Performative Nonchalance and Apathy: A Reflection on Addiction, Ethos, and Power Struggles in Honor of Earth Day

 I recently just read an article from WRCBtv.com where a police officer, Sergeant Ker Yang states (in regards to Chauvin) that police officers were “trained to appear confident, stay calm and avoid staring or eye contact.”

Simultaneously, we see the statement “he appears altogether unconcerned with the desperation and agony just below him” and that “this wasn’t the face of fear or concern or worry.”

Yet, obviously, he had complete cause to worry — he repressed it. He lost his job, he made a horrifying mistake. It doesn’t matter how excellent his performance of nonchalance was, he indeed had every right to be terrified and luckily for us, some semblance of justice was served.

Why, do you think, might this be? As part of deescalation tactics, many officers are trained to downplay the weight of the situation or pretend to be unworried or nonchalant. For instance, when things are going really poorly for a top official, this might be the exact moment where he may laugh, discount, and act as if there weren’t a worry in the world the most such as in the case of Daunte Wright. By acting as though this were true in a convincing manner, our limbic system is actually convinced and regulates itself to meet this fact. That does not mean, however — like running a real estate ad in a house infested by termites — that there isn’t incredible cause for concern underlying. Sometimes it is the moment where the aggression comes out and the big smiles, playing cute and downplaying begin that one might start looking for proximity to the true source of things, especially in the case of murderers. When something is really wrong, quite obviously, it should send out screaming sirens when this is the time someone spews such rhetoric such as “Relax” and “Be happy”. To be frank, in such scenarios, they are quite creepy attempts at further murder of the truth.

Another application of this performative nonchalance and understanding is here; “On Monday, Politico reported she has just received a $2 million advance for a book about how judges are not supposed to bring their personal feelings into their rulings.” This quote is from a story on Justice Amy Coney Barrett, who has a history of opposing abortion while clearly stating that she is a “faithful Catholic”. To say that her religious dispositions and many of the pathos-central rationales it implies do not inform her rulings would be a massive mistake to make. Yet, by having performative apathy, she gains credit with those who understand logic to simply be the absence of flusteredness — despite the fact, economics and other spheres of material excellence require us logically to signal accurately to avoid collapse. (AKA, if we are drowning, to not hold a salute while sinking because we were requested to “remain positive” — this would not be a logical or sane stance.)

In the same way, we can only hope that her Catholic predisposition on the issue of prosocial nonprofits will not inform her “dry judgments” toward the possibility of corrupted financial influence in her upcoming case.

We see here “stoicism” in its form as recursive rage to be a performance in order to gain the ethos of logic without any of the self-consistency. As stated, it would not be logical for a sinking person to salute without attempting to swim, but those who equated the stoic, unwavering salute with logic might find themselves out of an authority in due time.

Similarly, by “going against one’s feelings” — purposefully hurting themselves or someone like them, they demonstrate their credit that they can “do what is necessary” when in truth these self-harms could be exactly what they want to continue in order to keep the attention or entitlement that they have been cultivating endlessly for their entire lives.

For instance, when a leader witnesses a future come-up being seen as too “self-loving” she may take the reverse position to grab up the perceived deficit and fulfill that need, no matter the repercussion. It is not a good faith commitment to these principles, but a simple power grab by the vacuum created in order to make money and maintain presence where the powers of attention are sought. In truth, such obvious understanding of principles would be impossible — Catholicism and strict logic have been at odds for centuries, leaving many strict logicians wanting. It has everything to do with feelings, and that no amount of self-harm can divorce strict, axiomatic religion from them.

It is in the same way that people include “temporal discounting” in addiction. When those who struggle with addiction see a reward far in the future, they discount it. This may sound like

  • “There’s no way that’ll happen.”
  • “That may happen for others but not for me.”
  • “That doesn’t serve me now.”

They discount the future in favor of the present. Here are some other ways that have less to do with strict addiction that may happen

  • Pulling an investment quickly because it didn’t make immediate returns
  • Balancing every institutional gain with a loss to remain “reflective” of the market instead of “agentic” of the business
  • Punishing an ally to make them “go through what you’ve been through” to the detriment of their future allyship
  • Erring on the side of extreme devaluation for someone who you would otherwise evaluate highly on their merit to seem “balanced”.
  • Calling increased employee wages “business losses” not because these are actual losses to an educated professional but because less money can now be liquidated in quick (and potentially criminal) fashion with the CEO or supposed owners
  • Accusing individuals of “playing the victim” when they actively signal the proper state of things in an empowered fashion in such a manner that gives us a chance to actually solve the concern in time
  • Power struggle type gatekeeping; “Until I get x, I won’t give y.” Instead of, “How can we both get x and y at the same time in a way that respects both of our nonnegotiables?” For more on win-win, read here.

These discounts and deductions carry the ethos of balance, making these sources to be less likely to be sussed out by those institutions that are designed to detect and remediate unsustainable logical processes (doctors, education, etc.) By performing the expected signs, the individual buys time with a culture that does not deeply comprehend the principles of logic, but rather correlates them with a set of traits, due to a failing education system. Read more on this loop hereSimilarly, read more on contention tax and its applications to doctors, math teachers, CEOs, and politicians here.

Inherent in this ethos-hauling is a sense of power struggle; it is not the actual craft that interests the individual, but the power associated with it inherently. These power struggles, therefore, bely the power addiction that comes when both sides need deference when indeed seamless integration of the mutual wills would be the only way out. Thus, conflicts over craft may be nothing more than battling over the power stash — and ultimately, like the tale of Solomon, the craft is the final victim (neither of the professed loved it enough for it to survive. Both were merely using.)

It is therefore that we see, in both performative apathy and performative deduction, a type of virtue signalling based in maintaining and accreting power via “unbothered ethos” in the face of catastrophe. None of the sincere desire to be accurate continues; ultimately, as always, the short term maximum capitalizations characteristic of addiction become the default, even at the cost of destroying the source.

Have a happy Earth day!

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