Had a great session with the local gang this week at The Integral Center here in Boulder. As usual, we focused on an integral view of the current headlines. Here are some audio segments…
MITT ROMNEY: TEAL SHAPE-SHIFTER OR ORANGE OPPORTUNIST?
First in response to a question, I tried to wrap my head around Mitt Romney. If you read or listen to my recent stuff, you know that I play with the question: is Mitt Romney operating out of an integral perspective, or is he just a craven opportunist?
As I write this I realize how weird it is that these two things can actually look the same.
My comments here were recorded Monday, before Mitt’s now infamous remarks made at the fundraiser in Boca Raton where he said that 47% of the American people act like irresponsible victims. (I loved Maureen Dowd’s remark: “Oh, for the days when we thought Mitt Romney didn’t stand for anything.”)
I might write off the whole flap as Mitt Romney once again showing up how he thinks it will be most effective for his Presidential prospects, and $50,000-a-plate donors do tend to have a libertarian, Ayn Randian, “makers and takers” perspective. But the problem with this explanation is that as I listened to him speak at the fundraiser I realized, viscerally, that this was the first time I’ve ever heard Mitt Romney really sound like he means it, where he was in a flow of his own truth instead of struggling against a mental governor, which is how he sounds to me most of the time.
And yet … maybe he was just super-comfortable in a room of his peeps, and just blowing smoke. This is the guy, after all, who was for gay rights, gun control, Planned Parenthood, choice in abortion and who is indeed the grandfather of Obamacare.
My friend Jennifer Johnson Is having no part of the “Mitt Romney is integral” theory. After the event she wrote me, “I didn’t and don’t buy it. I grew up with his type–orange and contemptuous of “losers.”
I must say I fear she’s right. If so, he’ll get the most conservative 40% of voters. But he’s not going to get the movable middle and will lose. Anyway, here’s me trying to sort it out…
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I have been hanging within the Integral community for a few years, and I have not encountered anyone I would call “Machiavellian Teal.” Of course, it could be a girl thing as in I focus less on what is published as in, as per Jeff: Romney wrote a proto Obama care, supports gay rights, his parents were controversial Morman liberals – the implication I’m seeing is that, consequently, he must be at least coming from a Green altitude. I can see how Romney communicates with others, including me to whatever degree and I can see that his objects do not reflect the inter-subjectivity that I see characteristic of Green. Edgar Morin (keynote speaker at the 2013 Integral Theory Conference) wrote a UNESCO presentation in 1999 called “Seven Complex Lessons in Education for the Future.” It’s online and I encourage you to read it. Page 49: “Communication does not bring understanding… There are two types of understanding: intellectual or objective, and human inter-subjective.” How I tend to differentiate “Green content” from “embodied Green” is to that Green is just more sophisticated in its inter-subjective awareness. “Understanding, always inter-subjective, demands an open heart, sympathy, generosity” (Morin, p. 50). Romney still operates in “old” subject/object relationships. If you are shocked by his spiel to his rich friends, don’t be, because Romney isn’t evil or anything, he can’t see or appreciate two equal subjects. Look, my 80 year-old dad is quite the “Expert” as in young Orange on our spectrum map. He supports gay rights (gov’t needs to butt out); hates religious fundamentalists (Reagan ‘shamed’ him and now he’s Independent); he’s a conscientious recycler (too many people are wasteful and stupid); he is environmental (dumbass hopheads (too many depressed bitchers on pills) don’t know where they’re getting their drinking water – private sector will rip us off if they get a chance); etc…. I love the guy and I think he has healthy and intelligent values, but I don’t think he has the communication skills to function as President of the United States. Neither does Romney.