Dynamic Tension
Where’s The Cat? Where’s The Cradle? Pt. II
In my 32 years, I have never seen America more divided than it appears to be right now. In the six months since the turn of this new decade, we’ve been haphazardly navigating one unprecedented (god, I’ve grown to hate that word) challenge after another. We’ve been white-knuckling it in the back seat of a careening vehicle driven by COVID-19. We’ve watched as tens of thousands have died here and hundreds of thousands have died elsewhere while the national and global response has been pathetically ineffectual. We’ve seen widespread protesting and isolated riots across the country as persistent racial inequality and condemnable police brutality have reared their hideous heads yet again. We’ve watched with bated breath as the economy teeters on the brink, having absorbed the haymakers of these confounding circumstances. Recession, we’re told, is either already here, or assuredly on its way.
And in case all that wasn’t enough, it’s an election year in our country that’s been deeply and fundamentally divided by the mere existence of the current administration. The next four years hang in the balance.
But lest we lose our collective cool, we’ve been divided before. In fact, we’ve always been divided. Contrary to a growing public perception, America is still a free country after all, and the ability to espouse a belief or promote a viewpoint that challenges the orthodoxy is not only allowed, but encouraged. The examples of this are so ingrained into our identity as a nation that I don’t even need to enumerate them here. There have been winners and there have been losers. There have been resounding victories and shameful defeats. There have been heroic moments of strength and there have been horrific acts of violence and collateral damage. It would seem, at least today, that the negative outcomes feel more impactful than the positive ones. But for all the devastating tragedies, atrocities and indefensible acts we’ve endured as a nation, we have remained united through it all.
It’s counterintuitive to think about a nation becoming stronger because of discord, conflict, and tension among its citizens. Our gut would tell us that if we could rid ourselves of these things and agree to meet beneath a single, unified banner, that we’d become a utopia, like-minded and unequivocally harmonious. Wouldn’t that be great? Human nature suggests otherwise. Idealism is, almost by definition, relegated to the hypothetical, however difficult that may be to admit. History reminds us that the concept of achieving utopia is not only hilariously untenable, but actually a horrifically dangerous and dependably murderous thing to attempt. So if a utopia is out of the question, what’s the next best thing? If we can’t--and we can’t--all want, strive for, and believe the same things, then where do we draw our strength from as a nation? Could it be that it’s derived from our freedom to stand up against things we disagree with? Could it be that the only way to keep ourselves strong enough to ensure safety from would-be oppressors is to exercise our conflict muscles regularly against each other?
In Chapter 47 of Cat’s Cradle, Kurt Vonnegut ponders the sociological implications of the concept of “Dynamic Tension”, a non-fictional muscle building theory pioneered by real-life body-builder Charles Atlas. Atlas theorized that “muscles could be built without bar bells or spring exercises, (but rather) by simply pitting one set of muscles against another.” Vonnegut’s character Lionel Boyd Johnson, who will become Bokonon, the founder of Bokononism, a religion that informs the philosophy of Cat’s Cradle, wonders whether the concept of Dynamic Tension could be employed in an effort to bring utopia to a third-world country. Would it be possible to create a great society “by simply pitting good against evil, and by keeping the tension between the two high at all times?” Can Dynamic Tension bring harmony to the fictional island nation of San Lorenzo? Could it bring harmony to America?
DYNAMIC TENSION IN SAN LORENZO
When Lionel Boyd Johnson and Corporal McCabe are washed ashore on San Lorenzo after being shipwrecked on a voyage from Haiti to Miami, they find themselves upon a blank canvas. The incumbent rulers of the small Caribbean nation, Julian Castle and his sugar company, are all too eager to relinquish control of the island. Johnson and McCabe, without reason to question Castle’s lack of resistance, stroll into the capital and effortlessly assume control of San Lorenzo and its 450,000 inhabitants.
