When Does the Rejection of Obvious Insanity Begin?

Humanity is being tested to ascertain what percentage of it is reasonable and willing to take action.

Pleased to meet you, hope you guessed my name.

But what’s puzzling you, is the nature of my game.

Mick Jagger, “Sympathy for the Devil”

In a 1957 essay titled The Plight of the Individual in Modern Society, Carl Jung remarked.

Everywhere in the West there are subversive minorities, who—sheltered by our humanitarianism and our sense of justice—hold the incendiary torches ready, with nothing to stop the spread of their ideas except the critical reason of a single, fairly intelligent, mentally stable stratum of the population. One should not, however, overestimate the thickness of this stratum. It varies from country to country in accordance with national temperament. Also, it is regionally dependent on public education and is subject to the influence of acutely disturbing factors of a political and economic nature.

Taking plebiscites as a criterion, one could, at an optimistic estimate, put its upper limit at about 40% of the electorate. A rather more pessimistic view would not be unjustified either, since the gift of reason and critical reflection is not one of man’s outstanding peculiarities. And even where it exists, it proves to be wavering and inconstant, the more so, as a rule, the bigger the political groups are. The mass crushes out the insight and reflection that are still possible with the individual, and this necessarily leads to doctrinaire and authoritarian tyranny if ever the constitutional state should succumb to a fit of weakness.

Rational argument can be conducted with some prospect of success only so long as the emotionality of a given situation does not exceed a certain critical degree. If the affective temperature rises above this level, the possibility of reason having any effect ceases, and its place is taken by slogans and chimerical wish fantasies. That is to say, a sort of collective possession results, which rapidly develops into a psychic epidemic.

Lately I’ve been reminded of Jung’s reflections on an almost daily basis. I often wonder if humanity is now being tested to ascertain just what percentage of the population has retained sufficient critical reason to notice the obvious, destructive insanity to which it is being subjected. The following are a few random snapshots of madness from the last few days.

U.S. presidential candidate on what Americans need to strive towards.

Olympic opening ceremony depiction of the Christian God and his disciples

A biological male wins Olympics women’s boxing match.

Would be assassin on rooftop 400 feet from stage allowed to shoot first.

Would it be possible for the reasonable, fairly intelligent, mentally stable stratum of the population to get organized and take action to reject this obvious insanity? Or is our stratum of the overall population too small and fragmented?

Hats off to Elon Musk for being one of the few high profile men of real wealth and power to try to stand up for reason, liberty, and decency. It would be great if more rich guys would join him.