No, this is not about the Arnold Shwarzenegger movie (although that's a pretty cool movie).
This is about that incredibly sensationalistic and stupid Dateline NBC show 'To Catch a Predator'.
How interesting that is! Men want to have sex with teenage girls! That should really be on the front page of every newspaper in america. That really is astounding news. Who would have thought?
Oh, yeah - that's the way things have been for the last several thousand years...I guess we have forgotten.
Or is this show so popular (there have been 9 episodes of this repetitive garbage) because it appeals to the lower emotions that the show simultaneously casts in a negative light?
Those old men (and some not so old) are really dirty, aren't they? So nasty - the dregs of society.
Of course, the only reason people watch the show is so that they can titillate themselves by mentally casting themselves into the position of the 'dirty old man' (imagine that is you, walking up to the door of the teenage girl, knocking, - how exciting, yes?) or of the 'slut' (imagine that is you, so naughty, waiting for this older man to show up at your house when your parents are gone).
And then we like to feel so justified in watching the man get thrown onto the pavement by the cops.
But we forget that we are only unconsciously judging ourselves and our enjoyment of the show when we do this. It really is so much more easy (and such fun!) to judge other people, isn't it?
And I do so just love the moralizing of the host of the show - he really is the ultimate 'Father Figure' isn't he? I'm sure he's never even so much as glanced at an attractive teenager.
Not to mention the fact that most of the television shows and commercials on NBC (his employer) are heavily sex laden.
It's almost like the show is punishing people for watching too much television and acting on the impulses that are paraded in front of them for hours on end. Just like a snake swallowing it's own tail, the broadcast networks create the monsters that they also punish.
It's almost enough to make you vomit (that is, if you are paying any attention at all).
So I watched about 30 seconds of it and switched to American Idol...but's that's a whole 'nother story.
Tempters
"Lead us not into temptation, but deliver us from evil" (Matthew 6:13)
I question who is more immoral, a conscious tempter or the unconscious tempted. I keep my garage door closed to protect the items inside but also so as not to tempt someone to steal.
sympathy for WHO?
Tom, you said:
"I keep my garage door closed to protect the items inside but also so as not to tempt someone to steal."
I've never heard it put quite like that and really, really am glad you said it. Wow, that really says it.
When I was in Goethean Studies almost 10 years ago, I remember Dennis Kloceck (the teacher of the program) saying that in his opinion sympathy for the devil is almost completely lacking in the Anthropop movement. He said that most sophisticated Anthroposophists know how to talk about "balancing Lucifer and Ahariman with the Christ Impulse" but that he saw little signs of just the gut reaction of "sympathy for the devil".
He said this as the class was processing our experiences of enacting our shadows during a Halloween exercise he created: we were asked to locate an aspect of our shadows and use it to tempt and frighten people on the Halloween trail at Steiner College. The people walking the path were told that if they ever became to frightened, all they had to say was, "I am the Light" and the shadow figures would recede back into the darkness. Many of us felt what a release and relief it was- as the shadow- to be vanished by the light of the other person. It was an amazing process. At first some of us thought that our relief came not from the shadow but from our everyday ego. Dennis suggested that our sense of gratitude might go much deeper than that and point us into the true center of any counter-balancing force.
Jeff
We read this story and then
I saw a doctor on the show who you could see was a very good man with a wonderful family. He had a momentary lapse into his lizard brain and fell for the temptation. The show aggressively goes after their targets using their adult knowledge to create the maximum temptation.
The man will possibly loose his career of service and family both of which he spent many years building with good moral intentions. Are you saying he should be thankful for the show for its work? We should have "sympathy for the devil"? This is a valid principle but do you think this is a good story to apply it?
nameless moments
Hi Tom,
Thanks for bringing in what you saw with the doctor. You asked me,
"Are you saying he should be thankful for the show for its work?"
I'm afraid I don't follow your question exactly, but I can state that no, I am not saying he should have one feeling or another towards the show.
I would imagine that any "thankfulness" that arises as we watch such a show would come from seeing an opportunity that the show is offering us. However, in my experience this sort of gratitude arises through seeing, not through effort or a moral principal. It comes. At most I can create a readiness for such experiences by treading The Philosophy of Freedom.
In terms of where we should apply "sympathy for the devil"; again, it might *emerge* as we consider or encounter an event, but I can't think of a way it need be applied. In my experience, the moment I attempt to apply a principal to a phenomena I step away from intuiting it. That said, I think that applying principals has an important place in human life. What I am calling "sympathy for the devil" is not something I hold as a principal (although it could be utilized as such). It emerged as a nameless experience of deep and mysterious love in the face of darkness. I'm afraid these words missed the point of your question, but they helped me develop my own, so I am glad you asked.
