooks may be right, but 99 percent of the people that make up the world in which he lives and breathes are the exact opposite of this. Bravo Brooks for stating it, even if he doesn't live it!
I never thought I'd say this, given how opposite you and I are ideologically (I grew up in a Marxist household, and while I'm not in full agreement with those ideas, I haven't drifted that far): you are fast becoming my favorite columnist. IMHO, you have a far better handle on what is involved in human happiness than anyone else I read. Kudos to you - please keep it up.
Here are a couple of lies you have endorsed that should be on your list:
People who kill people on direction from the federal government are heroes.
Taking wealth from people by taxation and giving it to others is charitable.
The federal government can competently handle nationwide programs if only we get the right person in office.
Have we collectively become Dorian Gray?
("Dorian becomes extremely concerned with the transience of his beauty and begins to pursue his own pleasure above all else.")
Yes! Dorian Gray is our POTUS. Dorian Gray is our Capitol. Dorian Gray is our SCOTUS. Dorian Gray is our Financial System. Dorian Gray is our Religion.
Hence, USA and Dorian Gray are inseparable.
Can we please recognize that the nutrients for these lies are concocted - have been since the dawn of mass communication - by brilliant insights into human yearning, used in brilliant, empty-hearted, dehumanized sales/marketing/branding? That those techniques only get more and more effective? The lies will flourish as long as they pay. Education that genuinely supports thought and critical distance - real education - can be achieved formally or informally, but it takes rare advantages or rare effort or both. How can we change that when jobs rely on the status quo?
Happiness and fulfillment? Individualism and truth-seeking? Material riches and self-worth? These are all topics of interest for most of us. And Mr. Brooks' take is at least coherent, if not necessarily compelling. His use of the pejorative term "lies" tells us only that he has a bee in his bonnet with respect to the "culture." It tells us very little about how things got this way, even less about how to get out of any supposed predicament we're all in. As with most such "story-telling," it's an anecdotal exercise in crafting a "narrative." It may be a satisfying read for those who already share Mr. Brooks' beginning values - and ending conclusions. But it is one which has little explanatory or predictive power for most of the rest of us. Nice try, though.
A number of years ago when I worked with hospice there was a patient who had, before medical disaster struck, been a captain of industry with hundreds at his command. A helicopter came to ferry him to work so he would not have to deal with traffic. In the end, he would speak the only words he could remember: "Twinkle, twinkle little star...", over and over again. We would take turns sitting with him and singing it with him.
The funeral was well attended by those who knew him best and those who knew him not....needing to be seen at the service. People spoke of his fearsome ability in the market place. Not so much was said about him as a person. Money had been a great buffer, as it often is. But it won't save you. The late Henri Nouwen wrote that at the end of a life the only thing we get to take with us is the only thing we get to leave behind...the love we had for one another. We alone can do that. Others will take charge of our money, our stuff, our children and our reputation. And so it was with this gentleman. I think of him still, singing away, and pray that there might still be someone who remembers him with a smile and a tear.
I always feel that Mr. Brook's is trying to convince us that "conservative values" still exist and that if we just follow suit, things will be better.
Why isn't that lie, the biggest one of all, on the list?
2
Mr. Brooks, you are finally seeing the light. It is in the mundane that we find the enduring faith of our lives, seeing a hummingbird build a nest, and watering the flowers it loves. Making a meal, pouring wine, inviting the neighbors over. Watching children grow up, and finding a way to tell them it is not the clothes you wear, or the car you drive, or the size of your home--it is the love inside it.
Nice piece! Now, let’s do what we need to do to convince our friends, our children, and our communities that it is not “prestigious brands” that make us safe, strong, and loved--it is loving others.
I think Mr. Brooks is usually right and that he’s an honest and good thinker. Society needs people like him not to solve everybody’s problems (as if!), but to point to their roots so that we can know them and change.
This is great stuff. Looking forward to your book.
The "privatization of meaning" is nothing new and something that Lewis Carroll explored in 1872. It is one of the first problematic issues Alice faces when she goes into Looking-Glass world. The Red Queen and Humpty Dumpty are the definers of language and meaning in the text, and their meanings are both private and associative to their own individual experiences, not part of a larger conversation that might speak to community or to the social contract.
The new problem that arises from Brooks suggestion is that when we surrender our own sense of meaning to the community ethos, we are essentially becoming part of a hive mentality. What happens when the "communities and institutions" are misguided or just plain rotten? What then? It is absolutely worth identifying and asserting your own truth for the simple reason that it encourages relentless self-examination at all junctures of life, and it mandated some critical distance from the institutions that seek to shape us. Carroll knew this, which is why when Alice wakes up, she asks herself (and her cat) what her dream meant. It is her understanding of meaning that matters, not anyone else's. Lastly, the narrative voice breaks a wall and asks the reader, "what do you think" the meaning of this life is? You don't need to be Aristotle to embark on this journey.
I find some sense of inspiration from this article. A self examined life is indeed worth living.
And reflecting on what I just read is a good start.
David,
I can't say I disagree with your comments about the hyper-individualism promoted by our culture. Let's just keep in mind that the culture that is lying to us all is rooted in capitalist values, motivations, and goals. Welcome to the world of socialist critique.
All the best,
marc
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I think this is an excellent opinion piece, and I agree wholeheartedly. Well done, Mr. Brooks, and thank you.
1
The is just about the the best column I have ever read in the Times. Thank you. You have hit on the very problem with our entire framework of worth. Human beings, in our current system, have no INTRINSIC value. Their value comes only from the usefulness of what they produce. The reasoning goes, well, in your FAMILY, or in your CHURCH, you have intrinsic worth. You must turn there for your source of unconditional love. But many have families that do not love them, or no families at all. And even those who are members of a church or religious organization, may often be aware, that the members with more money and better clothes are accorded higher status. The problem is in us, all of us. We live in a world that only counts your worth in dollars, and determines that you are either deserving or undeserving of respect on that basis alone. Until we evolve out of this merciless notion, we will continue to act on our hate and kill each other.
I agree with Mr. Brooks. I was raised in the 1950s to see achievement and material accumulation as measure of my worth. The pain of this - the loneliness - the feeling never enough - drove me into therapy, groups and finally church. I've had to face my lack of skill in relationships, in community. Yet, I sense the truth that there lies genuine fulfillment and, yes, happiness. However, how did we come to this culture of loneliness and worth in externals? Advertising? Economic inequality? Mobility? Shattered families? Strife everywhere in politics, the news, online? Where are we to learn the skills for interdependence? Who is going to model caring for others, putting oneself second so others may step forward? Who? How? When?
1
In recent years I’ve realized how seriously destructive lies can be. When it’s personal and someone lies about you, there is no defense, it becomes one word against the other and protesting too much adds to the chasm into which truth descends and disappears. When it’s cultural, it’s worse because we live our lives by such lies if we are not careful, and chaos is down there somewhere. The life journey of each of us must include reaching a place inside where truth exists, where our humanity lives. At one point in my life, I remember saying out loud to myself, “At last, a member of the human race!” It was exhilarating. But we need help to do it. If successful, we will find a brilliantly lit palace big enough to hold everyone with no space between us at all and yet it will not be crowded, it will be beautiful. It’s the same place for everyone. Our shared journey and shared humanity connects us perfectly and the rest is merely the diversity of nature. We are not alone unless we bring it on ourselves.
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I remember my mother trying to discourage me from leading a bigger life than I could in my rural midwestern town. She always emphasized "taking care of your own patch". Becoming independent, traveling, volunteering, being an entrepreneur, and having financial security did make me happy. Women in those years were just beginning to have choices and independence was a hard-won and joyful experience. I do agree though that engagement with others through volunteerism is what drives me in my retirement as I lost the identity of "entrepreneur".
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Thank you. Debunking these lies is important to our mental and emotional health and our ability to work together. Life is a team sport. We forget this at our peril.
Unfortunately, our system requires each of those lies in order to work smoothly, and supports and promotes each of those lies in return. It's not difficult to see how our social and economic system values atomistic individuals to the significant exclusion of everything else. We should not be surprised then when we find ourselves un-neighborly, selfish, materialistic, and absorbed with personal as opposed to community accomplishments.
Consider how service contributes to a good life and creates conditions for greatness all around.
Consider the Japanese 1952 classic film Ikiru. Then take a deep breath.
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I absolutely love the phrase "the privatization of meaning." It encompasses so much of what is dysfunctional in our present day society.
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Thoughtful stuff from Mr. Brooks today - sometimes he does surprise in a positive way with his musings.
Two thoughts:
First, the term "meritocracy" doesn't necessarily have to imply materialistic striving. As humanity matures, maybe meritocracy will be based increasingly on the quality and quantity of one's service to others. Imagine what a wonderful world, both socially and politically, that could be!
Second, I'll bet among the comments here are more than a few remarking, in essence, "all the world needs to do is become a devotee of -xyz- religion, i.e., my religion! It's true that world religions almost all promote belonging, service (of some sort), and some claimed deity-given set of truths and doctrines by which to live. But history and even current events show that religions, or at minimum sects spawned by them, inevitably do as much harm as good. And while it's still early in humanity's growth away from superstition, it can already be seen that religion is unnecessary to make the cultural repairs and advances Mr. Brooks advocates.
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Scientists can bring great destruction as they seek knowledge of the physical universe; this vast scientific knowledge is frequently abused (nuclear weapons and weapons of mass destruction, destruction of the planet and its life sustaining ecosystems). The same holds true for all economic systems; each economic system can have a horrible impact on human lives and the earth. Would eliminating “religion” change that?
"Our" culture? Which "our" do you mean? At this moment in history, there doesn't seem to be a shared culture in this country, and THAT is the root of our political problems. I could easily dream up 5 lies that "their" culture tells them, e.g. "more guns makes us safer", "God is on our side", and 5 lies "my" culture tells me, e.g. "our politicians are primarily concerned with the well-being of society and humanity".
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Money is a clear, simple, and unambiguous statistic. As a goal, it's vastly more tempting than the fuzzy-edged values, psychological benefits, and ineffable rewards of small town-small tribe community. If we don't like the life that a society dedicated to the pursuit of money provides, we must arrange our institutions in a way that deprives that pursuit of its magnetic attractions. A return to authoritarian religions or communities is only the best option if it's only the sole option.
The biggest lie in America?
Probably the biggest lie in America concerns the definition of a good community, and each of our major political parties tells this lie in own but ultimately similar way. Any Western Civilization history book demonstrates the best societies and ages historically (Greeks, Renaissance, Enlightenment), the best communities, were such because the citizens were best aimed, directed, subordinated, and inspired by the best citizens their society had to offer, which is to say they had a high quality to quantity ratio and knew this was essential as a society dies if it does not continually aim beyond itself.
Now in America today both the left and right have a definition of good community which is essentially anti-genius, anti quality humanity, which makes both parties short-sighted and self-flattering crowd phenomenons ill-equipped to promise an American not to mention human future. If the right wing is not constantly trying to subordinate people to religion and some close-minded happiness the left is promoting any minority group other than the gifted and talented, which makes both parties actually rather selfish regardless of all talk of values and community and being against rampant individuality not to mention manifestations of individual selfishness.