In Chapters 56 & 57, we learn of the strange history of the island. We’re told that San Lorenzo has been stuck in a “queasy dream” where conquerors arrive to shoo away the incumbent rulers, who invariably offer no resistance. The new conquerors proudly assume control, only to quickly discover that there’s nothing at all on the island worth controlling. A sense of malaise settles in upon the newly instated regime and they reluctantly retain control until, when the next fearsome conquerors inevitably arrive, they graciously hand over the keys with a knowing and relieved smirk on their faces. This cycle has perpetuated since the sixteenth century. All the while, the nearly half million inhabitants of the island have seen exactly zilch in terms of meaningful or even noticeable improvements to their way of life.
“Bokononism: a religion that eschews the spiritual and supernatural in favor of a sense of mystical realism.”
Johnson and McCabe nobly endeavor to end the cycle of exploitation and hapless rule. They devise a plan to create a utopia on San Lorenzo by repurposing the fitness theory of Dynamic Tension. Johnson theorizes that, like muscles, a society can be strengthened by pitting one side against the other (good vs. evil) and by maintaining the tension between the two.
In order to create the illusion of good vs. evil for the inhabitants of the island, Johnson and McCabe agree to embody the two sides themselves. McCabe assumes the title of President of San Lorenzo with the intention of representing the “evil” presence of government. Johnson, conversely, becomes “good” Bokonon, the benevolent founder of Bokononism, a religion that eschews the spiritual and supernatural in favor of a sense of mystical realism. The two agree that in order for Bokononism to hold water and gain a following among the people, Bokonon should be vilified and forced into hiding. Likewise, his religion must be outlawed and practitioners sentenced by McCabe’s government to public execution.
The method of execution on San Lorenzo is “the Hook”, a sort of oversized fish hook suspended from a beam atop a gallows. Petty thieves, religious dissidents and murderers alike are punished by being put to death, impaled through the gut, before a crowd of spectators. Incidentally, while Jonah is on the plane to see San Lorenzo for the first time, he has a conversation with the Crosbys in which Hazel explains that she and her husband had once seen a similar execution implement on display in a museum. She describes it as having been on display behind a curtain, which had to be pulled aside in order to view it. According to Hazel, there was a posted sign stating that children were not supposed to look, but of course they found that kids were disobeying the sign left and right. Hazel explains, “a sign like that is just catnip to kids.”
So Johnson and McCabe theorize that the simple act of outlawing Bokononism and driving Bokonon himself into hiding will provide the required “zest” needed for the religion to spread like wildfire among the people of San Lorenzo. They understand that there’s really little difference between kids and adults. Adults have the delusion that they understand things, while children generally accept that there are things that they don’t know. Jonah, mere hours after arriving on the island, discovers that despite the religion being outlawed, everyone on San Lorenzo is a Bokononist, even, he’ll later learn, the current President, “Papa” Monzano.
In this way, Johnson (now Bokonon) and McCabe effectively create the illusion of institutionalized good vs. evil on San Lorenzo. They reason that this will be sufficient to eventually yield a utopia, but of course, they are quickly proven wrong. It doesn’t take long for McCabe to tire of playing the face of evil. He’s not, after all, an evil person, and pretending to be one doesn’t sit well. Likewise, Bokonon struggles to embody his new role as the island’s paper tiger saint. After realizing the minuscule effect their artificial tension has had among their people, they each lose hope in their own way. McCabe abandons the plan altogether, appointing his major domo to the San Lorenzan Presidency before putting a bullet in his own brain. Bokonon, at a loss without his friend and adversary, finds his once meaningful life of hermitude now devoid of purpose.
