These dynasties, like monarchy, attempted control of the mass through myth. The myth of the royals is the divine right of kings, and their wisdom, benignity and devotion to public service. This last — a low-cost, though fragile tool — is theoretically susceptible to public scrutiny through a free press. Absent this scrutiny, the myth of hereditary public service reveals its essential nature as the happy face of violence to the dissenting. We see this operation in religious wars, supposedly about doctrine, but, in essence, about hegemony.
***
Today, the Left’s protestation of benevolence is everywhere unsaid by its real threat of immediate ruin: the manner in which the various territorial claims of the Left’s clans — MeToo, Marxism, Feminism, Occupy, Anarchism and so on — spawn new collusion (intersectionality) and then aggression (gay rights vs. transgender rights) as one group tries to break to the rail. Life may be “the war of all against all”, but each prosecutes it with as much aid as he can muster; and that aid was, originally, the family.
The Scottish term for clan is Sept; the Hebrew word is Svat. Both mean seven; that is, the number of families making up a clan. The clan, then, is a military-company-sized group of individuals tied by blood, whose allegiance may be theoretically relied upon.
Yet the modern Left works, consciously or not, to destroy the family as the basic unit of loyalty, working to replace it with allegiance to the state, which can only mean those proclaiming themselves the champions of the state (political chieftains), the states’ incarnation (dictators), or their like in the states’ demise (effectively warlords). The decay of Western democracy has split the electorate into those accepting the new monolithic, unerring state and those preferring a constitutional accountability; that is, preferring democracy to subservience.
What of the family? For the past 50 years, it has been denounced as “the nuclear family” — and let’s note that, since 1946, the adjective has always meant “horrific”. The nuclear family has been destroyed: by technology, contraception, penicillin, travel and so on. Its destruction has been ascribed to the champions of its demise: humanism, globalism and atheism-as-reason. But these are only the beneficiaries of decay. In its place, membership to our various right-thinking groups is an unconscious attempt to reconstitute the family — that group which will offer protection. Just like life in the urban gangs.
***
The Hebrew Bible is the record of the growth of the state from the family. The family is the Jewish, religious polity. Chapter by chapter, mankind’s development is shown in the Bible through the family dynamic. Cain slays Abel out of jealousy; Abraham almost sacrifices Isaac; Jacob steals Esau’s birthright; his sons kidnap and abandon Joseph.
The last purely familial exchange is that between Moses and his step grandfather, Pharaoh. This will be familiar to anyone who has grown up in a broken family. Pharaoh has raised Moses, effectively, to be his successor; but Moses displeases Pharaoh — not because he slew the Taskmaster (after all, he was the Prince of Egypt), but because he did so to protect a Jewish slave. Moses publicly demonstrated allegiance to that despised group from which he had been graciously rescued. He insulted the benevolence of his step-grandfather, who asked nothing of him but expected simple loyalty.
Moses led the Jews out of Egypt, and in the desert the Biblical struggles of the family are supplanted by the horrors of creating and maintaining a unified state. In the Exodus, clans, tribes and individuals plot mutiny, challenge, disobey and infuriate Moses, and the story changes from interfamilial dynamics to the birth of democracy — with individual freedom and equality constrained by obedience to law and threatened not by the disaffected individual but by faction.
Moses’s power is depleted by age and he is spared the horror of his people’s behaviour in the Promised Land. The eternal struggle for power, absent operative myth and its defence, devolves into decay and the reversion of the state into the family or clan.
The Godfather, our American Myth, is the contemporary rendition of Greek Drama. They portrayed the family members as gods and demigods, each embodying a recognisable human ambition and its inevitable attendant flaw. Greek wisdom and drama cross-decked to Sicily, and, thence, to Hollywood, and the Corleone Family is the house of Atreus.
Every family will have a no-good brother-in-law, a crazed aunt or grandfather, a drunk, a homosexual, an unutterable secret; the envied, the despised, the tolerated, the shunned. It is a compendium of humans — as flawed as we each know ourselves to be — endeavouring or constrained to live together under a set of customs, both based upon and engendering myth. For myth is the expression of an otherwise ungraspable perception; it grows from necessity, and persists as it is useful operationally. When it is supplanted as unreasonable, blasphemous or absurd, it creates the chaos allowing for new hegemony, and, thus, new myth.
This, however, though asserting a new, rational content, can only be based upon that human consciousness which requires the comfort or control of myth — and, though it may change its content, it is psychologically bound to its form. The Twelve Tribes become the Twelve Caesars, just as the House of Atreus becomes the Kennedys.
Neither I nor you know much about that family, and much that we know may be false, exaggerated or hagiographic; but the Myth of the Kennedys is that of a family beloved by both the more benevolent of the Fates, and their less easily amused sisters.
