THE GREAT SWINDLE

CONTENTS

• Basic Qualities
• Nuclear Families
• Extended Family
  • Welfare? / Therapy?
  • 'Rugged' Pioneers
  • Good Neighbors
  • New Extended Families?
• Nuclear War?
• Arms Race
• Hot Spots / Terrorism
• Intra-National Contention
• Class / Race / Religion

The subtitle of this section equates the nuclear family with nuclear war.

We did this for the conscious purpose of hopefully hooking your attention through the shock value of such a concept (but also because in a very REAL way, it's TRUE!).

Obviously, the institution of the nuclear family, in and of itself, isn't going to lead directly to nuclear war. However, the mode of thinking which underlies and supports the idealized concept of the nuclear family can very easily result in nuclear war. How this can be so will become clear as we proceed into this section.

To state the name of this Grand Distractor is to define and describe it. It is the fallacious mode of thinking that its name indicates.

'Us' vs.'Them' operates at all levels across the total spectrum of human society. It operates geographically, on the international level between nation states, and on a continuously more localized level, between subdivisions within each nation state, and between regions and communities within those subdivisions.

It operates ethnically between supposedly different 'races' of men, and between differing groups and sects of organized religions.

It operates structurally between different economic classes and social castes.

And, it operates at a very local and personal level between discrete and isolated nuclear family units.

But in each and every manifestation of the 'Us' vs.'Them' syndrome, at whatever level, its basic qualities are the same:

[1]. 'We' are different and distinct from 'Them'.

[2]. 'We' are, by nature and of necessity, in competition and at odds with 'Them'.

[3]. 'We' must look out for our own, and only for our own, because that is precisely what 'They' will do.

These are the modes of thinking which underlie the view of "reality" that creates and maintains the 'Us' vs.'Them' syndrome.

There is only one general problem with these modes of thinking. They are deadly wrong. And we do mean deadly  !

'Us' vs.'Them' keeps our attention diverted while the Swindle robs each and everyone of us of all that we lose as we remain in contention with one another, and at each other's throats.

At the most localized level, it keeps every nuclear family unit primarily focused on a struggle for survival in competition with every other nuclear family unit; each family feeling a compelling, and sometimes desperate, need to do the same thing.

The abundance of benefits that would accrue to everyone, on a day to day basis, from a view of reality that extends beyond and outside the nuclear family as the fundamental social unit, is yanked right out from under us by a mode of thought that keeps us locked into a struggle of competition with everyone else, often just to keep our heads above water.

That is theft on a Grand scale, and we all lose!

It might not be theft if such a higher quality of life weren't otherwise so readily available to us but for our being Swindled out of it. But the FACT is, that higher quality of life is readily available to us, and the only reason we don't already have it, right this moment, is that we are being Swindled out of it.

Earlier on in our society [and even now in other cultures and in some portions of our society] we had a more expansive view of the basic family unit, ie., the extended family, which included directly within it a large number of direct and collateral blood relatives.

This extended family was able to provide mutual financial, logistical, emotional and spiritual support for its members, on a day to day basis, which the nuclear family can't even come close to providing.

As a result of industrialization, and other factors, the extended family has significantly broken down and dispersed in our culture, and the nuclear family has been pushed forward to take its place. But it is a poor substitute.

The FACT is, the nuclear family, as a social institution, is ill equipped to replace the extended family in the task of providing the broad range of mutual support, assistance and nurturing that we all require in order to be full and whole human beings.

And, if the nuclear family, as an institution, is itself deteriorating, as it so obviously is in our culture, this is not due to some 'moral' decline, but is due to the fact that we are asking the nuclear family to do more than it is capable of doing, and it is buckling under the strain.

And, any theory of psychology or sociology which attempts to correct for the evils resulting from the decay of the extended family, by trying to prop up the nuclear family as its natural replacement, serves only to prolong the agony by perpetuating the Swindle underlying it.

