[Bill,
May 26, 2009]
Changing the Narrative
Who's Afraid of Virginia Woolf? was a play about an abusive couple who made up a story about a non-existent son. For years, apparently, George and Martha have worked together to pretend they had a boy. They have an agreement that neither is ever to mention the "son" to others. When Martha violates this rule, George alters the narrative -- he kills off the boy in a terrible accident. Martha is shattered by the change. Apparently, she takes a lot of comfort in this illusion.
When it comes to politics, controlling the narrative is crucial. If one side finds itself in the other side's narrative, it's all over -- one side is the hero, and the other side is the villain.
From about 1932 to 1980, the Democrats flat-out controlled the American narrative. They didn't control the facts, but they controlled how the facts were told. And we humans tend to remember stories and to tell the story of our own lives in the sense of these over-arching narratives. We see ourselves as characters in a larger story. We become committed to our characters, we develop our own storylines, and they affect how we see the world, how we act, and what we think is important.
In 1980, a masterful storyteller named Ronald Reagan came along and interrupted the liberal narrative. Some were so convinced by his retelling of the American story that they changed sides. Others, like myself, waited to see how things would work out -- when the facts clearly showed that Reagan was correct on economic and national security policy, we changed sides belatedly.
However, Reagan didn't triumph. He merely started an argument. On economic policy and issues like statism, however, the GOP gained the upper hand. Liberals needed to talk into our narrative, our story, and by 1994, we had control of Congress.
But at no point did liberals entirely concede the narrative. They kept telling stories, especially in Hollywood, in the press, and in the universities, and refused to concede. The GOP, however, still struggled with certain aspects of the cultural narrative -- the Dems have always been able to paint the GOP as racists, sexists, xenophobic ... and the GOP has largely been on the defensive, and sought instead to inhabit the liberals' narratives -- that is, work within the terms established by liberals. The result, for about 20 years, was that liberals found themselves having to prove they weren't tax-and-spend (that is, trying to work within the GOP's story) and conservatives tried to show they weren't racist, sexist or otherwise mean-spirited (that is, trying to work within the liberals' story.)
I am speaking of how the story plays out in the media and in people's perceptions -- not how people actually are, if you follow. In fact, both political parties talk about the importance of "the narrative".
Both Bush presidencies, among their other failures, were failures to maintain and strengthen the conservative narrative bequeathed by Reagan. And folks who did continue the conservative story simply weren't as good storytellers as Ronald Reagan. It didn't help that certain regional voices dominated. Clinton, however, was often our best friend, repeatedly stealing conservative themes and trying to insert them into the liberal story -- a sign of victory that certain conservatives took offense to, out of sheer stupidity.
After Dubya busted the paradigms with his big-spending conservatisms, the movement is really in the shit, as far as storytelling, both on cultural and economic grounds. Events (the economic meltdown) didn't help. And then a photogenic, smiling candidate with an atrocious background has taken control of the narrative, enabled by a compliant media and Hollywood stars who hated that Reagan proved them wrong and were eager for vindication.
Conservatives first step to rebuilding needs to involve re-casting the narrative. But before we take power again, we need to look at the demographics. There are two groups of natural conservatives -- Hispanics and blacks, who should be our allies. We have the Asians and the whites, particularly white males, but that's no longer enough. We are on the verge of checkmate and permanent minority status.
What is the new narrative? That's the question. I'm still mulling it over.
When it comes to politics, controlling the narrative is crucial. If one side finds itself in the other side's narrative, it's all over -- one side is the hero, and the other side is the villain.
From about 1932 to 1980, the Democrats flat-out controlled the American narrative. They didn't control the facts, but they controlled how the facts were told. And we humans tend to remember stories and to tell the story of our own lives in the sense of these over-arching narratives. We see ourselves as characters in a larger story. We become committed to our characters, we develop our own storylines, and they affect how we see the world, how we act, and what we think is important.
In 1980, a masterful storyteller named Ronald Reagan came along and interrupted the liberal narrative. Some were so convinced by his retelling of the American story that they changed sides. Others, like myself, waited to see how things would work out -- when the facts clearly showed that Reagan was correct on economic and national security policy, we changed sides belatedly.
However, Reagan didn't triumph. He merely started an argument. On economic policy and issues like statism, however, the GOP gained the upper hand. Liberals needed to talk into our narrative, our story, and by 1994, we had control of Congress.
But at no point did liberals entirely concede the narrative. They kept telling stories, especially in Hollywood, in the press, and in the universities, and refused to concede. The GOP, however, still struggled with certain aspects of the cultural narrative -- the Dems have always been able to paint the GOP as racists, sexists, xenophobic ... and the GOP has largely been on the defensive, and sought instead to inhabit the liberals' narratives -- that is, work within the terms established by liberals. The result, for about 20 years, was that liberals found themselves having to prove they weren't tax-and-spend (that is, trying to work within the GOP's story) and conservatives tried to show they weren't racist, sexist or otherwise mean-spirited (that is, trying to work within the liberals' story.)
I am speaking of how the story plays out in the media and in people's perceptions -- not how people actually are, if you follow. In fact, both political parties talk about the importance of "the narrative".
Both Bush presidencies, among their other failures, were failures to maintain and strengthen the conservative narrative bequeathed by Reagan. And folks who did continue the conservative story simply weren't as good storytellers as Ronald Reagan. It didn't help that certain regional voices dominated. Clinton, however, was often our best friend, repeatedly stealing conservative themes and trying to insert them into the liberal story -- a sign of victory that certain conservatives took offense to, out of sheer stupidity.
After Dubya busted the paradigms with his big-spending conservatisms, the movement is really in the shit, as far as storytelling, both on cultural and economic grounds. Events (the economic meltdown) didn't help. And then a photogenic, smiling candidate with an atrocious background has taken control of the narrative, enabled by a compliant media and Hollywood stars who hated that Reagan proved them wrong and were eager for vindication.
Conservatives first step to rebuilding needs to involve re-casting the narrative. But before we take power again, we need to look at the demographics. There are two groups of natural conservatives -- Hispanics and blacks, who should be our allies. We have the Asians and the whites, particularly white males, but that's no longer enough. We are on the verge of checkmate and permanent minority status.
What is the new narrative? That's the question. I'm still mulling it over.