So the biggest social upheaval of our time is postmodernism. I must admit, as the LayGuy, I naturally steer away with anything to do with “isms” cause’ quite frankly, they confuse me in terms of how vague the references are and how relative they are to the individual. A breeding ground for opinion based on ones own opinion and worldview. Postmodernism fell into this category for a long time until I finally began to realise how real this phenomenon is.
Many are saying that “postmodernism” is the biggest motivator to change we have seen for a long time. It’s a challenge to many areas of life and many facets of life and business are in a continual cycle of evaluation an effort to keep up with the ever-changing values of postmodernism. But you need to go back to it’s foundations to understand the “rebellion” of postmodernism.
Postmodernism launched into the mindset of man in the early 1950’s when “modern” architecture started to invade the norm back then. In a “reaction” to the new way buildings were built, people freaked out and being “post modern” was to show your dissatisfaction for a change in the culture.In time, this definition was blurred to resemble any reaction to the current norm. The Wikipedia article on Postmodernism states it this way:
If used in other contexts, it is a concept without a universally accepted, short and simple definition; in a variety of contexts it is used to describe social conditions, movements in the arts, economic and social conditions and scholarship in reaction to, not “post” in the purely temporal sense of “after”.
LOL - now you can see we I used to avoid the subject - it’s not universally accepted! In a nutshell however, it’s basic characteristic is, when you peel the layers of the onion, a rejection of the norm in pursuit of a truth which makes sense to “me” right here, right now. Sometimes I marvel at the cunningness of the devil to lead mankind to such a mindset. It’s as if human intellect has been exalted to top dog and nothing else matters. I believe that the human condition is hopelessly depraved and what seems right to mankind, in the end just leads to stuff ups. And when this happens, you get all the atheists jumping up and down like they’re on ice saying, “See, that proves God doesn’t exist!”
Postmodernism is in true essence a rebellion against what’s considered normal. Fueled by the naive worldview of young, educated people who think they know everything and yet can’t prove shit, they become the vocal minority and impact culture in ways unheard of. I once listened to a culture presentation by Tim Keller where he outlined how MTV changed the culture in Romania in a few years in comparison to what activists have been trying to do for years.
But the question to all this is why? Instead of looking at the current, young and hip generation as the one to blame, I suggest that the previous generation is the one to blame. I work in the corporate world and am amazed at the lengths companies go to grow profits and market share. You and I are not seen as human beings with wishes, wants, pains and pleasures. We are labeled “consumers.”
What a ridiculous reality! And what a sad indictment this is to mankind. Cause at the end of the day, that’s what we are being slowly being programmed to become - consumers. And this is where, I believe, the fuel for postmodernism arises. We have an innate need to be perceived as individuals living in relationship with one another - the way God intended us to be.
While I flew from Melbourne to Sydney yesterday, I looked at the people around me. Being a 5.00pm flight, I had the “suites” all around me. Men and women living in the corporate rat race in their pursuit to increase their market share by a few measly points. I would have been one of them had I not decided to switch off and enjoy a wine or 3 in the Airline Lounge before the flight - oh and I ditched the suit at home.
Then I looked at a young guy who had his iPod belting out the tunes so loud I could hear it over the top of my MP3 player! This guy had his laptop buzzing away - not on a game like the “suite” geek sitting next to me. This young guy was blogging away - making his points heard - attempting to stand out in the rat race the previous generation have unleashed on us.
I looked at the older “suite” sitting next to him with a smug look on his face. I wondered to myself, “you’re probably rich compared to me cause you have busted your guts in the rat race and exploited my generation and consider us “consumers” in your pursuit of success. I looked at the young guy and thought to myself, “yeah cause of technology this guy has the ability to leap frog over the older “suite” guy in regards to success and fulfillment.
In the past generation, respect and position was gained over the years. It was the old who were looked up to due to the wisdom and dignity they attained. These people were honored and were the pillars of our loves. These days due to corporate greed, these qualities are not taught to us younger people.
Many senior citizens are still “old school” and do teach us younger people. But many have become selfish and self-centered during their years of corporate climbing. In an interesting twist, now it’s becoming the norm to spend you retirement away “cause you deserve it old timer” instead of handing it down to your children.
The retirement market – ie those baby boomers after WW2, are about to become the biggest market of consumers in the world, as they are about to unleash their spending spree’s accumulated over the years of saving.
And I, as the LayGuy, say that it’s this mentality of “think of me and my retirement first above all else” is what’s fuelled the selfish, self-centered culture we now have. As a result the new generation is rebelling in droves
They may or may not be aware that their mindset may be…
Thanks to technology, we are in a position to make you old timers look like fools and we will do so because you have exploited us over the years. You may have wisdom, but do you know what Joost is? Do you know how to influence the globe by blogging. Do you know how much you have pissed us off in your pursuit for profit? I can become something and someone without regard to you as you have disregarded me.
And to us in the Church, we need to be aware of this mindset. BUT and it’s a huge BUT, we should never give in to this generation in regards to the authority of scripture as they assault us in regards to our beliefs with their newly created aggressively questioning mindset. Instead we need to understand where they are coming from and present the Gospel in a way they can relate to.
And you know what, I love the fact that we had the ultimate postmodern Rabbi to ever walk the earth - Jesus. He rebelled against the norms of His day and had no regard for the authorities of His day - cause their authorities were based on human principles. Instead Jesus, rebelled, was a postmodernist of His time BUT, BUT, BUT held scripture in high regard. You emergent types out there should take note of this. You missional types should rejoice.
More than ever, the climate of our culture is ready for Jesus. Let’s use postmodernism as a tool instead of seeing it as a threat.
You are an interesting person w/ an interesting blog. Think I might keep an eye on you.
As for corporate America, or in your case, corporate Australia, all I have to say is this:
Middle Finger.
I think that every generation of philosophical thought is a reaction to the previous. Rebellion, extremes. But there are often careful agendas behind them, guiding them. I know some elderly that were post-modern before it was the general societal thought. The baby steps culture takes often is the rudder that guides the ship and I do believe your assesment that consumerism has also greatly influenced this is one of the many reasons.
I never quite linked the postmodern thought to consumerism. And I have struggled with the infiltration of both of these into the church, and have typically dealt with them individually.
One of the challenges that we face, especially here in the US is how entrenched we are in that mindset of consumerism. And consumerism has now become part to the marketing strategy in the church. It now about how much utility, approval, opportunity cost etc, and church is just another item on the consumer’s lists of errands, as long as…
In the area of postmodern thought, it is really difficult, because of the premise that cultural meaning and thoughts are tied up in the semantics of words and their meaning as it relates to the culture and the language of the culture. So the concept of “Logos” and “Logic” are relativistic at best….
Nice. Well thought out post.