Therapy by way of family, marriage and child counseling is, indeed, admirable and useful, given the state of misery and confusion that families, marriages, and the children of them, are all often in. Such therapy is far better than no help at all, if no other cure is available. But, unfortunately, even this help is often financially out of reach for the families most in need of such help.

Governmental social welfare is also far better than nothing at all, if no other cure is available, as a last, desperate means of providing at least bare survival for those family units on the edge of outright collapse.

But neither therapy nor welfare address the fundamental, structural weakness which is at the root of the problems they are trying to correct. Their efforts are tantamount to putting a band-aid on a shattered and hemorrhaging leg, and hoping the leg will stop bleeding and be able to support weight as a result.

Because, at the root of the deep malaise into which so many of our families have sunk is the Swindlous notion that the nuclear family can somehow provide the mutual support and nurturing of, and thereby replace, the deteriorated extended family.

The idea of the hardy, independent, self-reliant, 'pioneer' families of the old west is certainly a pretty one. But, as this concept has so often been misrepresented in the movies of John Wayne and others, and too often accepted as a "realistic" portrayal by their viewers, it is a much exaggerated, and thereby Swindlous, concept.

Because, the REALITY of the 'rugged' individualism of those pioneer families was that if they were to survive at all, they had to nurture and support one another at every step. And they did so. Those who didn't band together and support one another, didn't survive.

If they didn't move west and settle as a group of collateral blood relatives, which many of them did, they forged a genuine substitute extended family in the concept of being good  and true neighbors   - a concept in serious decay in this day of emphasis on the isolated nuclear family.

Indeed, the only reason our society hasn't totally collapsed by now is that enough of the concept of the extended family, with blood relatives and in good neighborliness, survives to sustain us, despite the corrosive effects of our misplaced emphasis on the nuclear family.

But in significant portions of our society today, that is about all we are doing - avoiding total social collapse. And under these circumstances, all that many of our nuclear families are able to do is barely survive, and some aren't even doing that.

And, other than the Great Swindle, there is no reason for this sad state of affairs to exist. There is no good reason for any of us to be deprived of the full benefits of the mutual support and nurturing that an extended family can provide.

If we would just relieve ourselves of the false, and Distracting, view that the nuclear family is somehow sacrosanct as the primary unit for providing the broad base of support we all need, our minds would then be open to, and free to start developing, the new kinds of extended families in which we could all thrive.

At the other end of the social spectrum, on the international level, it is just no secret that we are living under the cloud of the potential horrors of a nuclear holocaust.

And, although such a nuclear holocaust is still, at least for the moment, just a potential rather than an actuality, the fearsome and intimidating cloud of its mere potential is very much a REALITY.

And, the race to build bigger and more effective arms, nuclear and otherwise, is also very much a REALITY right now.

In that race, both sides, and all sides (or, in 2003, at least the United States with an apparent attitude of 'Us' vs 'The Rest of The World'), are committing a huge proportion of their produced wealth to nothing other than building and maintaining destructive weapons and supportive armies. By now it as almost a cliche to point out that if all the wealth that now goes into the creation and maintenance of armies and engines of destruction were put to more constructive uses, the quality of life for everyone in the world would be transformed for the better almost as if by magic. Such is the wealth available in our world, and such is the way that so much of it is being misapplied.

Such a ridiculous state of affairs is indeed insanity on a massive scale. And, such massive insanity is, in and of itself, an indication that a major Swindle is going on.

But, the potential horrors of a nuclear exchange and the expenditure of obscene amounts of produced wealth on the machinery for mass destruction aren't the only realities on the international scene indicative of the Great Swindle.

The actual, and not just potential, amount of physical and armed war, strife, military 'hot' spots and terrorism around the world remains at a distressful high, and seems to be getting worse.

There is what seems to be intransigent and intractable conflict going on in the Near East, the Far East, Central Asia, Central America, Eastern Europe, Africa, Ireland, and various and sundry other places around the globe. These wars and armed conflicts are very much a REALITY right now.