WHY DYNAMIC TENSION FAILED IN SAN LORENZO
What does Bokonon and McCabe’s failure to successfully implement Dynamic Tension on San Lorenzo suggest about its potential viability elsewhere? After all, San Lorenzo is far from an accurate representation of humanity. The fictional country doesn’t serve as an accurate proxy for any major society on Earth, at least not today.* Even 21st century third-world countries are different from San Lorenzo in that they are, however regrettably, exploitable in some way. No matter how impoverished or barren a country seems to be, humans have proven to be skilled at extracting some form of wealth from it. In the less common instances of the discovery of completely impotent territories, would-be conquerors have simply moved on, and if they did stick around for any length of time, the thought of socially engineering a utopia out of the nothingness certainly didn’t occur to them. Nor should it have, with the promise of richer territories nearby. Julian Castle’s sugar company on San Lorenzo operated under a feudal system, where native workers were indentured to the company and toiled for no pay, but the company never turned a profit either, so there was no incentive for Castle to resist Johnson and McCabe’s bid to “overthrow” him.
*There are a number of other arguments for why a utopia, or even a relatively comfortable society, could never exist on San Lorenzo. If the island was utterly bereft of resources beyond those required for survival, then the inhabitants could never be self-sufficient and would, necessarily, be dependent on outside world in order to graduate to some higher societal plane. This begs the philosophical, or perhaps semantic, argument of what “utopia” truly refers to and whether a utopia could actually be achieved amidst abject poverty if the constituent population had no knowledge of a better alternative. If that’s the case, then it stands to reason that there already was a utopia on San Lorenzo prior to the onset of the queasy dream.
Johnson and McCabe, though perhaps the first “conquerors” of San Lorenzo with noble intentions, were ultimately as unsuccessful as all the others not because their plan to bring utopia to the nation was fundamentally flawed, but because the population they sought to impose it on was incompatible. The problem is in their introduction of artificial and ultimately meaningless institutions intended to represent the dueling sides required for Dynamic Tension. The two saw the natives as a pristine sample of humanity, primed for adopting their vision of utopia. But they overlooked the fact that, despite perhaps having a cursory awareness of more vibrant and comfortable lives being led elsewhere (based on the existence of technologically superior conquerors arriving on their shores), the natives had extremely limited knowledge of any alternative and certainly had no ability (or reason) to compare their society with any other.
In order for Dynamic Tension as Johnson and McCabe envisioned it to have worked on San Lorenzo, the population itself would have had to have split into two factions, one which sided with and served the “evil” government, and the other which embraced the teachings of Bokonon. Because the inhabitants of the island had spent the last five hundred years watching conqueror after conqueror assume control of the island and either instituting some form of oppressive regime or, at best, affecting no change at all on the island, not a single one of them had any reason to side with McCabe’s “evil” government, which to them was just the next in an endless chain of conquerors.
Dynamic Tension only works if tension can be maintained. In order for tension to be achieved and maintained, the two opposing sides need to be able to push and pull effectively against each other. San Lorenzans had grown accustomed to one-sided scenarios where the regime-du-jour had an inordinate ability to impose its will and they, the natives, were without the means to push back. This is why real-world dictatorships, despite having an obvious good vs. evil dynamic, never achieve anything positive; the ability to create tension between the two just isn’t there and the result is oppression.
On the other hand, every San Lorenzan found in Bokononism ideas which resonated with them. They were a people resigned to living on an island which offered them nothing beyond what was required to sustain themselves. They had witnessed the tragic comedy of rotating conquerors come and go pointlessly. Their existence itself brimmed with the kind of futility which Bokonon commented on so frequently. In essence, Bokononism was the first thing to have come to San Lorenzo that benefited the natives at all, and it did so because it acknowledged just how bereft of meaning their lives seemed to be. This is why everyone in the entire nation gravitated towards it, even the ones that were supposed to represent the opposing side.
Johnson and McCabe’s plan to institute a system of Dynamic Tension on San Lorenzo was informed by their previous travels. They had seen societies the world over which embraced the tension, where the citizens naturally gravitated to opposing sides based on their unique and diverse experiences. In those types of societies, artificially implemented opposing institutions could gain traction and attract support because there existed far more disparity among the opinions and viewpoints of the population. The natives of San Lorenzo, however, were so galvanized by their menial existence that the allure of joining the side of the oppressor simply never occurred to any of them. In the absence of two clearly defined and populated sides, Dynamic Tension cannot exist.