An actual high quality community is composed of intelligent, self-sacrificing people, is proved in such, by its capacity to constantly choose the best people from among itself, to ensure human future.
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Brooks occasionally writes a column (like this one) I think is worthwhile, but I find it really difficult to square these sentiments with the vast majority of his output. It's like he wants individual people to make the individual choices that will make everything better, but doesn't want society to reflect those values or make those choices easier to make.
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Sure, money can't buy happiness. That's hardly a revelation. But the major lack of money (and the risks that come from it in our society) can cause sorrow and pain and even physical harm. After all, if that weren't true, why would income inequality be such an issue?
And yes, racing to win the meritocracy isn't a guaranty of a life well lived and loved. There are lots of successful people who were truly awful human beings, and almost anyone can come up with a good list of examples. I think that's also very widely recognized.
But striving to succeed and accomplish things is hardly a crippling "lie" foisted on the young. After all, the "it takes a village" ethos you describe still needs a village with plumbing, roads and grocery stores. It's not a lie to say that striving to achieve things can help the net quality of ease, and comfort, and joy.
Again, there are certainly unhappy people living in affluence, and there are happy people in simple surroundings. But its not a "lie" to say that accomplishments are valued, that comfort, pleasure and security do add to the quality of life, and that doing your utmost in a meritocracy can lift communities for everyone's betterment.
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It seems that here in the midwest, life is all about 'winning', in all its various forms. Did my child's team beat the other team? Did my son/daughter score the winning goal? No? Well, we'll fix that. Do I have the biggest, newest, latest, coolest 4-wheel drive truck/SUV? No? Time to head to the dealership and take out a 72-month loan for something that won't even fit in the garage. Do I have a bigger salary than my neighbors/coworkers? No? I'll work 60/hr weeks and show them! Did I take a better, more expensive, more exotic vacation than my friends did? No? Time for an African safari trip that I'll be paying for for the next two years.
The biggest section in our local paper isn't devoted to financials or headlines or culture, it's devoted to sports. Winning. The most fulfillment I've gotten from life has been from doing volunteer work for Habitat for Humanity, Big Brothers and Sisters, Street School, food banks etc. But yes, I am getting tired of all the 'winning'.
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@memyselfandi
Sorrry to get this input about your early life & education; those who raised and educated you stopped way too soon or skipped vital areas.
Midwestern families lead the nation in maintaining a real sense of community, as stories not so long ago in this paper revealed.
These farm and small-town families are often under serious financial strain but put on a happy face as they rush to help out the worker who is sudddenly ill or jobless and his family.
A vital part of growing up is realizing that how much nicer someone else's houses or vehicles are than yours makes no impact on you or your family.
BUT I am RELIEVED that you did indeed do volunteer work in a variety of ways! People cheat themselves by not doing what you did over & over again.
You don’ like this person’s opinion of the Midwest and your response is to blame the people who raised them? How about trying to be a positive member of THIS community.
David,
Good points. Except this:
"The reality is that values are created and passed down by strong, self-confident communities and institutions. People absorb their values by submitting to communities and institutions and taking part in the conversations that take place within them. It’s a group process."
This is where the curveball comes into the equation. If anything over the last few years, we've learned that "values" is a much-abused word.
And we've certainly learned that espousing values and actually adhering to them to two very separate things.
It's an ugly lesson. Long ignored, but a long time coming.
What's next is anyone's guess right now.
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Peace of mind from a life of balance, empathy, compassion, love, stewardship, and difficult but rewarding work that makes a difference is something we should all strive for. It does not take money but only ones time and courage.
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Bravo, David. Culture is fundamental, politics gives it voice and reflects the rot from its roots. To be sure, when a set of sustaining values (other than the ones that say Democracy permits us to say anything we want) are not holding us together and leading the way, we are subject to the sensational and divisive. I read something awhile ago that said the secret to life is to choose what kind of problems you have as we all got em'. Those who meet the external rewards of success have better problems than those who can't pay their rent. However, when communities are strong both groups can remind each other that the distance between the two is less great than finding and nourishing the ties that bind.
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The flawed American ethic of individualism and nuclear families works at cross-purposes to the deepest needs of each singular person. The values that built this nation are not the values to sustain the species. Americans have forgotten what our primitive ancestors knew; that the true purpose in life is completely predicated on belonging with other people.
Life is an individual journey; it’s the chains we choose that set us free. Depends on where you're standing, doesn't it? Life is one big developmental process. Your experience is relative to where you're standing in the cycle. This process mirrors biological considerations outside of culture.
For instance, you only have so many years to become a parent. However, as an adolescent, the human desire to develop an individual identity usually supersedes the impulse for parental stability. In other words, you generally go places before you choose chains. Otherwise, you're not really making a choice, are you?
This reality segues nicely into "You have to find your own truth." Morality is by definition prescribed. You're not choosing anything when you adhere to a moral code. You choose to live by tenets predefined by an institution, religious or otherwise. A moral person accepts these tenets as learned behavior and respects them as tradition.
An ethical person however will question the validity of each tenet within the context of their own time and place. Behavioral norms found wanting will be rejected and discarded. The ethical mind constantly evaluates their institutional morals and adapts as necessary. Institutions are rarely as flexible as the individual because institutions derive their power from conformity.
You should keep these considerations in mind before discussing the more arch-subject of human culture. Anthropology is a little more nuanced than Brooks presents.
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People in a capitalist society are conditioned to believe that acquiring ever more stuff will bring about happiness. It doesn't. The Declaration of Independence affirms our right to pursue happiness. We rarely catch up to it in any complete sense.
@Clark Landrum, But is that feeling new? There are a whole slew of 60s movies addressing that very feeling.
The following paraphrase disturbed me: "Without love, what I say, what I believe, and what I do has no value." This is from 1 Corinthians 13. In a spiritual economy, love is all. This chapter also defines what love is and what it isn't. Imagine a world that made love and service its one priority.
The following paraphrase disturbed me: "Without love, what I say, what I believe, and what I do has no value." This is from 1 Corinthians 13. In a spiritual economy, love is all. This chapter also defines what love is and what it isn't. Imagine a world that made love and service its one priority.
I suppose there is a problem inherent in trying to distill any degree of wisdom into a few paragraphs, but listing 'truths' that are primarily counterpoints to another set of what one assumes to be widely accepted, overly simplistic truths is more suitable for your book jacket than your newspaper column. But then, with a new book out, I guess that's your purpose here.
I appreciate your quest for meaning when the world you have been advocating through years of promoting individual effort and advancement over broader social values has come to fruition and is as ugly as we feared. But bromides don't cut it. Recognizing and analyzing the fundamental errors in your long-held political philosophy instead of just facilely shifting to 'inner truth' as the driver of our national emergency would be much more helpful in finding our way out of this mess.
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AMEN. Brooks is a hypocrite, and his woo-woo turn as moral philosopher rings hollow to my ears.
There is no "our culture." If those are lies, and they are being told, someone is telling them. Cite your sources. In fact, I challenge you to a contest. Start finding examples (other than Dr. Seuss) of actual people telling those "lies" in print or on screen. I will start finding examples of sputtering pundits invoking the hazy, pink, faraway notion of "community" as a remedy for things that scare or bother them -- mostly the idea of "lesser" people being free and making their own choices. If the ratio of our findings comes out any lower than 100:1 in my favor, I will buy your terrible book.
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Valid points. We humans are a mix of contradictions, some good to the point of self-sacrifice for the common good and implying the suppression of a basic survival instinct, and some bad, selfishness and greed disregarding the needs of others, and even the 'need' to trample on others for our material success. That our society, and ourselves, is in trouble, leaves no doubt, as we go into drugs and alcohol and workhalism to escape our unrelieved chronic stress and anxiety. A simpler life, usually considered a failure to achieve, the ever-present ambition to want more than our neighbors notwithstanding, is considered not good enough. Perhaps the old adage of 'To be or not to be' is true, if we could shake our souls from the shackles of being owned by 'things', and the addiction to fantasies so easily attainable via the Internet and our ever-handy i-Phone as proof of being connected. This is more evident in these disgraceful Trumpian times, where a liar and demagogue can so easily lead us to the slaughterhouse of individual despair...for lack of a social construct we should be part of. Our souls are at peril, but not lost if we change our ways by sharing our humanity.
Brooks has gone from conservative commentator to grand moral theorizer. He blames our “individualism” and “meritocracy.” But he totally fails to mention the effects of a society, which, by failing to support its citizens, makes winning and losing so consequential. Lacking adequate healthcare coverage and the income support and services available in many of our European counterparts, we send the message to young people, “win or perish.” Brook’s individualistic moralizing is as distasteful as his years of support for the political party that gave us our morally bankrupt president.
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@Ron, When has this Country done anything but give the least to those that need it?
.......and, the lie we keep to ourselves; the planet will be alright.
In the face of rising gun violence, drug overdoses, suicides, misogyny, racism, and fascism, is the absence of sufficient political concern globally which would signal an awareness that we are killing everything that lives on our planet - including ourselves.
Once I read on a poster in a cubicle in the office where I worked- "The man in the mirror" It is on the internet for anyone to read.
This is kind of my philosophy in life. I happen to be happy to say that"""" I am thrilled with myself."""" (sorry about the pun)
I do not know how those investment bankers in the crash have felt after their schemes put thousands of people I the street. They might rack several millions and wear Prada and Missoni---but I would imagine one day the man in the mirror will get back to them
I believe it said a clear mind is the best sleeping aid.
And also it counts to have the"" respect" of the people you admire/respect--which has also my case often.
And the love of little children and animals --which is also my case in many instances--dogs follow me in the street. And I have yrs ago befriended for a summer a flock of ducks in the river close to where I lived.
It is love for people who contribute to the working of a society-the garbagemen who pick up the garbage every week, the bus driver --whose boring job lets people get to their destinations and still has a smile on his/her face even when that involves getting up at 4 am. etc etc. And the knowledge that treating those "invisible" people with kindness can mean so much to them and lighten the burden of their drudgery
I also agree this country needs a cultural revolution.
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@a rational European
Really lovely post and so true !
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@Blanche White
Rational South Carolinian who loves Europe:
I spend more $$ these days on visiting family and making sure we have time and experiences together, instead of stuff. I know I am loved unconditionally by my brothers and sisters, husband and son (99.9% of the time) and KNOWING THAT fills my heart every day with appreciation and love. Makes being alive rewarding every day. We articulate our appreciation regularly too, to each other .
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As usual, I get to the spit-take in a Brooks column:
"It is found by defeating self-sufficiency for a state of mutual dependence. It is found in the giving and receiving of care."
But god forbid that the government (of, by, and for The People) should be in the business of giving and receiving care, or seeing to it that the citizenry are!
David, David, David (shakes head).
I agree that the lying is a window onto how corrupt the government - especially politicians - actually are. And Agent Orange has taken it to new "heights."
The entire Cold War, the Iraq,Afghan, Vietnam, and Korean Wars, the invasions of Grenada, the CIA interventions in Chile and Iran and many other foreign policy blunders were all based on propagandistic lies.
The entire fossil fuel and petrochemical industry lies to the public without shame. David, follow the money. Capitalists lie, too, and for such transparently obvious reasons.
