There is a parable about a man from the country who goes in search of The Law. He arrives at the entrance to the Halls of the Law, guarded by a mean looking Gatekeeper who blocks his path, saying he may not enter at this time. The man from the country tries to persuade, then to cajole and finally to bribe him but the gatekeeper is resolute and will not let him in, though he does give him a stool to sit on.
Hours turn to days and weeks to years. The man from the country continues to badger the gatekeeper to let him pass, citing his right to know the Law, trying to wheedle snippets of the Law from the Gatekeeper himself, begging and pleading, even enlisting the fleas in the Gatekeepers beard to mediate on his behalf.
Finally, the man from the country lies dying. He beckons to the Gatekeeper for a final exchange.. ‘What now?’ asks the Gatekeeper, ‘you are insatiable.’ ‘Everyone strives to attain the Law,’ answers the man, ‘how does it come about, then, that in all these years no one has come seeking admittance but me?’ The doorkeeper bellows in his ear: ‘ This door was intended only for you. I am now going to shut it.”
Its tempting to feel sorry for the man from the country but then his MO is precisely to get people to feel sorry for him so that no-one need notice he has wasted his life. The parable is told by Kafka in his novel, ‘The Trial’. The protagonist, Joseph K is inexplicably arrested for unknown crimes, charged by an unknown law and ultimately executed by unknown assailants. You quickly understand that his crime is this waste of his life, an endless stream of self justification besprinkled with pathological entitlement dressed up as a virtue. Its as though eternally importuning the Gatekeeper were some heroic venture. In this passive refusal to be himself he also forgets what others are for and so they become dehumanized, mere extensions of his determination to have his own way.
“Next time I come here,” Joseph K said to himself, “I must either bring sweets with me to make them like me or a stick to hit them with.”
― Franz Kafka, The Trial
The man from the country, who is Joseph K himself, cannot gain admittance to the Law because he cannot detail his own crimes, his failings and shortcomings, he cannot acknowledge his own shadow. His strategy for getting past the Gatekeeper is entirely based on the concept of his own innocence which, ironically, amounts to the crime for which he is finally condemned. The man from the country looks earnest but is actually the duplicitous weasel of you and me, more interested in the drama of how hard done by he is than in facing the elaborate strategy he has constructed to keep himself from the stream of life. Even his final end, murdered with a butcher’s knife, has the feel of orchestration to it. His final words, ‘like a dog…’ are as much stage directions as protest.
By the same token you can’t help wondering if the trial of the century about to unfold is really not the whole point of the Trump Presidency rather than its nemesis and whether it has not been brewing since the ink was still wet on the Constitution. My analyst Chuck always used to say, ‘you are possessed by whatever you are unconsciously identified with.’ The Man from the country was unconsciously identified with his own entitlement which then kept him trapped on his stool for a life time. The President is unconsciously identified with the trickster showman, which cares little for out come so long as there is a good crowd. PT Barnum’s genius lay in the recognition that for the showman ‘there is no such thing as bad publicity.’ Or, as Oscar Wilde put it. ‘There is only one thing in life worse than being talked about, and that is not being talked about.’
It will be a perfect Trial. Like you’ve never seen before. The crowds outside will be bigger than any other impeached president. They’re already saying that its the greatest trial on the planet, ever. More criminal than Nixon. More lurid than Clinton. Believe me. We’re having a hard time tonight. Roll up, roll up.
What more exciting finale for the showman than to be front and center on the world stage for his own swan song, to have committed never before seen impeachable acts to dizzy the imagination and delight the senses. See the amazing bearded lady collude with a foreign power. Sit aghast at the clowns with-holding military aid as leverage over an ally. Thrill to the twisting and turning senate who risk their acrobatic necks in legal jeopardy whenever they open their mouths. Roll up, roll up.
In the meantime, clutching popcorn and snacks, the public settle into their sofas for the spectacle. The reality TV show host never disappoints. Whatever he says or does can be guaranteed to fire you up one way or another. Isn’t that what he’s for? Isn’t the real news here how we have grossly underestimated the extent of our collective need to be entertained.?
I recently heard corruption described as ‘improper dependence’. Its a great definition because it captures the ides that corruption can be psychological as well as financial. The man from the country is corrupted by improper dependence on his notion of being without stain coupled with slavish yet secret dependence on the Gatekeeper as arbiter of his meaning and purpose. It fails to occur to him that there is more to life than the satisfaction of his personal desires, even the virtuous ones.
Mr Trump’s financial corruption may be more evident than the corrupt loss of soul involved in passively giving yourself over to an archetype though it is the lion’s share of the complex. The Showman is guaranteed an audience just as the Man from the country may be sure of his stool and the Gatekeeper’s eternal gaze. It is arranged for you to be the center of attention with the same assuredness then presided over your demise.
And we millions on our softer stools, commenting one way or another at TV coverage which will make OJ look like a commercial break, are no different the man from the country berating the Gatekeeper or Joseph K eternally citing others as reasons why he cannot live. We are consuming what we paid for, the drama of a reality TV host with nuclear codes whose gonna entertain you in a whole new way. Future generations, if there are any, will refer to us as Homo Vaudvillus, identifiable by the reflexively hunched shoulders of heightened anxiety and lowered center of gravity associated with hyper vigilance and eternal sitting.
Sometimes we grow, not by valiant effort but by accepting defeat. You cannot change your husband. You job doesn’t satisfy even if you put smiley face stickers on your lunch box. No amount of entertainment ultimately satisfies your itch. You find yourself walking away from the spectacle. Life itself steers us to experiences of defeat in order to lay bare our improper dependencies, the corruption of being a mere audience or bystander to life.
