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On Seeing the Matrix

archetypes, necessary fiction, rebel, stories, truth —

9 Apr 2009

I am currently visiting the University of Chicago in the hopes that I might join the ranks of its students next year and correct my gross ignorance of the world by actually learning a thing or two. Part of this invariably involves making nice with other prospective students and current faculty, shaking a few hands, pretending to be generally erudite, and otherwise giving the impression that I don't actually need to come here and correct my gross ignorance, but that it would merely be nice to come here and add to my already vast stores of knowledge.

In order to pull off this ridiculous farce, I found myself visiting the local coffeeshop to refill my system with charm juice. Upon walking in the door I found myself unexpectedly taken aback by how very studied the bohemian, rebel air of the whole place was. Each student had a very consciously tousled, punky look, with their clothes just so, their look of bored indifference...well...boring in its exact likeness to the look of bored indifference on each other "unique" and "alternative" face. The furniture was expensively decrepit. The coffee stains on the carpet just like all the coffee stains on all the carpets of all the underground coffee shops I have ever been in. Terrible memories of my pretentious youth came flooding back, and which point I practically threw my change at the disapproving barista and beat a very hasty retreat.

As I walked out with my cup of coffee in hand, I suddenly realized (why is it that all my stories about sudden realizations start with the phrase, "cup of coffee in hand?") how farcical the whole thing was. By definition, the whole idea of the "rebel" is that one is unlike others. Unique. Indifferent to their outsider status. The archetype is defined by the rebel's very inability to be defined based on normal social types. And yet, in absolute contradiction to that definition, here were many rebels all defined very precisely by one another and also by their perceived opposition to the normal (whatever that is), obviously caring very much to fit this existing story and role. The rebel was codified.

The rebel is not a rebel, I realized. Certainly I have heard this before, but I admit I have never really been struck by it quite as forcefully as I was this afternoon. The rebel is a story we have concocted. A fantasy. Those who look at rebels and sneer that they ain't nothin' but a bunch of self-important little bitches and they aren't all that rebellious have hit the truth of the matter, and it pained me to realize that I was just a boring old fart that could now count myself among their ranks.

And yet...And yet. The rebel, as the story goes, provides a corrective to society by acting in opposition to its most taken for granted values. And I suppose I wouldn't disagree with this entirely—by defining itself as the direct opposite of whatever the current norm happens to be, the rebel does, in fact, keep society from veering too far in one direction. An old maxim of group dynamics is that the more isolated a group is, the more extreme it becomes. By putting itself on the opposite side of normalcy, then, the rebel forces the norm to stay exactly where it is, rather than slowly veering off to its most extreme form.

But the only way the rebel could accomplish this is by actually believing they are rebellious. The moment a rebel suspects they are just the pathetic imitator the normal sees them for, they lose the ability to become rebellious. In other words, the rebel is correct to say that they are rebellious, but only as long as they tell themselves they are. And, likewise, those who say the rebel is nothing of the sort are also completely correct. It is not the act of being rebellious, nor the trappings of rebellion, nor even the theory of rebellion that makes this so. It is the story told of rebellion. As long as the story remains believed, rebellion happens. But as soon as the story is seen for what it is—a story—rebellion becomes impossible.

The rebel is not a truth, it is an idea. And ideas, unlike truth, work only so long as the mind lends credence to them.

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