Cut off in the literal age. Owen Barfield & Carl Jung on alienation and political disillusionment

There is a link between rising levels of mental-ill health and political disillusionment. Feeling cut off is not just an economic and psychological problem, but is a symptom of a wider alienation arising from modern consciousness.
Owen Barfield argued that contemporary political problems are fundamentally due to estrangement not only from others but from ourselves, due to a loss of soul and spirit to materialism and literalism.
As Carl Jung put it, the gods have become diseases - diseases of the collective as well as individual psyche. The pre-political must address this crisis of anthropology if politics is to be restored.
This is the sixth thought in which I’ve turned to a guide to illuminate the overwhelming feeling of malaise in this democratic year.
Look at others on my KZbin channel: Plato on beauty, Aristotle on ethics, Jesus on being in the world but not of it, Dante and civilisational decline, and William Blake on the rise of abstraction.

[@Owen_Barfield]

Thanks Mark for this excellent contribution, yours is a necessary voice.

[@jamesblack8173]

This has really helped me make sense of where we're at what we need. Thank you.

[@Borsfrancis]

Julian Assange has just gained freedom! Surely this is a cause for celebrating the spirit within all of us (positively manifesting in activists) striving for the good the true and the beautiful.

[@HowardARoark]

Assange has done nothing for freedom.

[@cameddy4081]

Great to see the wonderful Owen Barfield being celebrated !! One of the inklings !! 🙏👏👏👏👏🙏🌏✌️

[@jacquelineraner14]

100% agree with the assessment of what the problem is in that mental illness is a symptom but I would say that we do need to rethink how we relate to each other on q political and personal level. I remember noticing this when I was still a child to most people. The solution though will require us to identify the cause of the problem otherwise we are only treating and hiding the symptoms. I spent the better part of the last 20 years looking for the cause. I think I have found it and I am not the only person who sees it. The human condition as it were is self-inflicted and is caused by us living in a way that is not in our nature. We are not naturally competitive or selfish and we don't organize into stratified classes and heiarchy. We spent 300,000 years as egalitarian societies and archeological evidence shows that all members of a group shared equally. Nobody got more to eat than others and we could not hoard food or items. If someone was not able to get along in a group they wouldn't be allowed to remain. This is why we crave social approval, it was a matter of life or death if we were not able to get along. When you realize how dangerous it is for women to birth and how much time and effort it takes to raise a kid without modern medicine while you were basically nomadic and had to find or catch food there is no possibility that we could have survived for very long if we were not all involved in the survival of the group as a whole. That being said when we began agriculture we started to build cities and the first cities lasted longer than any modern civilizations by thousands of years and without any evidence of class stratification or anyone being given more influence than anyone else, every dwelling was the same, Nobody had special decorations or authority. There were still people who were unable to get along in the city and they would not be wanted around by others in the city but the Problem is they were able to form their own group and they were then able to force their will on the rest. This was a problem that was solved by the same kind of people if not planned by the very ones thar claimed they would protect us. They became kings and wars were fought and religion was created as a method to control and to justify some having more than they needed to maintain power and pass it down. To justify letting people starve and fight for scraps whole a few has more than the could eat in their lifetime. At first there were both men and women that could be the ruler and women were not given a lesser status until around 2000 years ago. Basically cleopatras death was the beginning of women being forced to give up their roles in society. So the way to fix the problem is to change the way we organize ourselves and we need to try to be more egalitarian and stop trying to control eachother. Ethics not morals. Look at nature for examples. The most successful species is ants. In fact the ones that appear the most advanced are in fact the bees. They have way more advanced politics than we have. Yes they are democratic and we have figured out their language. They speak in math and the only ones not voting are queens and drones. They don't decide until it is 100% either. Imagine human politics requiring 100% agreement to do anything.

[@CollapseWatch]

Would love to hear your thoughts on Jordan Peterson he was a big part of my introduction to Jung and Nitchze like 10 years ago I think he really played into that sense of disillusionment on his rise to fame. I dont listen to him anymore because he chose some weird hills to die on but I cant help but get the sense that there is something key in understanding how we are all disconnected in a time of technologic interconnectedness and how people in the past still faced the same issues despite different circumstances.

[@flow963]

Very insightful. Very appreciated. Thank you Mark

[@TheHajah1]

Brilliantly expressed, thank you… we are so often cut off from our deeper or higher selves in our lives as well as in Social interactions.. your description touches the place of how it is… & then the question of Transformation comes up… & seems to be involved with the last part of your talk.. & I’m minded that to take responsibility for ourselves & become aware that we share this as a spiritual responsibility, can bring about a top down revolution, or a Gurdjieff puts it.. the Higher Blends with the Lower to create the middle, & we are all three.

[@ElizabethMohr]

This is beautifully explained, thank you. Helpful to look at deeper layers of meaning and to consider scale when working toward wellness, toward creativity moving forward.

[@TheDionysianFields]

This channel had been losing resonance for me until I got to this video. Spot on analysis, Mark. I remain subscribed and look forward to more of your (well-nuanced) work.

[@Jakelefleur]

Mark, I am loving these

[@PlatosPodcasts]

Thanks for saying

[@margueritespringer3687]

Thank you. Personally most helpful

[@holgerjrgensen2166]

As We is Eternal, we have NO age in real sense, the body We see in mirror, is Not older than 1½ year.

[@thehypest6118]

We? Where's this "we" coming from, I don't feel any guilt at all, you've fallen for it by the labguage you use, Rand addresses this phenomenon in his book Anthem

[@mariecait]

Her*

[@thethomasraymond]

How else can he describe his point without using a “we” to refer to basic human psychology or cultural sentiments? Is there no collective identity at all? Nor ideas nor feelings running through our collective society found in discussions or media or ideology? If he said “people” or “I think that these people” it would just trip itself up over and again. I think you are being pedantic about that word and missing its relevant and descriptive use. He’s not projecting onto YOU guilt or broader cultural sentiments, he’s describing them as a phenomenon that we are all engaging in.

[@thehypest6118]

@@mariecait fair enough, never knew that