Are they more depraved, luckless, criminal, perverted, violent and so on than the rest of us? Possibly, as their remove or immunity from scrutiny may, logically, induce excess. The protected antics of the great have an analogue in the 19th-century display of Spiritualism. Here, the medium demonstrated his supernatural powers, loosening himself from manacles, or producing displays of “ectoplasm”, requiring only that they be done in the dark. The Kennedys are certainly more prominent. And we are all addicted to gossip, which is not only more exciting but less taxing than reason, and under whose sway we are enthused with licensed salaciousness — and a momentary sense of superiority to those we envy and fear.
© David Mamet 2023
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SubscribeI really have no idea what this article is trying to say.
Well said, It seemed to end so abruptly. It felt like it was building up to something but instead there was an anticlimax There was no punchline or summary to pull it all together.
Perhaps he was drunk when he wrote it and because of his perceived status as a very important playwright, Unherd’s editors went all “Emperor’s new clothes” about it and didn’t feel they could point out the obvious lack of direction or structure. Who knows?
Hmm… I think he’s trying to say that the Democratic Party was taken over by the mob (and became what we might refer to as “the deep state”), and that they got rid of JFK to show they mean business, but also, like the killing a sacrificial lamb, to place a great myth at the heart of American politics. He also seems to suggest that Democratic voters/supporters (who are completely unaware of this sinister under belly) will, nevertheless, NOT back RFK Jr as they perceive him as being unworthy of the dynastic Kennedy right to glory because he didn’t “work” for his status.
At least he mentions the brilliant Thomas Sowell, but far too briefly and without stating where he stands on him. Then there’s a really dumb-downed synopsis of the life and purpose of Moses. (Let’s hope he’s not planning on making a film about him!)
Somewhere in all of this I get the sneaking suspicion he simply wants to call RFK Jr the Antichrist but doesn’t have the balls to do so overtly. Can’t wait to see what “Hollywood” actually lets him get away with!
It is totally incoherent.
I hope he didn’t get paid to write this garbage!
Well said, It seemed to end so abruptly. It felt like it was building up to something but instead there was an anticlimax There was no punchline or summary to pull it all together.
Perhaps he was drunk when he wrote it and because of his perceived status as a very important playwright, Unherd’s editors went all “Emperor’s new clothes” about it and didn’t feel they could point out the obvious lack of direction or structure. Who knows?
Hmm… I think he’s trying to say that the Democratic Party was taken over by the mob (and became what we might refer to as “the deep state”), and that they got rid of JFK to show they mean business, but also, like the killing a sacrificial lamb, to place a great myth at the heart of American politics. He also seems to suggest that Democratic voters/supporters (who are completely unaware of this sinister under belly) will, nevertheless, NOT back RFK Jr as they perceive him as being unworthy of the dynastic Kennedy right to glory because he didn’t “work” for his status.
At least he mentions the brilliant Thomas Sowell, but far too briefly and without stating where he stands on him. Then there’s a really dumb-downed synopsis of the life and purpose of Moses. (Let’s hope he’s not planning on making a film about him!)
Somewhere in all of this I get the sneaking suspicion he simply wants to call RFK Jr the Antichrist but doesn’t have the balls to do so overtly. Can’t wait to see what “Hollywood” actually lets him get away with!
It is totally incoherent.
I hope he didn’t get paid to write this garbage!
I really have no idea what this article is trying to say.
This is effective creative prose but short on utility. The Kennedy’s are suddenly interesting again only because of RFK Jr. He might command attention because of his name but he’s not grandstanding on it. He’s a guy with actual knowledge about how the system works with a desire and focus to solve real problems. That so many of his Democrat establishment family members oppose his campaign tells you the Kennedys are not a “crime family.”
I agree. Mamet also only uses the Kennedys as a point of departure for his meandering musings. The attitude revealed here is profoundly cynical, endorsing Hobbes’s characterization of the State of Nature–“a war of all against all”–as likely an apt description of human society itself, and using an absurdly lose definition of “crime family”. In eating the forbidden fruit and suffering a sibling murder, I guess the Bible’s first family was also a crime family.
To assert that all non-democratic systems emerge from Crime Families is a lot like saying that because (almost) everyone lies at some point in their lies that we are all just liars. And with their slaves, violent internal struggles, and war campaigns, we could, with a facile flourish similar to Mamet’s, call Ancient Greek Democracy a criminal syndicate. But that would also be reductive and pointless.
“Humanity bad. Me smart.” –David Mamet
Despite his cynicism, I know Mr. Mamet has more to offer than this effort!
Is RFK Jr Moses for betrayal of the Democrats to side with us plebs? I feel like I am writing a university exam.
I agree. Mamet also only uses the Kennedys as a point of departure for his meandering musings. The attitude revealed here is profoundly cynical, endorsing Hobbes’s characterization of the State of Nature–“a war of all against all”–as likely an apt description of human society itself, and using an absurdly lose definition of “crime family”. In eating the forbidden fruit and suffering a sibling murder, I guess the Bible’s first family was also a crime family.
