Everything Is F*cked(27)

The problem with evidence and ideologies is that humans have a tendency to take a little bit of evidence and run with it, generalizing a couple of simple ideas to entire populations and the planet.28 This is our human narcissism at work—our need to invent our self-importance, our Feeling Brain run amok. So, even though ideologies are subject to evidence and verification, we’re not exactly good at verifying them.29 Humanity is so vast and complex that our brains have trouble taking it all in. There are too many variables. So, our Thinking Brains inevitably take short-cuts to maintain some otherwise shitty beliefs. Bad ideologies such as racism or sexism persist due to ignorance far more than malice. And people hold on to those bad ideologies because, sadly, they offer their adherents some degree of hope.

Ideological religions are difficult to start, but they are far more common than spiritual religions. All you have to do is find some reasonable-sounding explanation for why everything is fucked and then extrapolate that across wide populations in a way that gives people some hope, and voilà! You have yourself an ideological religion. If you’ve been alive for more than twenty years, surely you’ve seen this happen a few times by now. In my lifetime alone there have been movements in favor of LGBTQ rights, stem cell research, and decriminalizing drug use. In fact, a lot of what everyone is losing their shit about today is the fact that traditionalist, nationalist, and populist ideologies are winning political power across much of the world, and these ideologies are seeking to dismantle much of the work accomplished by the neoliberal, globalist, feminist, and environmentalist ideologies of the late twentieth century.


Interpersonal Religions

Every Sunday, millions of people come together to stare at an empty green field. The field has white lines painted on it. These millions of people have all agreed to believe (on faith) that these lines mean something important. Then, dozens of strong men (or women) plod onto the field, line up in seemingly arbitrary formations, and throw (or kick) around a piece of leather. Depending on where this piece of leather goes and when, one group of people cheers, and the other group of people gets really upset.

Sports are a form of religion. They are arbitrary value systems designed to give people hope. Hit the ball here, and you’re a hero! Kick the ball there, and you’re a loser! Sports deify some individuals and demonize others. Ted Williams is the best baseball hitter ever, and therefore, according to some, an American hero, an icon, a role model. Other athletes are demonized for coming up short, for wasting their talent, for betraying their followers.30

Yet, there is an even grander example of interpersonal religion than sports: politics. Across the world, we come together under a similar set of values and decide to bestow authority, leadership, and virtue onto a small number of people. Like the lines on a football field, political systems are entirely made up, the positions of power exist due only to the faith of the population. And whether it’s a democracy or a dictatorship, the result is the same: a small group of leaders is idolized and exalted (or demonized) in the social consciousness.31

Interpersonal religions give us hope that another human being will bring us salvation and happiness, that one individual (or group of individuals) is superior to all others. Interpersonal religions are sometimes combined with supernatural beliefs and ideological beliefs, resulting in pariahs, martyrs, heroes, and saints. Many of our interpersonal religions develop around our leaders. A charismatic president or celebrity who seems to understand everything we go through can approach the level of a God Value in our eyes, and much of what we deem right or wrong is filtered through what is good or bad for our Dear Leader.

Fandom, in general, is a low-level kind of religion. Fans of Will Smith or Katy Perry or Elon Musk follow everything that person does, hang on every word he or she says, and come to see him or her as blessed or righteous in some way. The worship of that figure gives the fan hope of a better future, even if it’s in the form of something as simple as future films, songs, or inventions.

But the most important interpersonal religions are our familial and romantic relationships. The beliefs and emotions involved in these relationships are evolutionary in nature, but they are faith-based all the same.32 Each family is its own mini-church, a group of people who, on faith, believe that being part of the group will give their lives meaning, hope, and salvation. Romantic love, of course, can be a quasi-spiritual experience.33 We seem to lose ourselves in someone we have fallen for, spinning all sorts of narratives about the cosmic significance of the relationship.

For better or worse, modern civilization has largely alienated us from these small, interpersonal religions and tribes and replaced them with large nationalist and internationalist ideological reli gions.34 This is good news for you and me, fellow religion-builder, as we don’t have as many intimate bonds to cut through to get our followers emotionally attached to us.

Because, as we’ll see, religion is all about emotional attachment. And the best way to build those attachments is to get people to stop thinking critically.





HOW TO START YOUR OWN RELIGION


Step Three: Preemptively Invalidate All Criticism or Outside Questioning


Now that your fledgling religion has its core tenets of faith, you need to find a way to protect that faith from the inevitable criticism that will be flung its way. The trick is to adopt a belief that creates a self-reinforcing us-versus-them dichotomy—that is, create a perception of “us” versus “them” in such a way that anyone who criticizes or questions “us” immediately becomes a “them.”