Remember the game show “Concentration”? There was a numbered grid and when a contestant picked a number, it would flip to reveal a piece of a prize. The contestant would now try to remember where they previously saw a matching piece, and if they did, they would call out that number. If it was, indeed, a “match,” the prize was won and then both pieces would flip to reveal pieces to a puzzle that was to be solved in order to win the game.
It was based on a children’s game to test and exercise the ability to concentrate and to remember.
I look at life that way. It’s basically a huge, metaphysical grid that we navigate by trying to connect thoughts, experiences, images and feelings that we discover in the present, with thoughts, experiences, images and feelings that we’ve uncovered in the past. When there is a “match” we find ourselves in love, or in a new job, living in a new city, discovering a previously unknown pleasure, or having made new friends.
Politics, also, fit nicely into this game show concept. Our political beliefs are a reflection of how we have connected squares on the grid, and the more we’ve connected, the more evidence we are presented with to solve the puzzle.
The “puzzle” is the big ideological mission to achieve the best of “Life, Liberty and Happiness” (or “cash and prizes” for those of us who actually enjoy using a Game Show as a metaphor for life).
Several months ago, I was in a discussion with someone who claimed that “Liberals are racists.” I’ve heard that strange and erroneous statement before and it’s based on a conservative notion that “liberals consider blacks and other minorities inferior and unable to achieve and that’s why they create programs like Affirmative Action.”
The “match” came just yesterday as I was reading a conservative blogger who said, “The liberal agenda is to keep the poor where they are by providing them with welfare, thereby disabling their motivation to work. Liberals do this because they have no faith in humankind.”
The two grid squares revealed a perception that conservatives have of liberals. Liberals, they conclude, do not believe in the fortitude of the human spirit and they (liberals) think that non-whites do not have the capabilities and wherewithal to succeed without assistance. Many conservatives believe that they have solved this concentration puzzle by matching Civil Rights legislation with Affirmative Action, and Welfare with Unemployment, to reveal a picture of cynical, prejudiced and elitist white liberals.
But, this is where Hugh Downs says, “I’m sorry, that is not correct…you’ll have to keep playing.”
As a liberal playing this game, I will step in with my analysis of the same revealed pieces. “Hugh, I’d like to solve the puzzle, please.”
“Liberalism recognizes that the oppressive specter of discrimination and prejudice weighs so heavily on those who are outside the overwhelming influence of white America, that policy must be created to counter where oppression still exists until such a time when the evolution of inclusion transcends intolerance.
The puzzle also says that welfare is the necessary component of a compassionate and civilized society that recognizes that there will be unfortunate and unfair complexities from a free market that also creates failures.”
The bells start to ring! Ding-Ding-Ding!
“That is correct” intones Hugh Downs with his signature understated declaration of victory. “You now advance to the Bonus Round where you can risk what you’ve won for a chance to triple your winnings!”
Well, I may be a liberal, but I am conservative in matters that risk my winnings.
“I’ll take what I’ve won, Hugh.”
There will always be conflicting analysis of the experiences that are revealed to us as we journey through the Game of Life (sorry, but I feel obligated to ending this post with the analogy I started with). The difference that will lead us closer to a better guess at solving the puzzles of policies, politics and ideologies will be our collective ability to concentrate; to pay attention; and the patience to allow for more information.
It’s a children’s game, really.