To assert that all non-democratic systems emerge from Crime Families is a lot like saying that because (almost) everyone lies at some point in their lies that we are all just liars. And with their slaves, violent internal struggles, and war campaigns, we could, with a facile flourish similar to Mamet’s, call Ancient Greek Democracy a criminal syndicate. But that would also be reductive and pointless.
“Humanity bad. Me smart.” –David Mamet
Despite his cynicism, I know Mr. Mamet has more to offer than this effort!
Is RFK Jr Moses for betrayal of the Democrats to side with us plebs? I feel like I am writing a university exam.
This is effective creative prose but short on utility. The Kennedy’s are suddenly interesting again only because of RFK Jr. He might command attention because of his name but he’s not grandstanding on it. He’s a guy with actual knowledge about how the system works with a desire and focus to solve real problems. That so many of his Democrat establishment family members oppose his campaign tells you the Kennedys are not a “crime family.”
“The Scottish term for clan is Sept”. No! The Scottish word for clan is clan. It means “family” in both Scottish Gaelic and Irish. The correct Gaelic spelling has a double-n. A “sept” is sometimes used to describe a sub-division of a clan
So the Scotch are really Irish immigrants?
That explains a lot!
So the Scotch are really Irish immigrants?
That explains a lot!
“The Scottish term for clan is Sept”. No! The Scottish word for clan is clan. It means “family” in both Scottish Gaelic and Irish. The correct Gaelic spelling has a double-n. A “sept” is sometimes used to describe a sub-division of a clan
Terrific essay with some very intriguing observations. I am going to read this several more times before I come to any conclusions on its propositions – but they are fascinating and extremely well put – the last few lines especially so. Thank you for such a mentally stimulating start to my weekend.
I am going to read it again too – if only to see if I can make any sense of it
I shall this this article again too, if only to try and work out what the writer is trying to say
Are you having a laugh?
I am going to read it again too – if only to see if I can make any sense of it
I shall this this article again too, if only to try and work out what the writer is trying to say
Are you having a laugh?
Terrific essay with some very intriguing observations. I am going to read this several more times before I come to any conclusions on its propositions – but they are fascinating and extremely well put – the last few lines especially so. Thank you for such a mentally stimulating start to my weekend.
I would file this piece under “playwrights disease”. LOL
I would file this piece under “playwrights disease”. LOL
The Actual Elites, they equal = Depravity.
The problem of billions in money, and massively, huge power is pleasure becomes meaningless. All Man’s pleasures are available, and thus lose the ability to give them pleasure. Only true depravity, the last taboos, still will have any excitement.
‘‘Today’s British monarchy is a ceremonial outfit,”
No – Charles is a WEF Young Leader. He is a Lizard.
The real strings of Global Power – the hands pulling those though – they are Monsters. Cruelty and depravity are all they have which can distract them as all else is nothing. You can see them forming the world now –
I think ‘Salty Cracker’ on Rumble has it right – he calls them Kid Fu* king Lizard People and Monsters…. and they are who are setting the direction of the whole world. The Nation State kept the old Elites busy – wars, dirty tricks, plotting amongst themselves, treachery….. always some other person and people to torment. But now it is Globalism. The top couple Hedge Funds and Brokerages and Banks own the world. They control the stocks which control the world – they own the world – and the Elites have nothing to distract them, it all is theirs, and so they turn on society – to wreck it, to break it, for their amusement.
You are David Icke, and I claim my ten pounds
Interesting theory. And do you think David Icke is for real? Or is he controlled opposition?
Interesting theory. And do you think David Icke is for real? Or is he controlled opposition?
You are David Icke, and I claim my ten pounds
The Actual Elites, they equal = Depravity.
The problem of billions in money, and massively, huge power is pleasure becomes meaningless. All Man’s pleasures are available, and thus lose the ability to give them pleasure. Only true depravity, the last taboos, still will have any excitement.
‘‘Today’s British monarchy is a ceremonial outfit,”
No – Charles is a WEF Young Leader. He is a Lizard.
The real strings of Global Power – the hands pulling those though – they are Monsters. Cruelty and depravity are all they have which can distract them as all else is nothing. You can see them forming the world now –
I think ‘Salty Cracker’ on Rumble has it right – he calls them Kid Fu* king Lizard People and Monsters…. and they are who are setting the direction of the whole world. The Nation State kept the old Elites busy – wars, dirty tricks, plotting amongst themselves, treachery….. always some other person and people to torment. But now it is Globalism. The top couple Hedge Funds and Brokerages and Banks own the world. They control the stocks which control the world – they own the world – and the Elites have nothing to distract them, it all is theirs, and so they turn on society – to wreck it, to break it, for their amusement.