We, the People let them get away with it by our foolish voting habits and lack of involvement in the political. I know so many people who "stay away from politics." And that's in a democratic, representative government. What do they think will happen to their wishes?
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Let's trade narcissism, self-reliance, individual rights, and solipsism for the recognition that without a functioning society the individual is destined for loneliness and failure. In other words, socialism would be a step in the right direction.
How about selling that realization to the GOP you've helped create, Mr. Brooks?
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I’d go even further and say that modern societies have failed abysmally in giving each citizen a deep understanding of our place in the universe. Living with the innate awareness that we are but short-lived specks in a space so vast our minds can barely begin to grasp its size, we might then pass our days in a state of profound humility and gratitude, with loving respect for each other and all creation.
3
I’d go even further and say that modern societies have failed abysmally in giving each citizen a deep understanding of our place in the universe. Living with the innate awareness that we are but short-lived specks in a space so vast our minds can barely begin to grasp its size, we might then pass our days in a state of profound humility and gratitude, with loving respect for each other and all creation.
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David Brooks is right when he says we live in a world of lies, and a cultural revolution is necessary. For centuries, our lives have been built on lies because we see these lies as not only good, but necessary. Under the guise that everybody has to believe in something, we promote beliefs in all sorts of things, not understanding that all beliefs, by their very nature, are injurious to the proper functioning of the human mind. And our minds are not originally sinful, but come programmed for our own healthy survival.
In the near future, we will program the human mind in the computer based on a "survival" algorithm, which will provide irrefutable proof as to how we trick the mind with our ridiculous beliefs about what is supposed to survive - producing minds programmed de facto for destruction. These minds see the survival of a particular belief as more important than the survival of us all. When we understand all this, we will begin the long trek back to reason and sanity.
See RevolutionOfReason.com
As usual Mr. Brooks you have given us a column that is required reading. Here’s a real issue from my youngest son’s college experience. He seems to have views and values that are center left. He attends a university that would be on everyone’s most liberal list. The dilemma is that he’s come to the conclusion that with many of his professors the papers he writes must express views that correspond with their’s. He frequently sells out his true feelings to give the teacher what they want so he can get a good grade. My older daughter experienced the same bias. I’m sure there are those who would say he just doesn’t get it or maybe thats what he will have to do on his job so get used to it.
My son is learning to sell out his values to get ahead. Is that the lesson of college?
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1 Timothy 6:10 : "For the love of money is a root of all kinds of evil." This is the crux of America's problem as individuals and as a nation. It always has been. Tell an American how you spend your time and they will inevitably ask or suggest how you can make money at it. Money is its culture like no other nation on earth. It's belly is full, its soul is empty except for its false patriotism and chronic hypocrisy. Americans have no history for lack of being honest about their history. That seems to be changing. America is waking up to its past without the rose-colored skew of World War II. Americans need to become the wholesome, loving people they see in their TV commercials. They know that. That's why some people tell me they cry during life insurance commercials. It's the life they were told they were leading but know they are not. It's sad for them. It's sad for a nation that doesn't know right from wrong, only us against them. It got us to the top, supreme innovator of power and profit. But, now, like a kitten in a tree, the stunted soul of the nation doesn't know how to get down without falling.
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All good, if we only can overcome the idols we made for ourselves.
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In his early 30s Aristotle married Pythias, niece and adopted daughter of Hermeias, and had a daughter, Pythias, with her. But she died about twelve years later, and Aristotle began a long relationship with the hetaira Herpyllis, a native from Stagira like himself. With her he had a daughter and a son, Nicomachus, who later would edit his father's work on ethics, the "Nicomachaean Ethics."
There is an exquisitely carved, small, French statuette of a bearded man, naked, on all fours. Astride his back rides a girlish, happy, naked woman. It is a statue of Aristotle and Herpyllis, and clearly it conveys the belief that Aristotle was not just the logical robot we fancy him to have been, but a fun loving and caring man who could enjoy sexual play as well as perfect syllogism.
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In other words, Greed is Not Good, There’s More to Life than Money and Acquisitions, Do the Work That You Enjoy, and Give Back to Family and Community.
2
No, I heard him on CBS yesterday, and he specifically decried commencement addresses urging young people to do what they love. It’s not about you. It’s about doing something for other people. . . It might not be something you love or enjoy.
"The truth is, success spares you from the shame you might experience if you feel yourself a failure, but career success alone does not provide positive peace or fulfillment."
The truth is, “career” success when it means a roof over one’s head, food on the table, warmth – that does bring peace and fulfillment.
“I can make myself happy. This is the lie of self-sufficiency. This is the lie that happiness is an individual accomplishment.”
But how one treats individuals in a community is directly related to individual choice to get along. One must choose to concede ego. No one else makes this decision; it’s solitary.
“In reality, the people who live best tie themselves down.”
In reality, people who claim to know who lives best usually have a rigid definition of what is best. Instead, tolerance for different lifestyles is essential. The wanderer, the artist, the hermit can live best too.
“The reality is that values are created and passed down by strong, self-confident communities and institutions.”
True. But what if those strong communities and institutions have a value to look out for their own, rig the system to get ahead at the expense of those not in the club. For progress, communities need to value other communities that have diverse group truths.
"The emotion of the meritocracy is conditional love — that if you perform well, people will love you."
And yet, the essay aspires to a sort of spiritual meritocracy in passive judgment of those who don't get it.
3
Well, it's nice to read about the conservative values shared by almost all the liberals, progressives, socialists I know. Social democracy plus a community of relationships would be nice for the USA, but instead we get the smugness of meritocracy and PBS shows telling the prosperous and self-absorbed niche of liberals that "everything happens for a reason," the same obnoxious preaching that says you get what you deserve, as if social and economic injustice is not endemic in society. Why can't these PBS purveyors of "wisdom" just say that good can be drawn out of evil?
And he was doing so well until the people “who live best tie themselves down” nonsense. If you don’t spend anytime getting out and seeing some of the beautiful world that is part of your birthright or meet a variety of people with a variety of world views, then it is fairly unlikely that you can be of much use to anyone. What makes David Brooks the expert? I am older and more experienced and traveled, have likely read more books and have certainly conversed with more people around the world.
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I don't really disagree with David when he gets all winsome and philosophical like this. But I do often feel like something is missing and, usually with David, that something missing is pretty obvious and straightforward. The biggest lie our society tells itself if that "greed is good" (and government is bad). This manifests itself in many of the things that David calls out. But he misses the exploitation that the few have built into the system for themselves (under the Republicans). This is what is poisoning our society and threatening the human race.
2
Another installment (lesson, sermon) in Philosophy Lite. Less filling. Taste is kinda bland.
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Truth in these lies, for sure. But, the one shoe fits all is a big lie. Some of these lies are truths for some people. Maybe one of these lies is a truth for most people. The notion that the set is a universal truth is the height of arrogance.
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The way to succeed is to back off from support of President Trump and write about something else. Anything else.
2
Is there a Pulitzer for elegant obfuscation?
Forty years ago our country stood atop the world, wealthy and powerful beyond belief. If ever there was a clear path forward for a happy juggernaut, it was there.
Turned out to be a criminally exclusive juggernaut. Rather than call the cops, David calls for group therapy. He sees a “spiritual and emotional crisis,” instead of the clear and present failure of his political beliefs.
The foundational lie for a couple of generations was at the heart of Reagan’s first inaugural speech: “In this present crisis, government is not the solution to our problem, government is the problem.”
Almost 40 years later, at his inaugural, Trump flogged the same garbage dressed up in populist garb: “Today... we are transferring power from Washington, D.C., and giving it back to you, the people.”
Over the span of years from Reagan to Trump, I’ve spent as much time as possible at the racetrack. And I’ve seen the same sad story play out countless times. A guy has a bad day, losing race after race, growing more and more bitter along the way. None of the losses are his fault because the whole deal is crooked. By the time the nightcap rolls around, he sees clearly the forces arrayed against him — the deep state, the media, the liberals...
Nevertheless, he doubles down, emptying his pockets, going all in. The inexorable date with the wrong horse is set.
It’s never pretty to watch...
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How can this tiny, constricted mind try to deal with weighty subjects. Five lies? Why not four? Or six? And it is very interesting that by his arbitrary definitions Brooks breezily negates the "lies" that most women feel are truly fundamental to happiness --because without them (that is, the truths, not the lies) the only path to fulfillment for women is... men. That's just a coincidence, i'm sure. Brooks needs to stick to his own business, whatever it is.
3
I can't read David Brooks anymore. The professorial lecture about life from a successful middle-aged white man about the fact that the motivating life values of middle aged white men ring hollow; rings hollow.
Brook's reminds me of the failed actor who succeeds as a theater critic. He analyzes how things should be in the language of the bystander because he's a failure or a coward as a participant. So his success is vicarious; the voyeur who is rewarded for transmitting to us his observational assessment about the life around him but not truly living that life.
Of course Brooks has a real life and must both suffer the defeats and enjoy the victories that come to him, but I always get the feeling that like most Americans in his socioeconomic class, he never really gets his hands dirty--that takes place in other venues walled off from the likes of us by the police, the military, the legal infrastructure, the politicians, the back-slapping in-crowd, and the media--all in the pay of the 1%.
1
Mr. Brooks may be bored with the success of his latest best-seller, but I think most young Americans are hard pressed just to survive, working long hours at boring, unpleasant jobs for lousy pay. They spend the few hours they are permitted away from being ordered around by the boss, frantically playing video games killing space aliens or getting so drunk or stoned that they don't have to face the realty of their situation. . . . On the other hand, if the Workplace Democracy Act--which would make Union organizing possible in America once again--were to pass--they might have a Union, decent wages and, equally important, regain their self respect as workers.
1
This is a first.......I completely disagree with Mr. Brooks.
His list of five lies, are merely symptoms of our present day confusion over which direction we should take America in the 21stCentury.
Is it time for the USA to "give up"?...just become like every other nation/culture/tribe on the planet? Accept fate? Admit that America is wrong?
There are no more frontiers? No new thoughts, ideas, inventions?
The five lies are meaningless mind games played by people believe they have nothing else to do.
This is an inherited problem that manifested itself during the student revolution of the 1960s......50 years ago. In that day and age, we killed our interests in science, engineering, building...and began to obsess over our inner selves and how to reshape society to meet that utopian ideal of 'who we really are'. We heap shame on ourselves for do whats best for each in his/her own way.....without regard to politics or some poorly thought out notion of "community".....
WE are taught to apologize for our success and prosperity....gained by doing everything deemed by 95% of the world as the "wrong way".
the one and only nation that charted a course to relatively well distributed wealth and opportunity for everyone.....is now convincing itself that it is guilty of almost unspeakable horror.
Four immutable American Traits, Mr. Brooks....look into it:
1. Rugged Individualism
2. Judeo-Christian Work Ethic
3. Pioneer Spirit
4. Yankee Pragmatism
One of the biggest lies of our culture is that the truth is simple, that it can be captured in, say, a list of five lies.
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The key to happiness is lowering your expectations. It's all in your mind.
Yes, indeed Mr Brooks...you are so right and so smart. I also like your carefully unbiased view. Especially the way you're able to boldly claim that all of your Five Lies are to be blamed on Trump.
