I had the experience, some thirty years ago, of sharing a canoe in the Canadian Arctic with a delightful child psychiatrist. Naturally, we talked all day long — of shoes and ships and sealing wax, I suppose — and I remember a few of the things I learned. One of them was that, when passing the serving platters around the table at Sunday dinner, you avoid offering more than one at a time to a very young person. They find the need to make a choice confusing, and will sometimes pass up both.
In a similar vein, my dear friend Bea the other day mentioned a phenomenon called Super Market Syndrome, in which a person faced with a very large number of choices (we’ve all felt this in the potato chip or salad dressing aisle) and unable easily to find the particular item they’re looking for, will sometimes just give up and walk away, buying nothing.
I suspect that we all pretty much instinctively avoid confusion, distraction, or diversion. Sometimes we use them, unconsciously or on purpose, to help us avoid unpleasant tasks or facts. Magicians use them to divert the attention of their audiences from what’s really going on. Politicians use them for the same reason (isn’t it a shame that the word, “politician,” has such a negative connotation?).
The practice is as old as civilization. Organized societies depend upon an implicit compact of shared values in order to prosecute any projects or even to just get along in a mutual spirit of comity. Leaders of societies have an interest in fostering that spirit and, under stress from any source, preserving it.
Ancient Rome, founded upon noble principles (cf. Marcus Junius Brutus), eventually degraded into bad blood between patricians and finally, with the ascent of Julius Caesar, into an imperial system — sort of the ultimate classification of the populace, from slaves and peasants to the emperor, nobles, and senators. Hunger was far from unknown among the lower classes, and the lives of the patricians were often wantonly profligate. Successive emperors couldn’t have (to use an old Adirondack description) carried the matches to light Caesar’s cigars. Predictably, the masses occasionally grew restive. Something was needed to divert them from their misery,
Enter the famous Roman system of panem et circenses (bread and circuses). The government built large amphitheaters in population centers — think the Colosseum, for example — and staged entertainments featuring enslaved gladiators, wild animals, racing chariots, even naval battles in a flooded amphitheater. The peons loved it, which quieted their overlords’ anxieties. Just as important as the entertainments was the distribution of free grain shipped in from the provinces. All of this was ostensibly done in the name of good government; it was also a way of keeping the natives quiet.
Articles about the Roman Empire’s techniques for keeping the lid on things and our current situation here in the United States are, I find, generally leery of drawing too many parallels between the two. I don’t share their reticence. If ever there was an effort at diverting a population’s focus from something disqualifying and other items calling for our attention, this is it. What bothers me most of all that every attempt endangers the lives of innocent people just (as far as we know) to prevent the humiliation and impeachment of one sorry spectacle of a human being.
Apparently, the president’s prior life was not that of an Eagle Scout. His followers, the so-called MAGA base, have been more than willing to overlook it because of his purported beneficial effects on the country’s life. Yet, for all their support of his claims of lower prices and inflation and unemployment, they seem to stick at sexual abuse of girls. If that occurred at Mr. Trump’s hands, and can be proven … well, it won’t make much difference to me. I couldn’t think less of him than I do. But it will make a colander of the kettle in which he keeps his support.
What would you do if you were in his shoes? None of the other diversions has worked; Representative Massie is beating the drum for the release of the files and is clearly in the effort for the long haul. Venezuela didn’t work at all. The ICE goons are regrouping for another go (though probably in a warmer climate). I’ve got it! Let’s start a war, have Secretary Hegseth claim they began it, and take down Iran. Congress, like the senate of imperial Rome, may bleat a bit, but they’re no problem. Hundreds, even thousands, will die; but at least we’ll get that monkey off our back.