Here’s my take, though it may be a bit pedestrian compared to previous comments. Not so much a comment on the article as just my assessment of the family and a few other thoughts.
The Kennedy family had two extremely exceptional members. Three if you count Joseph P. John F Kennedy was an amazing intellect and leader, as evidenced by his inaugural speech. Truly astounding. And we may have avoided the pile of dog s*** we live in today had he not been tragically murdered. ie. The Democratic party may not have begun it’s hard left turn that began under LBJ and has accelerated ever since.
The lion of the Senate was simply a narcissistic power addict with a volcanic voice, a trait (common to narcissists) that gives unearned credit to a speakers utterances.
The last person of integrity that the family produced was John Jr. He seemed to have been a truly quality and lovely human being. Not so with Caroline who is incredibly entitled and not that bright. Perhaps there have been some quality younger members that I’m not aware of.
I’m looking forward to learning more about RFK Jr. He at least seems honest and, of course, that’s a really big deal.
I have a hard time with the assination conspiracies (though part of me (a large part) just doesn’t want to believe them).
But wasn’t it Ben Franklin (I may be wrong) who said three people can keep a secret if two of them are dead. And didn’t we learn from some gangster movie (was it the Godfather?) that it’s always two shots to the head if you really want to be sure to get rid of somebody. One in the abdomen doesn’t carry a lot of guarantees (the bullet just happened to hit his aorta running to the kidneys). Unless the surgeon was in on the plot also and he severed the aorta, it was a low probability outcome. And why use a 38 instead of a 45 if a lot of very powerful people had a lot riding on it.
But yes, they certainly had their day in the sun and it was really something. Heroes like that (those two) don’t come along very many times in a century. No wonder why people are still obsessed with them.
Hey Brian, it was the movie Miller’s Crossing that said, “Always put one in the brain.” Just wanted to make sure you were being kept up to date.
Hey Brian, it was the movie Miller’s Crossing that said, “Always put one in the brain.” Just wanted to make sure you were being kept up to date.
Here’s my take, though it may be a bit pedestrian compared to previous comments. Not so much a comment on the article as just my assessment of the family and a few other thoughts.
The Kennedy family had two extremely exceptional members. Three if you count Joseph P. John F Kennedy was an amazing intellect and leader, as evidenced by his inaugural speech. Truly astounding. And we may have avoided the pile of dog s*** we live in today had he not been tragically murdered. ie. The Democratic party may not have begun it’s hard left turn that began under LBJ and has accelerated ever since.
The lion of the Senate was simply a narcissistic power addict with a volcanic voice, a trait (common to narcissists) that gives unearned credit to a speakers utterances.
The last person of integrity that the family produced was John Jr. He seemed to have been a truly quality and lovely human being. Not so with Caroline who is incredibly entitled and not that bright. Perhaps there have been some quality younger members that I’m not aware of.
I’m looking forward to learning more about RFK Jr. He at least seems honest and, of course, that’s a really big deal.
I have a hard time with the assination conspiracies (though part of me (a large part) just doesn’t want to believe them).
But wasn’t it Ben Franklin (I may be wrong) who said three people can keep a secret if two of them are dead. And didn’t we learn from some gangster movie (was it the Godfather?) that it’s always two shots to the head if you really want to be sure to get rid of somebody. One in the abdomen doesn’t carry a lot of guarantees (the bullet just happened to hit his aorta running to the kidneys). Unless the surgeon was in on the plot also and he severed the aorta, it was a low probability outcome. And why use a 38 instead of a 45 if a lot of very powerful people had a lot riding on it.
But yes, they certainly had their day in the sun and it was really something. Heroes like that (those two) don’t come along very many times in a century. No wonder why people are still obsessed with them.
“Every family… is a compendium of humans — as flawed as we each know ourselves to be — endeavouring or constrained to live together under a set of customs, both based upon and engendering myth. For myth is the expression of an otherwise ungraspable perception; it grows from necessity, and persists as it is useful operationally.”
Because this necessity is eternal, though, I think that this rationalization of myth requires a level of detachment that makes the rationalization often irrelevant. Part of being human is cohering socially with others, so myth will always be more compelling than reality in some contexts, and reality includes the fact that “myth… grows from necessity.”
the Kennedy Clan have no more power than the Trump clan. What narishkeint are you yecking about?
Trump put the skids under two clans (Bushes and Clintons). He then changed the Supreme Court 180 degrees, pushing through his last pick in about 10 minutes!
No wonder he has enemies.
Trump put the skids under two clans (Bushes and Clintons). He then changed the Supreme Court 180 degrees, pushing through his last pick in about 10 minutes!
No wonder he has enemies.
the Kennedy Clan have no more power than the Trump clan. What narishkeint are you yecking about?