Duty, defense, and altruism are the key concepts here. The basic concept of a "cause" can be expressed in the following formula: A "cause" involves a sense of duty to defend someone from a threat and gain a benefit. Duty, or a sense of obligation, is the reason why people justify their involvement in a cause: they feel impelled that they "should" get involved, "must" do something, "ought to" do their duty -- often expressed in work metaphors -- of a difficult, but necessary, job. Defense is viewed either as self-defense (survival, preservation) or, more commonly, as altruism, the defense of another who is often weaker, unable to defend self, who needs to be protected, or rescued Responding to a negative threat, a "cause" seeks a positive benefit. A "cause"
involves a sense of duty to defend someone from a threat and gain a
benefit.
These are the
key words (Qualities, Benefits) used in "cause"
rhetoric:
It's our Duty ... Obligation ... Responsibility ... Mission ... Job ... Work ... Task to Defend ... Protect ... Guard ... Save ... Help ... Shield ... Safeguard ... Aid ... Serve the ... Nation ... Country ... Homeland ... People ... Workers ... Common Man ... Poor ... Oppressed ... Children... Unborn ... Future... Animals .... Environment ... from a threat
and gain a benefit:
If the Threat is:
DOMINATION If the Threat is:
DEATH & DESTRUCTION If the Threat is:
INVASION If the Threat is:
RESTRICTION If the Threat is:
INJUSTICE If the Threat is:
CHAOS Causes often conflict, sometimes directly, more often indirectly. Opponents often disagree on what is the main issue. Often, the "hidden agenda" of any cause is power, dominance. Causes often cluster and group-bonding overlaps,
sometimes bringing together strange bedfellows. All people claim virtue and seek justice. Persuaders often repeat these key themes to justify the "cause." Individuals often benefit from "pep talks" as their self-image is enhanced, playing meaningful roles in dramatic conflicts. Diverse roles exist (e.g. prophet, liberator, avenger, righteous warrior) related to common themes; role-models from various sources often mix together. Leaders of groups also gain benefits of prestige, power, and, often, wealth. "True believers" in causes are likely to imply claims of moral superiority (often with a God-on-our-side attitude), epitomized in the advocate's attitude: "We are informed and good; they are ignorant and evil." Opponents are sometimes charged with unintentional flaws ("misguided, dupes") rather than with evil. In the 2004 election campaign, for example, the code-word to imply such righteousness was "values." But, sometimes the enemy is literally demonized as "pure Evil" or "the Great Satan." "If I know your
sect I anticipate your argument." - - Ralph Waldo Emerson
Thermostats & Wildfires So far this section has emphasized "pep talks" consciously created or delivered by professional persuaders deliberately trying to manipulate a group. Such attempts can be compared to thermostats in which the heat can be turned up or turned down to a desired end. However, "pep talks" can also get out of hand, can be like
wildfires.
People growing up in environments rich with propagandas are apt
to create their own internal dramas of conflicts stimulated by external
campaigns, but not under tight control. Individuals, for example,
in their own memory and imagination may internalize, rather unconsciously
and haphazardly, some rather strange combinations of "horror stories"
and "atrocity pictures." More commonly, we'll see "Letters to the Editor," or hear
soapbox speakers, with a bizarre assortment of incoherent ramblings,
a tirade of name-calling and invectives, and a disjointed collection
of "horror stories," buzzwords, and jargon. This section (above), originally in The Pep Talk (1980), is still pretty accurate, as far as it goes. At the time, I was thinking in terms of a lone madman with an AK47 or a bomb. As I update this in 2005, I recognize that it does not account for the organized terrorist attacks on September 11, 2001. I was stunned then, as nearly everyone else was, by the scope of that conspiracy and its methodical planning. This was not simply an individual "crackpot or a crazy," but a widespread religious fanaticism unseen in the West since the religious wars of the Reformation and the Inquisition. Other than the fragment reports in the press, I have little access to the propaganda of the fundamentalists in Arabic or other Islamic countries. But, from what I have seen, it indicates that the pattern of the "pep talk" (Threat, Bonding, Cause, Response) can be usefully applied to analyze it. Graham Fuller, The Future of Political Islam (p.145) -- "All societies prefer to ennoble their conflicts through justification at the highest level of moral cause. Thus, few will go to war in the name of capturing territory, destroying a rival, exacting revenge, gaining geopolitical hegemony, or seizing economic assets. Instead, war is waged in the name of Christian values, the proletarian revolution, the master race, the war to end all wars, the free world, the forces of history, manifest destiny, or whatever." This pattern of a "pep talk" is a useful structural framework to identify and to sort out the parts of complex, emotional controversies. Any use of a "pep talk" to stir the emotions, however, involves serious ethical issues. Questions to Consider: Is there an emphasis on duty? Is there emphasis on defending others? Who are these others who need defense? What key words, or concepts, are stressed?
FYI: also of interest here... Robert Reich, in The New Yorker (1997), on noble aspirations and just causes:"Politics is more than merely the pursuit of power. At its best, it involves the articulation of noble aspirations, on the one hand, and just causes on the other. These are not at all the same thing.Noble aspirations are appeals to people's better instincts -- to be more charitable, more patriotic, more attentive to children, and so on. The ends are indisputably good, and the preferred means of achieving them -- volunteering, exhorting, improving oneself -- are unobjectionable. Politicians offer up noble aspirations, because the public likes hearing them, yet noble aspirations are fundamentally apolitical, because they aren't intended to change the political order: their uplifting message accepts things as they are, and asks only that people do their personal best. Movements do not spring from noble aspirations.Just causes, by contrast, are moral crusades. They are inspired by -- and are intended to provoke -- indignation. Politicians who espouse just causes typically lead a core of supporters, all of whom share the same programmatic vision, and they call upon the rest of society to convert. Just causes are political in the most basic sense: they seek to change the political order for all time. Political unfeasibility at any given moment is no bar; on the contrary, it's the very reason for the causes to exist."Reich's analysis continues, saying that the Democratic Party's 20th century tradition of fighting for causes (the New Deal reforms, Social Security, the War on Poverty, Civil Rights) shows "signs of morphing into a party of noble aspirations" and the Republicans are "being busy trying to become the party of 'just causes' in their moral crusade against the income tax."
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