Of course, #1) Career success is fulfilling. 2) I can make myself happy. 3) Life is an individual journey. 4) You have to find your own truth. 5) Rich and successful people are worth more than poorer and less successful people...NONE of these existed during presidencies before Trump!
So please ADD THE SIXTH LIE - Trump in the Devil Incarnate and is responsible for all your problems, emotional, physical and material.
Thanks for another one of your articles of such high integrity...Oops, I just created another LIE!
The US has a sub-population that is actively partitioning itself off, echo-chambering. For David Brooks to write about our culture and not address this fracturing is blindness, basically willful blindness because he's a Republican and its the Republican Party that has mutated into doing this. This fracturing is all the worse because it is well-funded, aggressive and righteous; it wraps itself in the flag, in Christianity (albeit right-wing Christianity) and Judaism (albeit right-wing old testament Judaism).
2
All 5 of David Brooks' points - when boiled down to their essence are core REPUBLICAN principles:
•Career success -
Greed is good right?
•I can make myself happy -
you better because you're on your own in Republican America.
•Life is an individual journey -
Isn't that the core of Ayn Rand's message?
• You have to find your own truth -
Maybe the viscous dismantling of the social safety net erodes faith in all institutions? Yet you lament people distrusting them?
•Rich people are worth more -
Look where Republican policies place dollars and energy. "The true measure of any society can be found in how it treats its most vulnerable members." - Gandhi
Your GOP war on America has been highly successful Mr. Brooks. I fail to understand all the hand wringing. As a Republican mouthpiece, one would think you'd be dancing a jig.
3
Maximilien Robespierre, the architect of the French Revolution's Reign of Terror effectively utilized scapegoating to secure power, encouraged the execution, mostly by guillotine, of more than 17,000 enemies of the Revolution. Robespierre was also beheaded after he attempted to place fault, blame and pressure (more scapegoating) on the members of the National Convention. The goal of the French Revolution was to change the system, and get food back into citizens' mouths by getting rid of the monarchy and found a system powered by the people, their slogan was “Liberty! Equality!” This ideological war has been waged since the 17th century and continues today. Trump’s avoidance of the free press is an attempt to minimize the media’s access to verifiable activities illustrated by the demise of the White House Presidential Press Conference. Unlike philosopher Yuval Noah Harari, many of us haven’t put in the work of reading these writings, shutting out new ideas easily accessible to us. We often ignore new ideas despite knowing a thing does not therefore cease to be true because it is not accepted by many. Yuval Noah Harari describes this phenomena in his book "21 Lessons For The 21st Century", “When a thousand people believe some made-up story for one month, that’s fake news. When a billion people believe it for a thousand years, that’s a religion, and we are admonished not to call it “fake news” in order not to hurt the feelings of the faithful (or incur their wrath).”
2
In the usa, there is a myth (lie) about conservatism. The myth tells you that a True Conservative can look back at the past glory of the Nation and find the True Meaning of Patriotism. Usually, this myth of conservatism relies on a religious myth (lie) as well, since the Gods and Goddesses themselves have proclaimed this Manifest Destiny for the Beacon of the Free World.
But this is the myth. It's a lie, Mr. Brooks.
Thank Odin that our kids today don't reason as poorly as Aristotle. His physics, biology, politics, and psychology of real humans, Homo sapiens, was a disaster. Humans are not and have never been a species of Rational Animals. At least, no more rational than chimpanzees, bonobos, or columnists.
Thankfully, These Darn (mustn't curse) Young People are willing to question the Noble Truths that American Conservatives proffer. Otherwise, women would still be chattel, slavery would be a Great American institution, and duelling would solve problems. Just telling them to get off your lawn is not working.
The lie of American Conservatives is the cartoon they draw of the past. And the present. It is a lie about how humans behave. It is a lie about "moral" authority. It is a lie about the basic facts of science. It is a lie about history and Great Men. Oh, and sometimes women, but rarely. It is a lie about race, religion, and righteousness. Mostly self-righteousness.
I enjoy your Crotchety Old Man columns about the Good Old Days.
I just realize that they're lies.
1
These are great points to debate. I tend to agree with all of your takes, but would love to have an open discussion and hear other sides from the people I love and others in the community. The most important word you used was “relationships”. Unless you have real ones, you have nothing.
1
I don't disagree with most of what Mr. Brooks says, but the blind acceptance of what community tells you does not lead to growth or fulfillment. You may be 'happy' for awhile as you blithely ignore injustices in your society, but eventually your ignorance catches up to you.
You can ignore climate change as everyone around you tells you it is a lie, but the Oceans will rise and disasters come to you. Plenty of faithful Catholics may have known about sexual abuse by priests, but ignored it for the sake of peace within the community. Happiness is not momentary peace, but active involvement in community and sometimes that means standing up for justice even if that pits you against others and that takes teaching intellectual honesty and the ability to see injustice even at the cost of momentary peace.
2
Happiness in life happens when you come home and your dog runs to you with his or her tail wagging and is genuinely happy to see you. Increase happiness in the world by showing others how happy you are to see them. Wag your tail if you have to.
1
Truth spoken clearly! Reminded of the CS Lewis's essay "the inner ring"- I look forward to reading the book Mr. Brooks.
1
Brooks recently gave a speech about the need to have a cultural/political movement based on the concept of "love thy neighbor". I think he's written about it in his NY Times columns of late, too.
https://niskanencenter.org/blog/david-brooks-the-animating-idea-that-can-drive-moderation-is-love/?fbclid=IwAR3GV14Fz9jLjv_-ipHBNa8YcbXfVWauBQ1bLmw1V-VqlHfav4GUMgn2RL4
That concept animates in this NY Times opinion piece. In our hyper-partisan world, at first blush, this might seem like a pie in the sky/naive idea. I typically have read Brooks and other cultural/political commentary through a partisan/political lens but that's not where Brooks is writing from. Once you grasp that and have a better understanding of what Brooks is really getting at, it makes his columns come alive. You realize Brooks isn't writing for today's hyper-partisan world and those who engage in it, but rather, for what comes next, and more to the point, to help create what comes next.
He's inviting us to step off the partisan merry-go-round and help the country and world get out of this downward spiral and moving on to creating the needed solutions, policies, communities, etc.
I don't know about others, but I'm definitely to say goodbye to all that hyperpartisanship and move on to building bridges, 21st-century community, lifting people up.
1) If you only try harder, you will succeed
2) Your worth is measured in dollars
3) Market has a solution to everything
4) System is unbiased and just
5) Conservatives will help you...
I read this column, and then I read every one of the comments ( 271) at this moment.
I think David is on to something. Not perfect but approaching it.
Think of some fabulously successful people (financially) Hearst, Howard Hughes, Steve Jobs, etc. And you come up with some really abusive and messed up lives. No way would I emulate or salute the way they lived.
Or take someone like Fred Rogers, or Jimmy Carter, successful in nearly the same way, but just genuinely nice and caring people. I think Fred Rogers is more to the point----look for the helpers
2
“Career success alone does not provide positive peace or fulfillment.” I disagree. Career success on my own terms gave me a feeling of purpose and accomplishment. The key here is “on my terms, no one else’s.”
“I can make myself happy.” Yes you can. Happiness comes from a sense of profound purpose in life.
“In adulthood, each person goes on a personal trip and racks up a bunch of experiences, and whoever has the most experiences wins.” Yes, this is garbage. Memories, not experiences are the key.
This writer is spiritually negative.
1
What is your mission/purpose in your short time on this planet? Each person has to find that to be happy.
I have a good paying corporate job, but my mission is to teach and inform people, so I'm a prolific Wikipedia editor on current events (you've likely all read my work or seen my graphics), teach an economics club monthly, teach martial arts, and maintain an issues-based Facebook page where I share articles only from the most credible sources.
I even comment on NYT articles from time to time!
Find that issue you are passionate about, become at least an armchair expert, and educate your network.
1
Employment and income instability prevents most from putting down roots. It's not your grandmother's 50's anymore.
"We’ve created a culture based on lies."
Here are some truths, by way of antidote:
1. White-collar crime dwarfs ALL other crime, and the overwhelming majority of crime is committed by whites, out of all proportion to their percentage in the populations. A standard textbook, The Rich Get Richer, the Poor Get Prison, 10th ed., soundly estimates 100,000 deaths in the U.S. alone, each year, and a cost of $300 billion. (By contrast all reported robberies and burglaries cost $5 billion, each.)
2. Women in the West, on average, fare better, often far better than men, in nearly every category of well-being.
3. Slavery is still Constitutionally-approved, legal, and practiced in the U.S., in accord with our 13th Amendment.
4. The Democratic party is very solidly right-wing. You can only have your wars of aggression, your imperialism, and ownership of all politics by the corporate state, with or without a side of abortion. Both major parties are merely racketeering enterprises, their essential business selling specially-crafted legislation to the rich and destroy actual populist movements.
5. The tax rate on the rich, under Presidents of both major parties and during the decades most would like to return to, was over 90% for almost 30 years. (Say, let's run government like a business, and charge the rich what the market will bear for their use of our commonly-held $37 trillion national and international infrastructure, without which no one gets rich, and no one stays rich.)
"It's those restless hearts that never mend.." - The Eagles
"It’s easy to say you live for relationships, but it’s very hard to do. It’s hard to see other people in all their complexity. It’s hard to communicate from your depths, not your shallows. It’s hard to stop performing! No one teaches us these skills." Oh David you give yourself away so easily. I always speak from my depths and not my shallows. When referring to one's own experience remember not to project your own fears and short comings onto "everybody" as if they are universal. I have a list of 500 mistakes that everybody makes, don't get me started.
While Mr. Brooks makes a good argument, his teleology is somewhat flawed. I would suggest he go a bit deeper into the material and look into an old BBC series called "Century of the Self" which explains why American advertisers switched to a sales model in the '30s that focused on creating a nation of vain and selfish individualists -
- courtesy of Edward Bernays, the father of modern public relations. (and nephew to Sigmund Freud.
Bernays wrote "Propaganda" back in 1928 - it's a free download. See you at he next class.
No, those five things are not lies. They are privileged musings that most people, as recognized in the comments, are too busy, tired or poor to think about. The vast majority of Americans don't ponder their journey, their truth, their career success, their self-sufficiency, and the superiority of rich people as they write another bestseller that leaves them unsatisfied.
No, the lies that soil our culture are really lies. It's the small lie the insurance salesman tells. It's the car dealer who "sells" you a financing "deal" for your benefit when it's for his benefit. It's the drug companies pitching products all night on television, with the mandated "truth" about their claims in tiny print that rushes by before anyone can read a syllable. It's the extended warrantees that suckers buy because they don't know the "house" always wins. It's the oil and gas lobby pitching their love for the environment in 30 second ads that make the rape of the planet sound live love making. It's those and a million other things that are not only condoned within our culture, they are celebrated and lavishly rewarded. It is predatory credit cards peddled by slick guys who know full well they will ruin lives. It's the "introductory" rate that turns rapacious because the average person can't keep track. It's the annual renewal of something you signed up for intending it to be once.
We have become a country of sellers and suckers. And the myth of meritocracy celebrates the sellers.