(The ironies underlying the mere fact of the election of a President Bush II, and his domestic policies and his policies with regard to Iraq and elsewhere, are replete with indicia of the totality of the Great Swindle (not just 'Us' vs. 'Them') and how it is operating at this very moment in time. Perhaps more on this in the future.)

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In trying to figure out the causes of these various conflicts, experienced and learned diplomats and professors of political science tell us that the causes are so complex and complicated that only the experience and learning of these diplomats and professors can possibly have a chance at sorting it all out.

And that is hogwash  !

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The true root cause, which has created and sustains all of these conflicts is actually very uncomplicated and obvious if we will just open our eyes and minds and look at the situation as it REALLY is.

It is the 'Us' vs. 'Them' syndrome in action. It is nothing more complex than 'Us' subjugating or annihilating or engaging in endless and mutual fighting with and killing of 'Them', because that is the way 'Us's and 'Them's relate with one another in this "real" world.

How do 'We' justify enslaving or even annihilating 'Them'? Simple. 'They' are not 'Us' and, therefore, 'We' have the 'God given' right, or even 'commandment', to do these things, or anything else we want to do, to 'Them'.

Or, in those conflicts based upon historical mutual animosity (where no one but the 'Us's involved can possibly figure out who started it or which side is more the aggressor), such as in the Middle East and Northern Ireland, why do 'We' hate and kill 'Them'? Well, because 'They' hate and kill 'Us'.

And with respect to those mutual conflicts whose roots are embedded in history, what with all the atrocities each side has by now committed upon the other, whatever complaints and grievances either side may now have against the other, as diverse and varying as those grievances may appear to be in any particular conflict in the eyes of some, they are all the result of nothing other than the injuries each side has inflicted on the other as each side has lived up to the supposed "realities" inherent in the 'Us' vs. 'Them' mode of thinking.

If the Grand Distractor of 'Us' vs. 'Them' weren't in operation at the beginning of their mutual animosity and right up until now, neither side would have perceived any temptation or threat from the other side, and, consequently, neither side would have felt any need, nor found any justification, for inflicting injury on the other.

No battle lines would have been drawn in the first place because there would have been no antagonistic group distinctions upon which to base them. There would simply have been no atmosphere within which any conflict could have ever developed on the scale that it has.

And finally with regard to the political manifestations of 'Us' vs. 'Them', it can be seen operating in the contentions and struggles between sub-divisions within each nation state; and in urban vs. rural, east vs. west, city vs. city, etc. And although these 'factional' struggles don't usually erupt into armed conflict [although on occasion they do], and are as much an economic struggle as a political one, they nonetheless draw their basis and sustenance from 'Us' vs. 'Them'.

Finally, along the broad middle of the social spectrum, between the polar extremes of the competition between nuclear families and the armed conflict between nation states, there is the pervasive operation of 'Us' vs. 'Them' in class, racial and religious bigotry, contention and competition.

Numberless large volumes could be (and have been) written on the nature and intricacies of all these various struggles and conflicts. We won't go into those intricacies here; and we won't for the simple reason that all those intricacies are not, and shed no light upon, the true causes of these conflicts, and are only the result of the conflicts themselves. To get into the intricacies of each particular conflict is to get swallowed up in details and fail to see the forest for the trees.

Because, once again, the sole cause of all these various ethnic, racial and class struggles and conflicts, is nothing more complicated than 'Us' vs. 'Them' distracting our attention toward the superficial differences between us, and away from the overwhelming and essential similarities and interdependence between us.

It is true enough that these things are the way they are at the moment, and our understanding of how they came about and what actually causes them to persist doesn't change the FACT of the matter. But, our understanding that it is the Grand Distractor of 'Us' vs. 'Them', and nothing else  , which created and sustains these conflicts, does, for a FACT, point the way to how we can go about ending them, one of these days, once and for all.