Chasing satisfaction

I'm old now.

One of the great benefits of aging, of which there are few, is observing other people for long amounts of time and watching their journey evolve and change. The wisdom gained is infinitesimally small at any one point, but it accumulates, especially when watching friends slowly become radicalized.

When I see my friends adopt positions that do not make sense for them to adopt, either because the position is an underbaked insane one that makes no sense, or because it is coherent but explicitly makes things worse for them, I try to see why they would even embark on this journey in the first place. Two cases studies, no real names:

1. Cletus. Cletus was born into money, a lot of money, his family is an immigrant family and his father was very proud of immigrating from a Western European, non-English speaking country and making a life for himself in Canada. He came with very little money and started a very successful business around homebuilding. Insanely successful, one could say, considering his English skills by the time I knew him (maybe 20 years after he moved to Canada) still kind of sucked.

   Anyway, Cletus seemed like he was okay with all this but for reasons I cannot understand started to hate the Liberal Party of Canada. I do not know why, maybe because for his political-opinion forming years they ran Ontario and maybe taxed his father’s business or multiple properties more than he would have thought fair? Maybe he had no critical thinking skills and his conservatively-minded family reinforced these ideas?

   I could share stories about the various prejudices he would have been exposed to but it’s not worth expanding because the basic point is that my friend Cletus was and is, well, kind of a dumbass. Weak in scholastics, weak in logic, weak in argument, and never really able to parse why those things mattered. Just kind of a dumb-dumb. It didn’t really matter, we were friends, played sports, hung out, everything was cool, until Facebook happened. Then Cletus slowly surrounded himself with an echo chamber of people who gave him warm fuzzies for repeating the same kind of things he always had, as uncritically as ever, and not getting shit from his friends for being a dumbass.

   Cletus is a product of the immigration system, and was for the most part proud to be Canadian. Now he is thankful for the Canada that never existed: one that awarded the merit exhibited by his father, a deserving immigrant who contributes to society, and gave his family the opportunity to thrive because of (presumably) a combination of competent government and benevolent society. Now the Canada he sees is catering to evil immigrants who just want to take over and institute non-Canadian policies, whatever those are, and only by reposting lame videos and repeating the same talking points can he hope to make a difference.

2. Reginald. Reginald is a smart guy who had a very difficult life. We’re talking 95th percentile in terms of difficulty, think toxic upbringing, unstable housing situation, no money, etc. I think he found his community and ended up doing fantastically well considering the shit hand he was dealt. We met as adults and were friends for a long time until I moved away. He was very capable including doing things he had never tried before, loved exploring new ideas, and his employment situation was solid. He had a loving relationship and a home. Things were pretty good for Reggie.

   For some fucking reason, though, Reginald never really exhibited comfort with the state of affairs around him. This was a double-edged sword, on one hand he would strive to better himself, on the other hand there was a seemingly deep lack of self-confidence that led to him seeking guidance on issues that I suppose he thought were missing in his life. He would deep dive into some weird niche communities that I later discovered were essentially white supremacist groups. Groups that challenged members to be their best, were encouraging, and pushed back against things in society that would bother a man who feels like they are trying their best and not seeing the success they wish they saw. For example, maybe women are taking over and a man just can’t be a man anymore due to the pansification of society. Or something.

   Reginald is the first person who asked me if I had heard of Jordan Peterson or the Joe Rogan podcast. He started smoking a lot of weed and lending me books about why it’s okay to be a man, stuff like that, despite the fact that I never perceived his manful nature causing him any disadvantage. Then, suddenly, he decided lifting weights was very important as was the ability to protect yourself from vague threats, he one time mentioned the risk of suddenly falling off a ledge and having to pull yourself up it. Some people work out because they like it, but his working out seemed to be motivated by fear, or a perceived need to test his mettle in the future and not wanting to be found lacking. He was not an out-and-out fascist or anything, he just agreed with some general principles that, when taken to their natural conclusion, would lead to actions/suggestions that I don’t think Reginald would have agreed with earlier in our relationship. Reginald would dismiss my comments on the matter with a too-rehearsed-sounding “Well, if someone is too stupid to appreciate these points and call it all Nazi shit then there is no point talking with them.” Which of course sounds like a reasonable, non-isolating line for someone to knee-jerkingly pull off the top of their head.

   We drifted apart as our lives started to change, and gradually lost touch, but his ability to adopt pre-canned opinions was incredible to me. “What if the government comes and tries to take our freedoms?” was the response to the question of why he needed to buy three kinds of guns at once. I asked him if he could shoot all three guns at once and take out a tank like in Metal Slug. Liking guns is something that people can do, it’s allowed, why did he feel the need to defend it with a higher order concern? Because someone told him he had to.

Cletus and Reginald share a characteristic, the desire to be completely satisfied. They want answers, they want equilibrium, they want the world to be orderly and predictable, they want the world to just make sense. For Cletus this is (maybe) achieved by limiting your exposure to ideas you don’t like, for Reginald it is achieved by continually sifting through the endless amount of information out there and plucking ideas you like, running with them, then dropping them when a new one comes along. The problem is that some ideas are more weaponized, they have more tactics to draw people in, and are coordinated by malicious actors, thus radicalization.

I would argue that part of being a human is that you will never be satisfied, ever. Never, ever, ever. Even billionaires who live the life of veritable gods compared to us are not satisfied, they continue to chase power or money or experiences. Satisfaction is a Zen state that monks meditate on for years. It’s not something you can achieve by buying things or adopting a new motto, I don’t think this is a unique insight by me, it was literally taught to us in cartoons as children, but seeing the parallel situation in your own life is hard when you are not in the headspace to critically assess.

What does this have to do with Satanism? Well, Newcomers in our congregation will sometimes hit the ground running, consuming any and all information they can about Temple Satanism, trying to reconcile that with their pre-existing ideas, and comparing what’s left with what they hoped to get out of TST. I think that us being here and existing is unambiguously good for satisfaction chasing individuals, even if they don’t stick around. The best way to help, I think, is to model the tenets, as people yearning for something else did not arrive there randomly, so we can help them if they are adrift by showing them what it means to be a Satanist, rather than telling them.