2
Mr. Brooks the champion of capitalism does not like meritocracy?
Not a bad analysis but Max Weber reached a similar set of conclusions in his "The Protestant Ethic and the Spirit of Capitalism", published in 1905.
I had a simple epiphany in college. I was coming down from Seattle to Salinas and driving along the East Bay with the city lights of San Francisco to the right. Thousands and thousands of lights! And I thought of how many of them represented people I knew nothing about. People I didn't know, had never meet. People who had languages and jobs and families and hopes and knowledge of things I knew nothing about. How was I –– one young person –– to even try to understand what IT was all about, what THEY were all about? Who was I to think I knew what was best for them?
Of course, I had read a lot of Walt Whitman –– I was an English Lit major –– and it later dawned on me what Whitman was telling us about America, the American Dream, and the need for diversity, experiment, difference, and respect for the "other." Lincoln also alluded to this in his Gettysburg Address and the importance of its survival.
I get so sick of people who think that "Democracy" is only a mechanism whereby they can take power and negate diversity and cram every life into one form or a few "acceptable" forms. I would recommend to Mr. Brooks to drive by Oakland at night and look over at the lights of The City.
And this epiphany happened before I went to live in Europe for eleven years, before I went to South Asia and traveled to about 40 other countries. D-I-V-E-R-S-I-T-Y !!! Look for it! Cherish it! Learn to spell it!
Being successful at a career is fulfilling and is way better than not being successful, but it mustn't be the only thing you hitch your horse to. I had a chance to retire early and I got a lot of criticism for friends and co-workers, the number 1 comment " well, what will you do?" My answer was anything else and if I couldn't find other interesting ways to fill my day I must be pretty boring. Twenty years later it was the best thing I ever did. But I still can't imagine giving young people better advice than to go out and work hard at the chosen career when they are young and have the energy to be as successful as they can.
2
Yes, David, your five big lies are a problem in our society today. And which political party, which strain of American point of view, has spread these five lies with force and will? YOUR very own conservative Republican every-man-for-himself ideology, the damaged GOP ideal that wealth is the only measure of success, of character, of intellect of a man, or of a country's values. YOUR core beliefs are the root of these lies. YOUR conservative "values" distilled these very lies down to give us the Trump ascendency - the triumph of the love of wealth over the love of life, of intellect, of decency, of rationality. YOU gave us this dysfunctional society, this horrific administration, this conservative reign of terror. YOU owe us an apology. Get to work on that book; it will take some real work.
1
The lies of individualism are the lies of the Capitalist ideology. We need Regenerative Economics!
"Rich and successful people are worth more than poorer and less successful people. "
For someone who grew up in the peace, love and understanding era of the sixties and seventies this is the one that stands out the most for me.
We have culture of people being famous for being famous. And other people look up to these people for some reason. Super rich and famous celebrities on the covers magazines covers that have never done much of anything other than be rich and famous and live a life of luxury and leisure.
Back in the day most famous people had to have some sort of accomplishment to be famous. They were good actors or musicians or inventors or adventurers or even scientists or something. Now half the the people on the covers of magazines in the check lines are reality TV stars or are part of these families that everybody has heard about but has no idea what they do other than be rich and famous. A lot of young people today when asked what they want to be when they grow up say they want to be famous. That's it. No reason for that fame is given. Just famous.
You see this word "hater" all over the Internet. "Oh you are a hater because you are jealous." Because so and so is rich or famous and you are not or some thing to that effect. There are also a lot of rich people who are questionably "successful" Successful at what?
Thank you for this column. It deeply moved me because at my age, I'm questioning what I have accomplished. I don't have a flashy job, don't make that much money and sometimes I don't feel like I measure up. But I have noticed that I feel more secure in myself and who I am. I treasure my life with my husband whom I have been with for over thrity years. My joy in my job comes from when I can help someone and not when I get accolades from other people. I like to be in my own world and don't want to spend my time with people who are pretending and showing off. I thought something was wrong with me but maybe I am just content. And it's OK.
David, what you say is true about extroverts, those who draw their psychic/emotional energy from others. How does it apply to introverts like me, who find their energy within? Being with others in any kind of social setting is often draining for those like me -- we need time alone and solitude to re-charge. How would you address this?
Aristotle said happiness is found in striving to live the virtuous life. Gandhi said happiness is found in service to others. It is unfortunate that American culture has defined happiness as a commodity. It is not a symptom of illness in an otherwise sound society, it is a central feature and organizing principle of our culture - we perceive everything as a commodity (even time is money).
1
I am not religious and by saying that I still live by YNWA and do the right thing when no one is looking. These two mantras has guided me since I was a teenager and served me well.
29
In this time of presidential lies, dark money, a partisan judiciary, gerrymandering, a social system that favors the 1% and mounting evidence that our religious leaders have often had clay feet, I yearn for a secular spiritual leader. Thank you Mr. Brooks for filling that vacuum for me.
5
Thank you, David, for a very helpful article. I have sent it to both my children who are in their 30's and who all too frequently struggle with dimensions of these issues that bombard them daily. More than a little helpful to me also! It has been bookmarked and will be opened and sent to others frequently.
2
Humans are social animals, that’s what evolution tells us.
Humans are formed by their cultures, that’s what biology, sociology and psychology tell us.
The pervasive ideology of individualism has roots in an operational delusion that we are singular organisms.
It maybe has been the most destructive ideology ever invented by human culture.
It gave us overpaid CEOs, billionaires, job creators and President Trump.
These people have achieved hardly anything by themselves, but behave as they are super humans.
We will only have a future as a species if we accept ourselves as social being thriving in a web of various communities.
3
David has been writing some interesting columns lately. Is he becoming a Hippy in his old age, after all these years? Who would have thought? The truth is that none of us live an independent life. We all require the connection to the whole for our existence, all the way down to the basics of oxygen, water, and food. We all want to feel that we are in control of our destinies, but the truth is much more complicated. Luckily, Happiness does not depend on having control!
2
We will always have people with vice and others with virtue. I’m for good governance and less labeling. We are all liars living subjective existences. Some of us are aware of the in vogue labels and the language/s used to rationalize our actions, others are ignorant to reality or in denial. Some things don’t seize to be true because they’re not accepted by many. Some of us only love what we know and only put effort in knowing what we love. This is a safe bet and may provide a blissful yet false sense of security. No judgment, for it’s only through self discovery that I’ve been able to tap into the discomfort of consciousness in the present moment offers. I’m facing my shadows instead of running from them. At times, a difficult task that painfully reveals my flaws. Self awareness had led to my freedom. Freedom is what you do with what’s been done to you. Peace and love to all.
6
Using the word "lies" leaves no room for the gray areas in which the truth usually located. This black-and-white approach is actually one of the roots of cultural problems.
That said, the conservative Brooks points out some of the ills of society that seem to contradict modern conservative thinking. Wouldn't the logical conclusion of this column be a call for socialism?
5
Tired of the lies and living like a caveman? Learn the C.E.N.T.S. process which stands for control, entry, need, time and scalable. Begin with an honest visualization exercise. See yourself in a cave, in which prisoners are kept. These people have been in this cave all their lives. All eat the same food and share the same eating habits. The cave’s exit is not impossible to reach but since it entails making changes to learned routine, most prisoners stay inside the cave. If a prisoner managed to exit the cave, at first he or she would be disoriented because being exposed to new things may seem intimidating and scary. But as the fear goes away, the person is no longer a prisoner and is able to make better choices. How easy is it to Enter and make these changes is up the individual. After learning this, as a former cave dweller, you’ll see how bad the choices of your former colleagues in the cave really are.
You may not feel a Need to return to the cave and feel conflicted. If you returned to the cave and rejoined them, you would take no pleasure in their accolades or praise. If you’re an altruist and want to help the perceived unenlightened, will you have enough Time to truly make a difference? For their own part, the people may see you as deranged, not really knowing what reality is and would say you think you’re better than the rest of them. Lastly, is your process Scalable? Information is an almost perfect example of a pure public good. Offer solutions not complaints!
1
Mr. Brooks, I enjoyed reading your article.
“Value are created and passed down by strong, self-confident communities and institutions. People absorb their values by submitting to communities and institutions and taking part in the conversations that take place within them. It’s a group process.“
This is correct and part of the pervasive proliferation of Breakdown in morals and ethics.
What do you do when institutions betray their stakeholders?
They lie, cover up, and lack integrity.
How do you raise children with strong values where schools leadership destroy justice by silencing kids to cover up abusive behaviors?
A long story, but, when my daughter was 14 she encountered a sexual harassment in an elite private school where many girls were affected and afraid to speak up. She spoke up. School leadership tried to silence her. She was more traumatized by school officials deplorable tactics than the incident itself.
“mom, you tell me to speak up when I see things wrong. Look, what happen...they are attacking me for telling the truth.”
This is how institution leaders infuse perverted values to our society.
Therefore, I believe, leaders who cover up, lie, and bully their stakeholders should be fired, fined, and denied “golden parachutes.”
Let’s stop rewarding corrupt leaders.
10
Thanks for writing transformative articles, love reading them. This one reminded me of the mystic writings (Hidden Words) I read and mediate on:
"ALAS! ALAS! O LOVERS OF WORDLY DESIRE! Even as the swiftness of lighting ye have passed by the Beloved One, and have set your hearts on satanic fancies. Ye bow the knee before your vain imagining, and call it truth. Ye turn your eyes towards the thorn, and name it a flower. Not a pure breath have ye breathed, nor hath the breeze of detachment been wafted from meadows of your hearts. Ye have cast to the winds the loving counsels of the Beloved and have effaced them utterly from the tablet of your hearts, and even as the beasts of the field, ye move and have your being within the pastures of desire and passion."
1
All of these lies are, of course, the "values" that conservatives in America have championed since at least the 1980s. I guess they all sounded good to conservatives for quite a while. Appears like they still do to many. In fact, this list appears to basically define modern American conservatives. Those of us who questioned this course over much of this time period were dismissed as unrealistic, unmotivated, subversive, drop-outs, malcontents, nonconformists and the like. I suppose it is nice to see some conservatives finally coming around. It would be encouraging sign , I guess, to witness this change of heart among at least a few conservatives, if only the consequences of these "conservative values" weren't so dire and the hour so late.
7
This is an excellent column, Mr. Brooks, and you've almost reached the right conclusion. We do, in a sense, have a culture of lies in the US and beyond. But the true problem overarching all of our various -isms, epidemics and crises like an umbrella, is this:
We have a culture of infinite entitlement.
Sometime in the last 35 or so years (it started with Reagan), we've basically adopted the universal attitude that anyone and everyone should be entitled to whatever they want, no matter the cost or inconvenience, whenever they want it. Obesity, opioids, illegal immigration, rape culture, callout culture, anti-vaxxers, the Great Recession - all of these things stem from a culture of entitlement. Everyone wants all the good stuff without any work and without any consequence or accountability. And while this problem afflicts all generations, we've created an entire generation of what would, in any historical sense, be considered children - the Millennials - who have been raised to think that everything should just flow to them without any personal sacrifice. Everyone should have free college, a cool job, beautiful apartment, expensive food, enviable possessions and Instagrammable vacations.
