At the heart of every great social, cultural or political movement, uprooting and revolution, lies an ideology. At the heart of most ideologies lies an idol – the ideal incarnate. Hovering above the realm of mortals, it nonetheless guides them fully and infallibly from its seat of honour in the clouds. On its glittering crown resting atop of a proud head, a flawlessly engraved phrase promises perfect freedom, perfect victory, perfect wealth, perfect happiness.
Who could refuse an offer like that?
For the Ancient Greeks the engraving assured them of democracy and philosophical wisdom, for the Ancient Romans the seated figure was a warrior, fire-eyed and unflinching. The French had liberty, equality, fraternity, and later Napoleon. Queen Victoria meant the culmination of a nation's prosperity, Gandhi the herald of another's freedom. Despite the incessant metamorphosis it has undergone throughout human history, the essence of this phenomenon is simple and constant: an image of some form of perfection to revere and strive for, but which only a select few may deferentially approach.
We need an ideal. We need it for inspiration and direction, to find purpose, hope and comfort in. Its nature may be religious, political, aesthetic, intellectual or something else entirely. It may not be as literal as an emperor in military uniform on a white horse, but it can be found lurking behind our actions and our thoughts, silently governing virtually every aspect of human experience. When you desire recognition at work or good grades in school, you wish to get closer to your ideal of a successful person. When you enthusiastically advocate for or campaign against some political view, decision or figure, you do it with the indirect goal of moving a step closer to what you consider to be an ideal world. When you are deciding whether someone is a suitable romantic partner, you are measuring them up against your ideal of a romantic partner.
All of these lofty conceptions work well as guides and motivators for a time, but without some apparent ground in reality, they may eventually be put aside as naïve fantasies. Nothing kills the human spirit more than an absence of ideal. So, we feverishly search for evidence that our dreams can and do exist in life.
Enter the idol. This is someone who can present themselves to be the physical incarnation of abstract perfection – a paragon of living, breathing archetype of wisdom, courage, beauty, triumph: any of those vaguely defined yet highly coveted qualities we seek. In showcasing their apparent superiority, however, an idol must by definition remain distant. This is because in keeping the ideal separate from the “worshipper”, it is also kept separate from any hardships or mundane life the “worshipper” may experience. The idol thus develops into an all-encompassing symbol of all that is good and nothing that is bad. A parallel can be drawn between this phenomenon and idea of crystallisation – the process by which an imaginary identification misrecognises what is real. Essentially, the whole process is an intricate halo effect, the result being that the image overtakes the individual that made it.
How does this relate to modern life? Open any social networking app and the answer is in front of you. Welcome to the world of the influencer, where you are paid to convince people you are attractive, wealthy, talented and interesting, then have them attempt to follow your example with the help of product placement. That should ring some bells. Moreover, the online world is adept at not only erasing any undesirable aspects of your image, but also distributing that enhanced image to the rest of the globe. One of the reasons why the Beatles triggered an international frenzy was that they were among the first to be subject to the glamorizing effect of a screen.
An idol's influence is cemented when enough people have been drawn in by the presented image and act on this enchantment – likes, comments, votes, concert tickets, merchandise and so on. From there, influence grows exponentially, as there is the psychological effect of more easily accepting a view held by many. If you see dozens of comments about how brilliant someone is, you will probably internalise this as a fact, not an opinion. However, the majority can and have been wrong countless times. Thus, the idol and their corresponding ideal ascend to the public throne.
Now to examine the consequences of this newly acquired power. On a sociopolitical level, you can now direct entire crowds to live and fight for some cause that may not even be in their own best interests. Gustave Le Bon deals with this subject in depth in 'The Crowd: A Study of the Popular Mind'. On an interpersonal level, many people now live with the conviction that many other people are better than them in some regard. Two contradictory behaviours may result from this belief, both rooted in a drop of self-esteem. The more intuitive one is envy of the person being idolised and a general resentment towards the universe that such an apparent injustice is possible. The second can be seen as a kind of escapism: having been convinced of the idol's indisputable superiority, the infatuated individual decides to devote much more attention and energy to their idol than is reasonable. Often, the person gets distracted by the surface level appeal and invests themselves in an attempt to live vicariously through this perceived deity. Naturally, the little attention the worshipper pays to their own existence is riddled with dissatisfaction.
Much can be said on how ethical it is for so much power over people's thoughts and feelings to be concentrated in one place, but that is not the aim here. It is also worth noting that some people are more susceptible to the influence of idols. A pragmatic, stoic sort of disposition with both feet firmly on the ground will most likely prove immune to such flights of fancy. It does not, however, safeguard from being deceived regarding the spread of misinformation, half-truths and propaganda. A healthy dose of scepticism is therefore a rather helpful approach to take when sifting through the jumbled mass of headlines relaying the dogma of the day, churned out by keyboards that never sleep.
To return to our flourishing idol, happily benefiting from their fifteen minutes of fame. What happens when the timer stops? The death of an idol occurs when it becomes commonplace, when it gets too close to our everyday lives. Perfection is, for most, incompatible to the everyday, because we take the everyday for granted and something taken for granted can no longer serve the function of an idol. Having accomplished one thing, many people will then set their sights and hearts on another, loftier goal. Every celebrity is aware of the carnage that can result from inciting the public's boredom. Modern technology has sped up this process of disillusionment, thanks to its promotion of instant gratification. When an online news article averages a two minute read and videos on social media barely surpass twenty seconds, even fifteen minutes of fame may seem too long.
Thus, we are left with the impression that the entire thing is depressingly cyclical. Are we doomed to endure the journey of bright-eyed inspiration, disenchantment and a hunger for that elusive perfection ad infinitum? Every revolution is only a stepping stone towards future revolutions, after all. Idols, in embodying an ideal and making it part of our lives, must lose it for themselves. Are we cursed to never truly get what we want, because in doing so we find it is no longer desirable?
Of course not. Viewing the ebb and flow of history's tides as impermanent entities that exist only to dissolve does not make them meaningless. Each movement carries the seeds of the next, making the process one of continuous creation and hope. That is to be celebrated. The alternative is stagnation – is that preferable, or even possible? We would gain nothing from simply grinding to a halt. We would never improve.
Furthermore, losing an ideal as a result of achieving it is actually due to an attitude of dissatisfaction and greed, of assuming that we always need more than we have. With this mindset satisfaction is impossible. Fortunately, we can learn to appreciate on a deeper level what we have accomplished. Our search for an ideal can teach ambition, perseverance and optimism, but also gratitude and appreciation for our old ideals, now in the form of stepping stones and gleaming memories.
Hope does not die. It only evolves, and so does that which inspires it.
[image: painting by B. Cavarozzi]
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