Demoralization thesis

A summary of:
Lynch, G. (2007). New Spirituality: An Introduction to Belief Beyond Religion. I.B.Tauris: London.
Chapter 5 – The Collapse of Civilization? Progressive Spirituality and the Demoralization Debate (130)
& Chapter 6 – The Future Prospects for Progressive Spirituality and the Progressive Milieu (162)

The remainder of the book is really concerned with morality; emphasizing the link between spirituality and morality, which I will have to explicate in my dissertation. The question in modern society – or perhaps the fear – is that without religion, where will we get our morality. I basically reject this as a reasonable question on basic evolutionary and historical grounds. We can see evidence of morality in animals, who don’t have religion (so far as we would know it), because it is useful for survival. Dawkins argues that altruism is advantageous – I scratch your back, now maybe you’ll scratch mine – and therefore that personality trait, that basic morality, survives to the next generation. And I find it hard to believe that before religions became established, we were completely without a sense of right and wrong. Of course, Durkheim argued that totemism, the earliest form of religion, concretized sacred and taboo, making it clear to society what was right and what was wrong. I think in this sense, you may be able to say that religion is useful for clear delineation of morality, thereby removing the need for subjective introspection. How facile to point to a passage in the Bible as your moral compass, rather than seeking that wisdom within! As they say, ‘Morality is doing what is right regardless of what you are told. Religion is doing what you are told regardless of what is right.’

Now, given that disclaimer, I do think that our conviction in our morality may be being eroded by technology, precisely because a new, more aggressive morality, namely the values of technology, are coming to dominate our worldview. And there is evolutionary sense in this! In a world where technology is so important, those who adopt its values are more likely to succeed, to thrive. Those who buy into the technological worldview, fit best in this society. The more we engage with technology, the more familiar we become with technological values, and therefore the more comfortable we are with them, the more they ‘feel right’ to us, purely by repetition. Jonathan Sacks, Chief Rabbi in Britain, says, “Now we choose because we choose. Because it is what we want; or it works for us; or it feels right to me. Once we have dismantled a world in which larger values held sway, what remain are success and self-expression, the key values of an individualistic culture” (142).

And I’ve been concerned with this issue for several years, focusing as an undergraduate on the values of consumerism (not at all dissimilar from technology – in fact, a segment of the technological paradigm; e.g. George Ritzer’s McDonaldization thesis, “in which he argues that increasingly large sections of society are modeled on the rationalized principles of the fast-food restaurant: efficiency, measurability, predictability and control through non-human technology” (150)) that may have begun to upset our well-being, making us more susceptible to anxiety and depression. And I find myself having gone full-circle with this quote: “‘Demoralization’, as used by writers such as Gertrude Himmelfarb and Ralph Fevre, points to an important association between morality and well-being. Essentially the term ‘demoralization’ suggests that a crisis develops when people lack an adequate moral framework for living their lives, and that the lack of such a framework is not only a source of unethical behaviour, but also personal anxiety and unhappiness” (134).


I guess this means that I believe there is some truth to the latter two demoralization theses presented in the book, that demoralization of society is caused by:

1. “the liberal, ‘expressive’ revolution of the 1960s…”
2. “increasing secularization of western society…leaves people devoid of adequate moral and religious frameworks for their lives”
3. “the ideologies and lifestyles of contemporary capitalism which distort people’s views of what is important in life, provide them with illusory forms of happiness and trap them in an exploitative and dehumanizing web of social and economic relationships”
4. “the growing influence of rationality in modern societies which weakens our ability to think about our lives in morally adequate ways, traps us in inhumane and (ironically) irrational social systems, and separates us from a proper relationship with out emotional lives” (135).

I found Clifford Geertz’s categorization of ‘mythos’ and ‘ethos’ useful for this discussion, and probably helpful for my dissertation. Lynch writes (apologies for the large chunk pasted below):

“‘Mythos’ is the story within which the members of a culture locate themselves – a story bound up with particular cultural symbols and rituals. ‘Ethos’ is the moral sensibility – the values, sentiments and motivations – that are generated through immersion in that mythos. Progressive spirituality offers a particular mythos through its turn to the story of the unfolding universe as the grounding narrative within which human existence makes sense. Unlike a secularist world view that depicts human life as devoid of meaning and value other than that created by humans themselves, the universe story places humanity as one small element in a greater narrative of cosmic unfolding. Within this story, human consciousness is seen not as a site for nihilism or existential despair, but as a symptom of the universe becoming conscious of itself. Human consciousness finds its meaning as it is used to deepen awareness of the cosmos of which (159) we are part. It finds its moral significance when it is used to reflect on how humans can act constructively within the cosmic drama into which they have been invited to take part. Far from being atomized, isolated individuals caught in a meaningless universe, we find ourselves born into a story that gives us both pleasures and obligations. As Thomas Berry puts it, ‘we are… thrown into existence with a challenge and a role that is beyond any personal choice. The nobility of our lives, however, depends on the manner in which we come to understand and fulfill our assigned role’” (160).

Lynch reiterates his thesis of the evolution of a progressive spirituality with this smaller paragraph:

“This mythos of the universe story has the potential to give rise to a particular ethos. The moral sensibility celebrated by progressive spirituality is one of a deeply felt participation in the unity and interdependence of the whole of existence. According to Carol Christ, ‘the source of morality is the deep feeling of connection to all people and to all beings in the web of life’” (160).

If this sense of connection is the heart of this new spirituality, this seems to justify my focus on the Internet. Thus far, we have sought to realize this connection by technological means, i.e. the Internet; but the question we have to ask is whether the Internet has been designed in such a way as to allow meaningful connections to form. It is a question, again, of depth vs. breadth; of many weak ties vs. fewer strong ties. And perhaps we need both. Weak ties are useful. But on the whole are we more able to form strong ties through the Internet? And a follow up to this would be to ask whether weak ties are enough to produce a morality centered on our fellow human beings. Do we in fact need strong ties (in addition to weak) to help us realize a ‘deeply felt participation in the unity and interdependence of the whole of existence’?