The upshot to this has been the rise Bernie Sanders-style Middle School Socialism: Everything is Not Only Free, The People You Hate the Most Are Forced to Pay For It. We live in a world of pathetic overgrown teenagers.
3
“We’ve created a culture based on lies.”
So you noticed that, did you Mr. Brooks? Thank Fox News and other conservative media outlets. They’ve been pushing lies since Reagan gutted the Fairness Doctrine in 1987.
“What cool thing can I do next?”
Nothing wrong with this. I always find the next cool thing to do; then I invite friends and family to join me. My friends and children have had many adventures that are wonderful memories, because I suggested it to them and got them to come along with me. It is a good system.
6
Another lie I would add is the lie of destruction. Why is it we never see the great plastic island in the Pacific or birds dropping from heat, or handfuls of dead honeybees killed by fertilizer?
We view the world as a playground against which we sell products, preen and pose while fish swim in medicine we flush down the toilet.
At what point will we look at what we do and demand change of ourselves?
9
@Michelle Teas
I think we are beginning that process now but it's very hard to get off the ship in the middle of the ocean.
You do understand that every one of these lies is perpetrated by capitalism? That we are conditioned to believe these lies because they support the system that demands continual and increasing worker productivity? And then you feed us the further lie that each one of us, individually, is responsible for lying to ourselves. We don't just need a political or cultural revolution. We need an economic one.
7
Soul to be saved? David Brooks's commentaries are some of my favorites and his views are important lessons. But his references to Christian-centric views have a way of lessening the impact of his words. In an increasingly secular Western society, the moral message still holds, but spirituality can come from nature, music, and photos of black holes. It does not require God, heaven, or saved souls.
4
Cultural revival? I doubt we will. People, or a significant portion there of, can see beyond their material success. To me people are fatally flawed. I doubt very much the world will beat global warming. We will shutter borders as third world countries infrastructure fail, and wars and mass migration takes place. Nationalism will raise its ugly head even more. People work to preserve their power and position. As we fail them so the world will fail us. We rise or fall together, we are one people. I wish we could see that. I for one will fight for it. But ...
3
One big lie America tells itself?
Open a history book. Any history book. What is the primary lesson of history? What, taking any field of study, from military history to art and literature do we see when we view from the perspective of the history of the subject? The answer is simple: In any day and age the vast majority of people, and for all their goodness, community, truth, values, self-sacrifice,--all the values other than individuality, selfishness, etc.--are in actuality quite short-sighted, self-flattering, regularly against the appearance of the best people, those most promising of the future, their age has to offer.
Take any genius historically. No doubt the communities in which they appeared had all the positive values on their side and the genius virtually none, yet any decent history book demonstrates the community actually has little value unless pointed in the direction of producing exceptional human beings, those capable of pointing beyond the age. Now with this obvious lesson in mind, what do we see today in America?
America, like all previous ages, has a primitive, non-genius producing concept of community, which is to say geniuses today, as always, are accidentally produced by society and community in society, per history, is largely a self-flattering, short-sighted affair no matter the big stink about values, and we can be sure when someone gets on a high horse about community and values it means being anti-genius.
I respect genius producing community.
Dave is back on solid ground here. YAY! Importance of culture echoes Yo Yo Ma , PBS Newshour April 15.
1
I'd add a few, starting with our culture's violence, racism, and misogeny - cultural lies about the culture rather about the individual. More difficult to face - to proclaim it would be un-American.
1
In your first book you seriously misread our culture. The problems were always there, and you should have seen them. So now you see them and wrote a book. I'm happy for you but I'm not impressed in the least.
4
Oh David! it breaks my heart that is had taken you this long to get here. Now that you are here I hope you understand that politics IS culture. The cultural revolution you seek IS a political revolution. The latter will flow from the former. Until very recently you have been on the wrong side of history stumbling around in the dark trying to reconcile what you know to be right with what you learned from William F. Buckley. My reaction to your idea of a "second mountain" is that its the first mountain and most of us have lived there all our lives. Where do you live that you have only stumbled on it now?
3
The political revolution IS a cultural revolution, in the age of Trump. Trump embodies each of the five lies in our culture. Removing him from office should prompt a discussion of what his life was about — the five lies.
2
Who are we now? Let’s envision a different reality. Let’s assume that DJT is an aberration; and that he wandered into the Oval Office because the smell of crystal meth cooking out in Kansas caused the Koch Brothers to blink. Let’s also assume that the U.S. Congress is not filled the worthless, unemployable hacks bought & paid for by corporate interests. Let’s further assume the hacks in Congress understand that the Federalist Society was founded in 1982 not 1776. And just fun, let’s assume that politics is about governance. And finally, let’s assume the USA has only temporarily hidden its light under a basket. You see my point?
It’s not the message of meritocracy or the privatization of meaning that has brought us to this moment, it’s the awful struggle of metamorphosis.
5
"The emotion of the meritocracy is conditional love — that if you perform well, people will love you." Nothing to do with "performing well", but much to do with being responsible, trustworthy and showing personal and moral integrity. Hard to love someone who has no self respect and is unreliable, lazy, lying, cheating and/or shirking their personal and family obligations.
1
Beware the person who tells you how to live. By convincing you, they can believe it themselves. The world is rarely black and white. Rather, it is shades of grey and those who preach morality (e.g. David Brookes), rarely live up to their expectations for others.
1
In your first book you seriously misread our culture. The problems were always there, and you should have seen them. So now you see them and wrote a book. I'm happy for you but I'm not impressed in the least.
For all of the assertions that Mr. Brooks makes in this column, the under-girding assumption is that our society lies to itself in order to deny the basic human impulse to feel empathy toward others. In 2006, Obama pointed to this "empathy deficit" during his presidential campaign. It still resonates loudly today.
We may need to tell ourselves these lies because of the overarching focus on our individual wants, needs and desires. What is obviated in this culturally narcissistic character trait is the critically important value of being able to put ourselves in the place of "the other."
It is also obvious that the lies we tell ourselves has led to the divisiveness that became the linchpin for the election of the narcissist who currently occupies the White House, & the sycophants in Congress who blindly support his lies and distortions on a daily basis. As a result, it has become acceptable to put children in cages, support repetitive hate-mongering speeches & daily insulting of "others," & to activities that at a different time would be considered unforgivable and likely illegal as well.
Until we as a nation can turn the page on this alarming trend, we must find it in our hearts to base policy on the understanding and a common belief in our founding principles "to form a more perfect Union, establish Justice, insure domestic Tranquility, provide for the common defence, promote the general Welfare, and secure the Blessings of Liberty to ourselves and our Posterity."
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I thought for a moment that Mr. Brooks would include the cultural lie that we are a just and fair nation. We cling to our sense of national goodness despite the genocide and slavery and civil war and Jim Crow and racism and rate of imprisonment, drug overdoses and soaring suicide rates, and the elite 1% that rigs the game. Despite Trump's showing us our ugly side and bringing it to life, we persist in self-delusions of grandeur. How can we become better by believing we already are the best.
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Looking back over my 87 years I have come to believe that the catalysts for a successful, contented life comes from picking the right parents and the right spouse. Leave the lies to the other fellows.
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Rarely do I agree with Mr. Brooks, but today I found a great deal in which I could find common ground.
America, as well as the rest of the world has been built on lies. Whether it’s “all men are created equal” or cable tv won’t have commercials or the promise of the paperless office. So, when trump, came along with his bag of goodies he was welcomed as promises made, promises kept, although name one. My income went down and my taxes went up. How did that happened?
Lying has become an ingrained habit. Just turn on the TV and become hypnotized. Do you actually believe those macho truck commercials where they conquer (pre-determined) obstacles. As my automobile salesman said, “ The only off the road driving any of my customers do, is their driveway. But if they had to, they think they can conquer Everest.” We are up to our necks in lies.
Then there is AG Barr.
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Right. So four years ago, David Brooks wrote a book. Then he thought all was fine in America. Now he has changed his mind and produced another book. I can think of a few lies we are indoctrinated with (magical thinking, American superiority, cultural prejudices, us vs them) but here is a truth. Journalists write stuff. Often to sell stuff. And four years is not a long time.
The five lies are the American Dream, the individual success story. The Dream was historical reality for many yeoman farmers, craftsmen, plantation owners, and merchants in 1776; farmers who got land on the Great Plains through the Homestead Act; the wave of immigrants from Eastern and Southern Europe; and factory workers in post-war America. Now 3/4ths of us live paycheck to paycheck, many in gig economy jobs, and the American Dream was never even a promise for most African-Americans and women. Trump has mesmerized his base with a racist, authoritarian, self-destructive caricature of white Christian values, the American Nightmare, as he accelerates the neoliberal capitalist destruction of the middle class.
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Here's a visual to ponder: An exultant Tiger Woods, frozen on the 18th green against a colorful sea of equally exultant spectators who will always remember the day and the moment, and the emotion and the commentary--and a banner scrolling across that screen, in small but emphatic font:
"The message of the meritocracy is that you are what you accomplish. The false promise of the meritocracy is that you can earn dignity by attaching yourself to prestigious brands. The emotion of the meritocracy is conditional love — that if you perform well, people will love you.
The sociology of the meritocracy is that society is organized around a set of inner rings with the high achievers inside and everyone else further out. The anthropology of the meritocracy is that you are not a soul to be saved but a set of skills to be maximized. "
Can one peddle cultural revolution at Augusta National? If you can make it here, you can . . . .
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The sociology of the meritocracy is that society is organized around a set of inner rings with the high achievers inside and everyone else further out. The anthropology of the meritocracy is that you are not a soul to be saved but a set of skills to be maximized.
I am often a dismissive critic of Mr. Brooks but there is little to take issue with here...except that Mr. Brooks drank the so-called conservative line for so long. Not the cultural part, the Thatcherite transactional part.
couldn't all these ails be collectively called "the culture of capitalism"?
(no, I'm not a socialist).
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Here are a few more, and they are more basic:
What makes me feel good is what is true.
A great leader is someone who tells me what I want to hear.
Lying is acceptable in a good cause. There are lots of good causes.
A liar is an acceptable leader if he gets me what I want.
Notice a common thread?
Politicians and clerics who lie systematically have always been a scourge. But never before have they been a threat to human existence, as in the case of climate change denial. Truth today is at a premium. It is the price of survival.
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All so sadly true . However , some of the five ills listed suggest we as individuals can work to cure ourselves . What we can't do is change the outside forces that are generated by people and society as a group nor can we easily inhibit the effects of Capitalism , or Racism , or Sexism , or Politics .
His opening truth that " the President's repulsive behavior is tolerated or even celebrated by tens of millions of Americans " , and I would add the Media acts and has acted in a manner to promote acceptance of the harms and perils of Trump even before he was elected is perhaps the one that troubles me the most .
The acceptance of Trumps lying , his degradation of women in past video clips , his refusal to disavow racists , his willingness to slander entire races and religions and the refusal of the the opposition party at least to recognize his danger , be alarmed and devote themselves to getting rid of him and what he stands for is for me just as troubling as knowing so many White Americans are sexist and racist .
The hope that a Black President imagined for equality and inclusion has been burned as quickly as that fire in Paris yesterday .