Jeff
P.S. Above I wrote "this sort of gratitude arises through seeing..."
But it would equally true to say, "this sort of seeing arises through gratitude"
Language (and Ego)makes it appear as if one must "cause" the other. In reality, I think they act as all intuitions act: as pre-seperated multiplicities.
You say: What I am calling
I was just wondering if it emerged from the Mysticism of feelings that Steiner cautions about.
8-8 The tendency just described, the philosophy of feeling, is often called mysticism. The error in a mystical outlook based upon mere feeling is that it wants to experience directly what it ought to gain through knowledge; that it wants to raise feeling, which is individual, into a universal principle.
I wouldn't know in your case but these are the introspective questions the book encourages us to explore.
the conceptual mystic in me
Thanks for the question,
And thank you very much for framing it with the caveat that it emerges as speculation based on my previous post. I find that very helpful because it allows the exploration we are engaged in to take center stage as opposed to creating the image of two bible-thumpers screaming the Truth!
For me, Tom, I understand mysticism of feeling to be what happens when we abandon the intuitive occurrence for the often powerful but flat emotionality or sentimentality that might come with it. Because intellectualizing is my default defense mechanism, I am much more prone the "mysticism of concept". It's very hard for me to cultivate and stay in mere feelings. I know that for others they LIVE for the feeling and make their life about staying put right there. My one-sidedness pulls me towards designing grand conceptual frameworks and wanting to live right inside them. I try to counter this by attending to the stream of ongoing experiencing that flows under all feelings, concepts and impulses of will. It's always there to lean into.
When I say that my experience presently entitled "sympathy for the devil" is not something I hold as a principal, I mean that the intuitive occurrence is not something that I then translate into a moral maxim. If I was asked to do so, I think I could. But not being asked, I simply let the experience stand for itself. This, to me, speaks to the self-sustaining nature of thinking. It isn't held up by anything we say about it.
In Chapter 10 Steiner speaks of how we can live our way into the edge of our ideas by staying within the act of thinking; this is happening during the intuitive occurrence of the concept, which is before we reflect on the occurrence.
I've noticed in study groups that when a person tries to find words for what she is experiencing at this "edge", people might interpret the words as "mysticism of feeling" because the person is having to rely on a new type of vocabulary to describe what the *act of thinking* is like BEFORE they apply logical concepts to it. To be a playful pest, I have sometimes handed people Steiner quotes in which he is talking about the experience of the act of thinking but I leave off Steiner's name. I ask them to see if PoF would place this thinker in a specific category. 78% of the time, people go straight to mysticism of feeling because they see that 97% of the description is talking about feelings and impulses and flow, not concepts and ideas and understandings.
When I describe what happened as I had my experience of "sympathy for the devil", I am forced to use lots of feeling words, but these are not what I experience as day- to-day feelings. They emerge as an unspoken Word (or felt-meaning)that is filled with not-yet-formulated meaning.
Hey, look, I'm quoting The Book. I'm in chapter 12 where Steiner says,
"the concept will have to realize itself in a single occurrence."
The occurrence, for me, happened in class with Dennis. Immediately it was translated into a mental picture, which now works against the freedom of the actual intuition. As Steiner says,
"For the unfree spirit, this link is given from the outset. Motives are present in his consciousness from the outset in the form of mental pictures."
A moral maxim is a mental picture to the extent that it is governing my thinking activity. I am unfree to the extent that I try to turn the intuitive occurrence into a code of conduct for other situations. So, instead, I try to simply notice what arises as a motivation and stay with the present intuiting. For the sake of discussion it might be necessary to draw upon past examples and give them names and labels like "sympathy for the devil", but it is important for me to not mistake the map for the territory. "sympathy for the devil" will never be what it was in the mental pictures I have formed of that day in class. As I was reading Jay's wonderful post, I noticed that the idea of "sympathy for the devil" was arising in me and it brought with it mental pictures of that day in class. In my approach to PoF, it is important to keep what-is-arising (the intuitive occurrence) distinct from what it brings along (the mental pictures).
I would see myself falling into "mysticism of feeling" if I elevated the sentimental aspects of the experience ABOVE the actual intuitive occurrence. As I said, I tend to fall on the other side of the fence and elevate the finished concept above the intuitive occurrence: I call this "mysticism of concept". Steiner was writing PoF to philosopher's who *tended* to fall into mysticism of concept and it was, I believe, a main point of the book to bring them to the edge. It is this "edge" that Steiner speaks of in chapter 10 that is my interest of research and play! I gaurd against this form of mysticism by trying to always go back and directly refer to the intuiting that is sourcing the temporary finished concepts.
Thanks for letting me think about "mysticism of feeling" in this context. All this said, who knows, perhaps I'm just one big feeling elevator!!!! It sure doesn't *feel* that way, I mean....I sure don't *think* so!
