Eminence Front

"And people forget-forget they're hiding

Behind an eminence front

Eminence front - It's a put on."

                       -Pete Townshend

The recent back and forth in the comments on the previous post illustrate a point that is given, but which is rarely spoken.  That is, we are all actors.  I act like I care about my work, so that I can get money to buy food, clothing and shelter.  The Pope acts like he accepts without question Catholic dogma because he's the leader of that cult and that's his job but we know not what he thinks in the quiet of his room.  He may truly believe what he says or he may not.  I can't tell you,  but if you read this blog you already know that my beliefs are more than three standard deviations from the mean. Yet, I can be found working, paying taxes, and more than less acting like everyone else.  I put on a front like everyone else, but I try not to forget that I am hiding, and that the truth and my identity are different from what is purported to be the truth and what I say and how I act publicly.  I never confuse the truth with what I do to survive.  I can speak the truth as I have in these posts, but the masses are indifferent.  They have accepted the actor and the play as reality, and it serves them well enough. Quiet desperation has been replaced with cold comfort and sublimation of the self to the collective. Some day, we may awaken from out self-induced coma, but that day is not today or tomorrow.

I'm soooooooo confused. Are you AND the Pope both full of shit? And is he evil but you're good? Is knowing the truth while living an "eminence front"  better than not knowing the truth and still faking the crap out of everyone? Please enlighten.

No, Yes, Yes.  Only the Pope can  know if his faith in the Cosmic Muffin is truly his faith or whether he is just putting up an eminence front because he gets to wear the funny hat.  The hat alone would keep me faking it until the day I die.  I am good and he is evil because I not only recognize  the front I put on but am willing to acknowledge, document and demonstrate it if need be.  You are painfully aware that at the Big V in the sky my eminence front only had a small degree of opaqueness, Allowing the barely observant to see that I despised working there.  But it was union and difficult to get fired.  Now, it is easier to get fired, so the front is more opaque.  It is far better not to have a front of any kind, but the social construct is simply not built that way.  The major tenet of my philosophy is to "Never confuse the truth with what you do to survive."  Another is "Seek the truth."  The Pope and all religious zealots have given up seeking the truth, They have it in their book, which is a nasty thing.  It is obvious that humans need to be constantly updating the truth as new information comes to light.  So, until the world becomes rational, it is necessary and good to have an eminence front to the world because this allows me to earn a living with some time off to rail against the very society that requires an eminence front.  I don't want to be a martyr because they is no afterlife.  Railing against society without constraint would make me one.  I've lost enough jobs pointing out the truth to pointy haired bosses.  The Pope is my antithesis:  Hanging on to unproven dogma merely to perpetuate having a really funny hat and hordes of gold and jewels and real estate and providing a place for pedophiles to ply their trade.