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David Brooks nails it. With 40 years in medicine, especially the last 6 in geriatrics and terminal care, I agree entirely.
How strange. The five lies (and pernicious lies they are) are the bedrock of the Calvinist/ classist/ Republican system that infect this country - and that he with his GOP confreres have advocated throughout his career. Could this be a late-life conversion? Or a run for cover? The world wonders.
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So so earnest. Brooks never tires of sharing his humanist message. I can't really disagree with what he says when he taps this particular vein, yet I always end up finding the words reductive and the manner preachy.
Oh dear. Another white male with a net-worth in the millions teaching us how to live in relationship. Instead of reading Brooks' latest book you might want to walk into any nursing home and speak to the women who work there for $12/hour caring for your elders. Take a single mother out for coffee and listen to her speak of her childhood. There are millions of women all over the world who were taught to put others before self and live in community before they were taught to read. They will not have had a spouse to care for their children while they went off to pursue their grand career. They will not have a prestigious education or home in an affluent, leafy neighbourhood. They will, however, teach you all you'll ever need to know about our culture. And love.
This could be a series! "Five Lies Our Democracy Tells." "Five Lies Capitalism Tells." Et al.
Just this morning, I had to fire someone - a homeless drug addict who can't get out of his own way. I bent the attendance rules for him, I gave him information about shelters in the area, I gave him on-the-job training, I never gave him a hard time about his hygiene and personal appearance, and I looked the other way when he was a no call, no show for a week after an arrest.
The point is: that the story he'll tell himself is that I'm the bad guy. That he's a tortured hero, alone in the world, and the system is stacked against him.
I'd suggest that this story is a product of both political parties' flawed narratives.
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Some nights I sit in my 270-year old house on the coast of Maine and think about the people who lived here before me.
In the 1740s they built this house by hand. It was cold. At night it was dark. If someone was not successful at fishing, cultivating, hunting, or sharing food they did not eat. Life was hard. The concept of happiness and fulfillment in life was nonexistent. Survival was the goal. Happiness came, if at all, in the “afterlife.”
Survival, for Americans, is not so challenging anymore. So we strive for career success, family, community, mindfulness, adventure, material wealth. I almost doubt that there is a path to the connection and fulfillment and healthy community that Mr. Brooks points to.
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For once, and it is a new and rare sensation, I find myself nodding enthusiatically and in approval with an op-ed by David Brooks. To the point, succinct and devastatingly accurate in its diagnostic. More of those Mr Brooks!
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David saved the best lie for last.
In my 7+ years as a hospice nurse, I had patients who lived in million dollar houses and patients living in conditions I wouldn't inflict on my dog. I attended a lot of funerals.
The rites for the rich and locally famous usually drew large crowds, though to call them "mourners" might require stretching the meaning of "grief" a tad or two. Dress for the occasion, see and be seen, these were as much the order of the day as paying respects were.
Poor folks drew mourners in numbers that took a back seat to no wealthy person's funeral attendance. The poor actually did mourn. You heard and felt it, palpably. And they celebrated. Boy, howdy, did they shake the rafters. Death was not the worst thing that could happen when you have nothing.
Did you ever wonder if really rich people share true friendship with anyone, even one of their wealth peers? I have. I've never wondered that about poor folks, judging from their final send-offs. I think I know the answer to the question.
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@Glen
I agree totally.
I actually feel sorry sometimes for those with tremendous wealth.
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@Glen
I get your point but you may be missing something.
I think it is possible that you have been too distracted by the trappings of the rich and famous to notice the few, perhaps the same few in number as the poor, that mourn for them.
I number myself amongst the humbler of God’s creations, but do not begrudge the feelings of my fellow men and women, regardless of their social station.
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@Tito Perdue
In absolute numbers, yes; but the concentration of wealth is at historic highs in the hands of the few. America was truly at its wealthiest when it shared the wealth across a broad spectrum of its population, it is at its poorest when only a relatively few share in the wealth, like the 19th century, or today.
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My father was one of seven from a large Italian family. He and is siblings were first generation Americans. I remember him telling me about the many Sunday’s when the family would gather for a huge meal after church. A long table would span two rooms of the house and there might be twenty or more there for the meal. This was a near-weekly event. It sounded wonderful - a pity that nobody does this any more.
This is an excellent column. I may buy the book. But in the end, I think the lies all implode into one inescapable truth. We have steadily lost a deeply rooted sense of family. Without family, all of the career, status, & money chasing is merely a hollow & empty pursuit.
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@Once From Rome We've also lost the sense of community, that slightly large social unit into which families are interwoven. To be resilient, we need to relearn the skills essential to DOING community: peaceful conflict negotiation, tolerance of our neighbors, mutual support, and sharing of resources. Say what you will about the Amish, they got this stuff DOWN.
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@Zelda The Amish adopt what most would say is a rather rigid set of beliefs without much tolerance. They do apparently make the decision to adopt these beliefs a conscious decision made during adolescence. To their everlasting credit they don't seek to impose it on others.
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@Once From Rome
Those images of large happy families around a long table are, alas, for many only a dream. Unfortunately, many parents, often for their own ambitious reasons, push their children to succeed according to the meritocracy model, never valuing who they really are; the children, in turn, with some resentment follow through with work that they were never cut out to do in order to please their parents. How can nourishing relationships and community be built around such lack of authenticity?
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Once I had the opportunity to be in a small class of students in a medical-related field. The moment of enlightenment came with the results of the final examination. One person did not pass. Some test takers went out with the instructor to celebrate, while some others decided not to do so because not everyone passed. That latter seems like a healthy social community.
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Maybe. But even if every word of this is true Mr. Brooks still doesn't address the reality that the days of stable jobs and a secure retirement, not to mention affordable housing, education and health care, are gone -- perhaps forever. And until those things are addressed, all the commitment to community in the world isn't going to relieve the anxiety felt by millions of Americans who have correctly perceived that the emerging economy is creating wealth for the very few at the expense of the many.
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@Emily P It's the same uncertainty one feels when one is at the bottom end of a pyramid scheme.
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@Emily P
Yes, I couldn't agree more. My sister is a case in point - she has the values that Mr. Brooks extols - to a fault. She has an incredible work ethic, is self effacing, truly cares more about relationships than any material things. . . Is not judgmental but does embrace Christianity. But her husband is disabled & to support the family she often works 7 days a week. Her health is failing - her doctors think probably some type of auto-immune disease & clearly because of the stress in her life. She's poorly paid, has no retirement savings and just lives from day to day. Yet she never complains and is always cheery. Mr. Brooks would love her.
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@Emily P, exactly right. Building relationships and community takes a commitment of time and energy — time and energy people struggling to eke out a living in the gig economy simply don’t have.
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My life (I'm 77) so far tells me that there are truthful and important insights about our culture in these words of yours, and I thank you for them. Trying to synthesize and summarize a guiding rule for life, I rely more and more on this: If you smile watching your monitor go flat, you won. And, you will smile if you love now.
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John, your post brought thoughts and a smile to me. Thank you! The thoughts persist, thank goodness; the smile will return - ah, there it is! - on an irregular but appreciated basis.
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The biggest lie our culture tells is that we enjoy free will; we don't. Each of us is the product of our DNA and the countless causes poured into our lives by those around us, especially our parents. We can't make choices other than the ones we make. Scientific research into the brain tends to confirm this. This does not mean that we cannot/should not be held accountable for the choices we make: our challenge is to build a world in which people are able to make good choices. Of course our society is predicated on the idea that we possess free will: I could have stayed in school; I could have left my abuser; I could have stopped drinking --no, you couldn't. But don't confuse the absence of free will with a fate that's set in stone; new causes are made every moment of every day.
Ditching the belief in free will gives us a whole new way of looking at others, with more understanding, more compassion, and give us a new way of understanding our own lives. Giving up the belief in free will is hard and our culture won't do it anytime soon, but think about it; explore the idea; read Sam Harris and others who have explored the idea of a society that understands that free will does not exist.
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@Ray C I have lived outside the US for the past 20 years and worked with the urban poor in an oligarchical country and my observations confirm every word you say. Despite a burning desire to get out of generational poverty and a willingness to work hard to accomplish goals, so many other factors out of their control insure another generation in poverty. Some do make it out but very few and it takes more than one generation.
I was spiritually bankrupt until I got sick enough to join a 12 step program and actually work 12 steps. It showed me that unless I experience a complete mental change there is very little hope of my recovery. I learned that selfishness is my problem, and that no external thing-- no activity, no chemical, not money, fame or admiration -- can fill an internal lack. But I wasn't willing to change until I admitted complete defeat and surrendered.
My dog is my spiritual mentor. He gives unconditional love. He has a short memory for insults, holds no resentments. He doesn't judge. He doesn't fear the future, doesn't regret the past. Give him a sunny spot on a carpet and he has all he needs, all he wants. A lesson to learn there-- but can I learn it?
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@rich. Brilliant! Thank you. Best comment of em all.
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@rich"My dog is my spiritual mentor." If more people saw that simple example, the world would indeed be a better place.
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@Mr. Little Yes! A pet of any ilk is the balm for what ails you.
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How about the myth that capitalism equals freedom. We are seeing so much stress and insecurity because people are being gouged, exploited, fooled, spied on, and flat out lied to so that people with means can make even more money. It's not freedom for a lot of people.
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At its core, our nation is based on the myth of self-centered individualism. We can pretend it isn’t so and put on the trappings of working for the collective good but the engine that drives us is our ego-centric drive for superiority. Unfortunately, the only way we can sustain the myth is to rig the system to favor the chosen few.
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........create new organizations?
Mr. Brooks; can you give us 5 organizations that you have hope can instill values that work differently in our culture, that are already in existence, and are not in such bad shape that they can be revived?
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@David Roy----------------------Here are a few, David.
1)Medicins sans Frontiers
2) Asoka
3) Social Work
4) Teaching kindergarten to 12 in public schools
5) ASPCA
Whoa, only half of every root belief I absorbed. What about the journey being the success satisfaction because it is discovery? What about self-reliance being what you contribute to others that enter your life and theirs vice versa? An individual journey because life throws some curves and no one else can act on them. Your own truth is not a set of vague moral feelings, it is the impetus to process facts, experiences and then act on growth and knowledge. About those rich and successful people> Not who I was taught to admire and certainly not the Murdock, Trump, etc. clans. Money was only admired when returned to the community's larger well being not passed on to shallow, grifter children and trophy wives..
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David, is culture in America is based on Judeo Christian values? Evangelicals never tire of quoting from the scriptures. When society goes array, they blame it on those who do not follow the scriptures. That people are too individualistic, too selfish in their quest for success. Please blame Ancient Greece. In Prof Nisbett's book The Geography of thought: how Asians and Westerners think differently and why, "Nisbett demonstrates that "people actually think about—and even see—the world differently because of differing ecologies, social structures, philosophies, and educational systems that date back to ancient Greece and China".
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@petey tonei, there is more, from Prof Nisbett's book.
"The book proposes that the passion for strong ontology and scientific rationality based on forward chaining from axioms is essentially a "Western" phenomenon. Ancient Greece's passion for abstract categories into which the entire world can be taxonomically arranged, he claims, is prototypically Western, as is the notion of causality.