THE MERITS OF REAL-WORLD DYNAMIC TENSION
If Dynamic Tension failed on San Lorenzo because of a lack of diversity in viewpoints among the natives, then how does it fare and what does it do for a population possessed of the most eclectic and diverse viewpoints of any in human history? It’s not a particularly bold statement to say that there are examples of Dynamic Tension working to varying degrees across all levels of our society. In some cases, like sports rivalries, the impact is innocuous, but the effect is incredibly strong. There’s a reason why even casual observers will tune in to watch the Yankees vs. Red Sox, Packers vs. Bears, or Lakers vs. Celtics. The level of tension between sports rivals benefits both sides, as well as neutral parties. It’s important to note that the effect is optimized when both sides have strong teams. If one side is having a great season and the other is floundering, the effect is lessened, as it’s much less compelling to watch a game when the outcome is all but guaranteed.
Perhaps the best example of the merits of Dynamic Tension is the relationship between labor unions and the corporations which employ their members. In the days before the advent of unions, workers were subject to a bevy of undesirable working conditions including long hours, long weeks, and oppressive and often dangerous working environments. Rogue groups of justifiably disgruntled workers lashed out at their employers but their gripes were brushed off like they were nothing. It wasn’t until the workers realized that if they banded together and agreed upon a set of shared objectives, their employers would have a much harder time ignoring their concerns and demands. Now, though the system is not without flaw, the relationship between labor unions and corporations guarantees that neither side is inordinately oppressed or taken advantage of. So long as the tension between them remains, both the workers and the corporations can get what they want.
GOOD VS. EVIL
One interesting thing to note regarding real-world examples of Dynamic Tension is that the distinction between “good” and “evil” is usually hyperbolic. Realistically, every side engaged in this type of an arrangement views themselves as “good guys” and their opponents as “bad guys”, while tacitly acknowledging that their relationship is more akin to protagonist vs. antagonist, and not necessarily a statement about their “goodness” or their opponent’s “evilness”. This might seem like a petty observation, but it becomes easier to identify examples in our lives when those extreme conditions are understood to be relaxed.
On the other hand, there are certainly examples in our country that embrace the bonafide “Good vs. Evil” rhetoric. The 24-hour news cycle is abounding with examples of this, though of course the assignment of which side is “Good” and which is “Evil” is subject to change depending on what channel you’re watching. While animosity has always existed between Democrats and Republicans, the level of vitriol and hatred between them has been exacerbated by the polarizing nature of Donald Trump’s presidency. We’ve seen a rise in the proliferation of “Negative Partisanship”, or the tendency of people to choose a side not based on the merits of that side, but by the perceived flaws (“Evils”) of the opposing side.
In this example, the sides are starkly defined, so much so that the real estate between them, once occupied by a huge contingent espousing moderate viewpoints, is becoming increasingly barren. It is a clear example of Dynamic Tension, perhaps the strongest one there is. The question is whether this polarization is making us stronger or weaker. The tension between these two sides seems to be at DEFCON-6 all the time. Each side is galvanized together in their virtuous assertion that they are right and the other is wrong. Or are they? Why does it feel as though the divide between these two sides is making us weaker? Is it because Dynamic Tension isn’t real, doesn’t work, or doesn’t apply? No, no, and no.
IS THERE SUCH A THING AS “TOO MUCH FREEDOM”?
Dynamic Tension is becoming decreasingly effective as a tool for strengthening America for the exact opposite reason it was ineffective on San Lorenzo. There, you’ll remember, Dynamic Tension failed because the population possessed too few opposing beliefs, viewpoints, opinions, or ideas. The natives were, without fail, united in their beaten down and oppressed mentality. Therefore, there were none among them who were able or willing to embody the role of “them”. It was only “us”.