Jeff
The Devil in Us All
When I read Jeff's "sympathy for the devil," and Tom's keeping the door shut to avoid tempting people, I thought they were the same thing! Because keeping the door shut is a sympathetic act, not just a defensive one. And saying "I am the Light" to the scary shadow figures may have been intended as a defensive act, but it was also a sympathetic act as the scary shadow figures found out.
Both these are the exact opposite of the show, it seems.
When I was young, my sister and I did a shameful thing to our younger sister, who was about 4 years old and going through a stealing phase. We found out she wanted to steal some toys from a neighbor girl at whose house we were playing. We pretended to go along with her and actually helped her formulate a plan to steal the toys, all so that we could set her up to get caught and punished.
When my father found out about the whole thing, he was very sad. He took us two older girls aside and said, "You girls are sisters. You're supposed to be FOR each other."
The show could be about helping people to overcome their socially unacceptable (but biologically natural) drives, instead of exploiting them for the monetary gain of the show's sponsors.
yep
Yes, I jumped on Tom's phrase about locking his garage because I saw it as a very penetrating act of love: to the extent that it was coming from a
"forgive us for we know not what we do"
Boy, Lori, what rascals you were!
Jeff
You are the Prey
You go, Jay! That was fun!
Oh my, how Ego loves to know that it is always somebody else's fault! It's the "predator" or teenager or the show itself which is to blame! Ego says,
"Look I know I have my faults; I'm not perfect, but if you want to see the REAL cause of the problem look over there at (Iraq war, Bush, Clinton, pedophiles, suicide bombers, greedy CEO's, weak liberals, etc.,).
Ego really enjoys cultivating positivity and has read Steiner's suggestion that we take Christ's praising of the decaying dog's beautiful death as our example...but...Ego cultivates positivity on Its terms.
The thing I love most about your post, Jay, is that as hard as you come down on the show, you include your own coming down on the show as part of the phenomena.
You predator, you!
Jeff
Positivity
Actually, I find that most people don't understand positivity.
If we are a gardener, and 'like to think positive' that 'there are no weeds in my garden', this thought in itself can blind one to the presence of weeds, which can then overtake the garden.
In the same way, one has to notice the dead dog first, before you notice it's teeth.
You have to know where the shadows are before you can throw any light on them.
The concepts I enumerated above are simply the things I generated after thinking about the revulsion the show produced in me.
They are the reasons why I find the show so tasteless.
But NBC has found this show to be a 'winner' and so they keep making more of them. And don't think for one moment they don't know what they are doing. They know exactly why it's gets the ratings it does.
Obviously the vast majority of viewers are asleep to the reasons they are really watching it.
And, in a way, just knowing where a shadow is, is a form of throwing light on it.
And the most positive thing one can do with a show like that is to turn it off.
Why not go out and buy some pornography, then lie to yourself about why you are watching it - "Oh, I'm just practicing Rudolf Steiner's 'positivity exercise'!"
Dude, that whole show is a dead dog, and, I'm sorry to say - this dog ain't got no teeth.
dead dogs
Now I see! You really weren't implicating yourself in the nature of the show. Something about the tone you struck threw me for a loop.
Jeff
Cosmic beings on NBC?
I was thinking about this a little more today - (I had to drive to Chicago and back from Sheboygan and so had plenty of time - especially after making a wrong turn...).
I'm sure that there has got to be something positive about the 'Predator' show. However, I still don't think most people should watch it.
I have a sinking suspicion that there is something very nasty lurking (in an occult sense) within the images that show provides.
Think of it this way - there is also likely something positive about the worst neighborhoods in this country. I'm sure that you could walk into a bad neighborhood (and by 'bad' I mean, 'shots fired indiscrimately' bad) and practice the 'positivity exercise' and actually find something positive.
The problem is you may not live long enough to find the positive thing. Or if you do succeed in finding it, you may not live long enough to get out.
The same thing with the NBC show...
I recieved some incredibly bad vibes from that show - and (now of course I am hypothesizing here) I have a feeling that this was due to the beings that are working through it.
If I were going to make a guess, I would say that they are Asuric beings (another disclaimer - this is a hypothesis - I am NOT making any claims to exact clairvoyance).
If I am right - a person is better off watching American Idol (better to tangle with Lucifer than Asuras)
That's all I'm saying.
Maybe one positive thing
Maybe one positive thing about the show is that it drags an ugly thing (self-righteousness, that is) to the surface where we can see it for what it is.
Lori's pile driver
Lori,
at first I just liked what you wrote:
"Maybe one positive thing about the show is that it drags an ugly thing (self-righteousness, that is) to the surface where we can see it for what it is."