“In the Chinese intellectual tradition there is no necessary incompatibility between the belief that A is the case and the belief that not-A is the case. On the contrary, in the spirit of the Tao or yin-yang principle, A can actually imply that not-A is also the case, or at any rate soon will be the case...Events do not occur in isolation from other events, but are always embedded in a meaningful whole in which the elements are constantly changing and rearranging themselves. [In the Chinese approach to reasoning], to think about an object or event in isolation and apply abstract rules to it is to invite extreme and mistaken conclusions. It is the Middle Way that is the goal of reasoning."
Ugh, You see this clearly in our politics today in America, either you are with Trump or you are against Trump, either you are pro Israel or you are against. Either you are born a democrat or you are born a republican. There is no room for changing rearranging views perceptions.
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What is it that holds a society together?
To a major degree, it is goodwill, the belief that the person walking passed you on the street or sitting too close to you in a cramped airliner does not mean you harm and might even, in a moment of need, spring to your assistance without being asked.
We a losing the goodwill that makes a nation something more than a random collection of people out for themselves and concerned only with how fast they can get it. One of the advanced warning signs is coming from the way in which people "date" and find someone to marry or love for an extended period.
"Ghosting", just disappearing from someone's life, has become a common means of breaking off a relationship. I have a female friend who, having thought she'd found the love of her life, received a break-up text message and a refusal for any further discussion. Now, there is "cloaking" coming along, a process by which a budding relationship is cut short by totally blocking all email and social media for the spurred party.
We have allowed our souls, our most intimate selves, to be taken over by greed. In the process, we lose our humanity and decency. Yes, there are many contra indicators of community service and volunteerism, but greed and the need for getting material goods is rotting out the core of our beings. Once abandoned, humanity is hard to get back.
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"The reality is that values are created and passed down by strong, self-confident communities and institutions. People absorb their values by submitting to communities and institutions and taking part in the conversations that take place within them. It’s a group process."
Sadly we know which communities and institutions you have submitted yourself to and what values you have absorbed from them.
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There is truth to much of what David Brooks says; however, there is also relevant truth to much of what he leaves out.
The main problem of our society is that democracy, equality of opportunity, and fairness are honored mainly in the breach for a large and growing portion of our population. A large percentage of our politicians are snake oil salespersons who cater to the lobbyists and the mean-spirited and exploit the ignorant and the frightened.
The worst influence upon our young people is the bad example set by our politicians and the partisan, blatant bigotry of the Fox network, and the cowardly disrespect for individual liberty that has permeated our society since 9/11.
David focuses on an erroneous view, across the population, as to what the good life is. That problem does not arise at the grassroots level. It is a defect that flows from the political and commercial leadership levels, and with little effective counteraction from the religious and educational leadership levels.
As Notre Dame Cathedral burned today, it struck me that it was symbolic of how how society is deteriorating. We had better take rapid strides to put out that social conflagration.
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The cultural roots of our political problems can partly be traced to people like David Brooks who for decades sold the Republican- Conservative fallacies that he now never alludes to. Instead he now peddles morality and fairness, things he never cared less about when he was selling supply side economics for Reagan and the Bushes in their wars on the less fortunate.
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@Gary Shaffer You are absolutely right, as are Dario and Chip Leon, both below. The root cause of the lies is the political revolution--specifically the Reagan Revolution--that Brooks himself supported for decades. We all have our blindspots, to be sure, but for Brooks not to acknowledge this here, not even in passing, beggars belief. And that's why we need, precisely, a political revolution. For the health and well-being of our kids and the planet itself.
@Gary Shaffer-------------------What is the point of punishing people for their past? David Brooks has pretty much seen the light. Why not celebrate him?
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@Gary Shaffer Amen . . . pls write a book about all of these fallacies, or at least an essay.
Part of the problem I believe is that before you can find your own truth you have to actually be looking for it. I don't think most Americans give it a thought. They are slaves to pop culture, having the right car, the right clothes, the right phone for God's sake! Too many live their life as a series of acquisitions without any thought of what life might be about, and where the meaning comes from, and then they can't understand why it feels so empty. But whoa, that's much too deep for too many of us, it just spoils all the mindless fun. Can't have too much fun.
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"You shall know the truth and the truth will set you free." Ancient words but maybe worth reconsidering during Holy Week. Come to think of it, I struggle to recall another life which lived this truth: Loving your neighbor as yourself brings more rewards here on earth than any individual trophy.
Mark, Wisconsin
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I came to this realization while observing/reading Christopher Hitchens during the last two decades of his career. While I have no doubt Hitchens was an intelligent, thoughtful, and at base caring person, his place in the media firmament required him to be on a perpetual treadmill of having to produce yet another provocative article/book/position. At times these things were very necessary topics/conversations, but other times they seemed to drift toward the realm of highbrow filler. Parlour game would be too harsh, but certainly a sort of intellectual entertainment. Indeed Hitchens hinted at as much with his impish “in fine bookstores everywhere.”
Much like Mr Hitchens, Mr Brooks is an intelligent, thoughtful and clearly caring person. And although his delivery does not have the roisterous character of Mr Hitchens’, it does have a notable charm. But this morning I found myself switching to skim-mode somewheres in point 3. That our society is going through “some sort of spiritual and emotional crisis” I agree, but these five points seem scattershot, something to chew over at best. Hope the upcoming book is more concise and insightful. I’ll be sure to look for it, in fine bookstores everywhere.
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Sounds a lot like Jordan Peterson. Thanks for the article.
I agree with Brooks' analysis of the "lies" that are, for example, destroying our kids' mental health and well-being, and thus also their futures. But one of the major (if not exclusive) origins of those lies is to be found in, yes, political revolution, i.e., precisely what Brooks disavows at the conclusion of his essay. In fact, it was the Reagan revolution of the 1980s that led, in time, to the brutal monetization of almost every aspect of human endeavor, and thus to the raft of lies upon which our kids are supposed to build credible futures. Chip Leon below is absolutely right.
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This sounds like the philosophy of the Democratic Party or even (gasp!) socialism. That people working together is better than everyone going his own way.
And since democratic government is the most successful example we have of cooperation among people in all of human history, well it boggles the mind.
My favorite lie is "You will be wildly successful if you work hard."
Not to diminish the value of effort, but it helps to be good at what you do, have connections and a bit of luck.
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@SXM Also still helps to be white and male. Yes, I know that a lot of white males have been hit hard by globalization, industry consolidation, and technology. I wish that reality would help more of them understand that sometimes there are systemic forces that hold back hardworking individuals, and create empathy and a feeling of solidarity with others similarly harmed. I feel their pain; wish more of them could feel the pain of others similarly harmed.
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An important comment on contemporaneous culture.
It brings to mind my mantra of:
I am not the Universe -
but the Universe is me.
Perhaps if one realizes that the World does not revolve around us to serve our personal ambitions but that we are all an essential part of the whole one may find some comfort in our own skin and happiness?
A message to the young is you are less important than you fear but more important than you may realize.
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The purpose of life is to live.It is the gift we receive from birth.
What you do with your life is up to you. If you listen to the "culture" ( example Mr. Brooks) you can find lots of reasons to think that collective political and community action will provide meaning and direction to your life. All I can say to that is "I hope it works for you."
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If the leadership of a country is supposed to lead by example, the current occupant of the white house seems to be diametrically opposed to all five points made in the article.
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Mr. Brooks, your thoughts on the need for a more spiritual and communitarian life are well taken, but I do wish you would let up on the "Down with the Meritocracy!" silliness.
At this point the USA can only aspire towards meritocracy. We are at best an oligarchy, and since 2016 technically an authoritarian kakistocracy.
A glance at your own newspapers' headlines -- Trumps in power, the GOP tax cut, wealthy dummies cheating their way into top universities -- tells us immediately that we are NOT ruled -- politically, socially or economically -- by the Best and the Brightest. Wealth accretes. Greed and unearned privilege still dominate.
The Weltschmerz of the Central Park West crowd notwithstanding, the vast majority of people still lack even the chance to learn the lesson that economic security is not the noblest goal in life.
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@Evangelos
Well said - I too think his laying blame at the feet of meritocracy is a headline grabbing, divisive argument and distraction from the real causes of our current societal divide, which looks more generational. Perhaps if he spent his talents addressing the issues that his party is exacerbating (stacking the deck, eroding the regulatory agencies that oversee the health and safety of all citizens, urging his party to be the third and equal branch of government), he would be a better citizen. Instead he uses this specious argument to sell his book. Part of the problem, or part of the solution?
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If you want to fix this Mr Brooks, then try these terms on for size: universal health care, free education, investment by the state in the public good. Until the US begins to take care of these things, all your theorizing is empty talk and it will remain a land where the majority struggle to get by. And this too: higher tax rates for the rich. It's time to put your money where your mouth is, if you really want change.
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The cultural revolution mr Brooks is hopefully writing about,is in essence a religious revolution.From Evangelism to Catholicism.
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Another lie: The United States is a place of the people, for the people and by the people. It is actually of the corporations, for the corporations and by the corporations.
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@Tom But Tom, didn't the Supreme Court tell us that corporations are people? And now that Trump has stacked the court I think we're trapped.
My friend I always enjoy reading your pieces because your heart is always visible - this one though I feel misses the essential issue - god - if you believe in God as I do it is patently obvious that you are here to be happy - sharing and caring are automatically part of it - love joy and silliness are the watchwords
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I suspect that if we had the cultural/societal revolution, the political one wouldn’t be necessary.
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I just read a book called THE YEAR OF LIVING DANISHLY by Helen Russell, a Brit who moved to Denmark from London when her husband got a job with Lego. She asks Danes why they are so happy. (Denmark had been rated the Happiest Nation for a few years.) Turns out, they value most of the things David lists in this article. They do not value competition in the work place and it is not highly thought of to out-do your colleagues. Spending time with family is of utmost importance. What a concept!!!
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@Shirley Reynolds. Depends on the family.
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Multiculturalism makes it difficult to agree on shared values. Globalization requires American workers to compete with the whole world. And global warming will make everything David Brooks writes about irrelevant. This is why young people have it so hard.
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This column reminds me of an old Bill Cosby bit, where he talks about how his mother's personality changed as she got older because she became "an old person who's trying to get into heaven." David Brooks seems to have had a similar epiphany. He has spent most of his career supporting a party and ideology that promoted the lie "rich and successful people are worth more than poorer and less successful people." I'm glad that he's come to this realization. Unfortunately, it might be too late to repair the damage from that philosophy.
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It sounds as if Brooks wants us all to join labor unions or to get active in our local DSA chapters. That would solve two problems in one go...cultural individualism and economic inequality!
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Well thought-out, Mr. Brooks. I take issue with only one line, in the closing sentence: The revolution we need is not cultural, but spiritual. The American spirit is ill and is making the culture ill. When we heal in spirit, we will heal the rest.
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Not to dredge up Aristotle...but he spoke of the middle of things, the Golden Mean. While David's essay is a healthy correction to our obsession with individual success -- perhaps a balance of individual freedom and social responsibility would be a good fit.
The person and the community. The citizen and the country. One's belief and the common good. A challenging struggle to live a life that is both individually satisfying and culturally meaningful. I hope we're not too far gone to see if it's possible.
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