In 2020 America, we have the opposite problem. There is such a mind-blowingly huge number of differing viewpoints--all of which are justified with varying levels of legitimacy--that the perceived value of all viewpoints has become diluted. The tired, but impossible to deny culprit for the cultivation of these viewpoints and for the reinforcement that they are of equal import is social media. Not only has social media mutated the way truth is defined and perceived, but its prevalence has all but demanded that traditional media follow suit, forgoing objective reporting for content and perspectives tailored to increasingly acute viewpoints. Once it became possible for subjective truth to supplant peoples’ thirst for objective truth, the perceived value of objective truth was reduced to equal the perceived value of subjective truth. That is to say they became one and the same. Objective truth has become open to interpretation and as vulnerable to dismissal as any lunatic fringe theory.
And, yes, “subjective truth” is an oxymoron. There’s no such thing--except in the realm of individual perception. Personal beliefs, values, feelings and opinions have become conflated with “truth” such that rather than entering into a debate or discussion with someone over a belief, value, feeling or opinion, we now witness people battling in defense of their own personal “truths”. And of course, really, “truth” is not up for debate.
So how does this devaluation of objective truth lead to the decrease in efficacy of Dynamic Tension? Dynamic tension relies on two opposing forces pushing and pulling against each other constantly in order to strengthen both sides. What we have now is a panoply of opposing forces all pushing inordinately against all the others. No one can settle on two distinct sides because we’ve traded nuanced understanding and even productive disagreement for an unwillingness to budge from a position we find most comfortable. This, coupled with the escalated sense that anything that does not jive with our position is not just different, or even wrong, but immoral, discriminatory, fascist, racist, deplorable, unconscionable, et cetera, leads to a self-righteous sense of moral superiority where to admit a willingness to compromise, change your mind, or find merit in opposing viewpoints is unacceptable.
The existence of the two major political parties and their followings seems to indicate that Dynamic Tension should still exist between them. But the rise in the viability of subjective truth among their constituents has drastically loosened whatever obligation they once had to virtuous campaigning or representation. Now, all they have to do is illustrate, however obliquely, that their opponents are hate-worthy, a task which has never required less effort.
WE ARE MORE ALIKE, MY FRIENDS, THAN UNALIKE
The ideal that everyone should be able to voice their opinion with equal footing and with equally weighted legitimacy is one that, while sounding instinctively good in the hypothetical realm, has been proven over the last decade to be not only counterproductive, but fundamentally disastrous. It has led to the devaluation of objective truth, which has in turn led to a reality where no one’s voice or opinion holds as much weight as it, ideally, should. The San Lorenzans, though oppressed, impoverished and generally and historically downtrodden, were actually galvanized in their shared experience and their collective situation. Because of this, none among them were willing to take up the mantle of the oppressor and turn against their fellow citizens. Dynamic Tension failed to lift the natives to an elevated quality of life, let alone a utopia, because there was no one to genuinely embody the “other”, and thus tension could not be created, let alone sustained.
In America, we’ve witnessed the emergence of millions of sides, nations of one or few, which were once united by precious nuance, which has become collateral damage in the assault on objective truth. The tension we feel is not from the pressure of a singular opposing force, but rather from the sensation of being pushed from too many directions and have too many directions in which to push back. It feels as though like-minded fellow citizens no longer exist, but of course that is not the case.
America needs to find a way to reinstitute a system of Dynamic Tension. In order to do this, we need to reopen channels of communication with those whose views, while perhaps not identical to our own, are similar enough for us to find middle ground. We need to encourage those who we fundamentally disagree with to do the same on the other side. We need to remind ourselves that attention to nuance is not a weakness, but a strength, as well as a powerful tool for unification. We need to remember that the people we interact with almost certainly know something we don’t know and that new information, insight, wisdom and perspective should be craved rather than shunned.
Dynamic Tension absolutely works, but it requires cooperation, patience, understanding, unity, and a recognition that we can accomplish much more by working together than we can alone.
Part III Coming Soon >