I thought, "yea, there is such self-righteousness that goes into the shows I am most concerned about and, yep, it's a good thing that people can see it so clearly and consciously realize that the shows are worthless and, perhaps, unhealthy."
But then...oh, Golly, I saw the deeper angle into your post and thought, "How freakin self-righteous of me!" The show (i'm thinking of one that takes place on an island) really does bring up my most concealed forms of self-righteousness on a weekly basis. Hey, but it's getting less and less the more and more I watch it with a touch of PoF.
Jeff
On the other hand
On the other hand, Jeff, I don't think it's self-righteous to call crap, crap! Whether it's food additives or mean-spirited tv shows. I read somewhere that someone asked a nutritionist if it was all right to have a little bit of trans fat in your food. The nutritionist responded, "Is it all right to have a little bit of dog feces in your food?"
crap is crap
Yea, that's funny. Ok, I'm with you as long as long as I don't elevate my crap above the t.v. shows.
What I'm calling "crap" in the show is really also the same crap that is in "me". What I see as beauty and truth in the show is really the same beauty and truth I see in "I".
crap is crap, ego is ego, Self is Self and Love be Love!
Jeff
Killer Tomatoes
Applying the concept of self-righteousness correctly makes one self-righteous just as little as applying the concept of 'tomato' correctly turns one into a tomato.
Who Should
In reference to the show "Catching a Predator" our fearless pop culture Critic (Hey, I wanted that Job!), Jay Harms did say:
"I have a sinking suspicion that there is something very nasty lurking (in an occult sense) within the images that show provides."
"I recieved some incredibly bad vibes from that show - and (now of course I am hypothesizing here) I have a feeling that this was due to the beings that are working through it."
"If I were going to make a guess, I would say that they are Asuric beings (another disclaimer - this is a hypothesis - I am NOT making any claims to exact clairvoyance)."
"However, I still don't think most people should watch it."
Your faithful readers can't help but notice that you said "most" people should not watch it. In a state bordering on hyperactivity they are curious who you would think should spent time encountering those pesky Asurical beings, assuming your hypothesis is correct for the sake of discussion?
Thank you, thank you,
J-man
How old are you?
How old are you?
not telling
Old enough to recognise and enjoy a well executed passive-aggressive question as much as the next guy! It might help that I grew up with a mother who had mastered the art of the p.a. question. Seriously, if you really want to know I'd be happy to talk about it via the "contact" option.
Jeff
p.s. I read an amazing article when I was doing my psychotherapeutic training about the question "how old are you" in therapy. At the beginning of my training, I would mostly just answer the quetion straight out when clients asked, but this artical went WAY deep into the psycho-dynamics that might be taking place when a client asks the question. Now, in therapy, when I client asks me my age I am much more curious and we'll go into it (and sometimes I just tell 'em my age!)
Fishers of Men?
Jay, I'm interested in this tv program in the context of sect. 1.4, where Steiner is presenting von Hartmann's point of view:"But if one bears in mind that a man adopts an idea, or mental picture, as the motive of his action only if his character is such that this mental picture arouses a desire in him, then he appears as determined from within and not from without."
I was thinking about the nature of entrapment and what role the trapper plays in supplying the mental picture that then arouses the desire. The point of the exercise seems to be to root out those horrible people who have that horrible desire, by giving them something to focus it on and adopt as a motive. If they didn't have that desire, then they wouldn't take the bait.
The assumption must be that if they have the desire, then sooner or later they're going to act on it. Therefore, the end of protecting teenaged girls, which nobody can argue against, is used to justify the means. But what if the original assumption is wrong, and they weren't actually planning to act on this biologically-adaptive, culture-driven desire until the mental picture was, so to speak, dangled in front of their face? What if they were wrestling with it inwardly and had been at the point where they were going to conquer it, until the bait was dangled? Then it would seem, to me, that the determining factor of the incident in question, the incident for which the man is going to be held responsible, could in some cases be the trapper. The trapper is obviously the brains behind the scheme.
The show seems to come from a profoundly pessimistic view of human nature. The belief is that we are determined by our desires and only need the right stimulus to make us act on them. Never having seen the show, since I don't get that channel, I'm left wondering if the show's narrator offers any advice as to what men can do to change their desires.
trappers
I think all men have this desire to a certain extent. The only one's who wouldn't would be those with a completely purified astral body - and we can probably count on both hands how many of those there have been in the history of the world.
Ethically speaking I think the makers of the show will likely have some karmic making up to do in the future...I don't know the legal definition of entrapment, but one could make a pretty good case that this show is highly unethical.
They are simply taking advantage of people with little self control, plain and simple.
I find it very hard to believe that these individuals recieve actual invitations from young teenagers very often - Justin Timberlake they definitely are not!
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