Cougars and Swingers on Nova = Mimetic Rivalry!

This morning on Nova, Hughesie, Kate and Ed were talking about their ‘Cougar Cruise’ that they organised on Valentines Day. They had 30 ‘cougars’ (women over 28) and 30 cubs (men under 28, and presumably over 18!), who came together on a 3 hour cruise with an unlimited alcohol tab. There is a four-minute video clip up at nova.com which overviews the night, and let’s just say, there’s a lot of random kissing, sexual innuendo and intoxicated noise!

I’m not sure how the conversation started this morning, but they had a ‘Swinger’ on the line talking about how morally corrupt cougars are. They then got a ‘Cougar’ who was on the cruise on the line to talk to this ‘Swinger’ and thus began a debate about who was the most ‘classy’ and who has the most ‘self-respect’. Each tried to justify their own position and belittle the other positions to show who is morally superior.

Mimetic rivalry is one of the key concepts of Rene Girard. The foundational idea is that we desire something because our neighbour has it. Then our neighbour sees that we desire it, which reinforces the fact that what they have is valuable, and so they desire it more. Our neighbour becomes our model, we copy them because they have what we want. They also become our obstacle – they are in the way of us getting what we want, so somehow we have to overcome them. This results in escalating levels of conflict (whether verbal, subtle manipulation, physical violence, judging etc.) where we have to get rid of (scapegoat) our neighbour in order to get the object of our desire.

In the Cougar Vs. Swinger scenario, the object that both parties desire is for society to see them as ‘moral’ or ‘classy’. They perceive that society gives the tick of approval to the other, and so they copy each other – trying to defend themselves as being classy. They then become each others obstacle, they start attacking each other, trying to pull the other down (scapegoat), and this conflict, if allowed, would escalate into violence.

Now, obviously in our society we have laws that prevent if from escalating to that level, but in archaic societies this would involve more and more people getting involved, creating groups of people in conflict against other groups, which ultimately leads to violence. This escalating level of violence and escalating amount of people getting involved would lead to such a crisis and such a casualty rate that everyone needs to find someone to blame. The groups somehow pick someone, usually the weakest and most vulnerable, find them responsible for the entire crisis (a very simplistic verdict!), get rid of them (by murder or excommunication or something – called ‘scapegoating’), and then all the groups experience a ‘cathartic’ effect, the pressure cooker lid is released, and the groups can return to equilibrium (peace) because the cause of all the conflict has been dealt with. The ‘scapegoat’ is innocent of the charges laid against them, but they’re not around to defend themselves anymore. This is called the scapegoat mechanism.

In today’s context, the scapegoat doesn’t get ‘killed’, we just have the luxury of being able to look down on them from a distance and not directly associating with them (villages and societies of old didn’t have that luxury!). We scapegoat the person who gets the promotion – ‘they might have got the promotion, but at least I have a life’. We scapegoat those mothers who do things differently to us – ‘their parenting style is so wrong.’ We scapegoat the bosses – ‘they’re just greedy and evil in it for the money, whilst us hard-workers make all the money for them.’ We scapegoat the celebrities and love to see them fall – ‘did you see Britney, what an immoral ‘xyz.” Here in Australia we call it the ‘tall-poppy-syndrome’, we love cutting people down, scapegoating them, to make ourselves feel important and meaningful, better than the tall-poppys in some way.

This ‘scapegoat mechanism’ is the same evil that enabled Hitler to unite a nation and commit some of the worst atrocities the world has ever seen. Yet, it is the same mechanism that we’re caught up in day in and day out. Christians call it ‘sin’ and look to Jesus who was the only one in human history to ever not get caught up in mimetic rivalry and who willingly chose to become the scapegoat. He was the perfect innocent victim who exposed the lie that has been hidden since the foundation of the world.

You can see this mimetic rivalry everywhere. From children with their toys, to teenagers for the latest clothes or mobile phones, to adults with their promotions and parenting styles, to grandparents with their grandchildren and super-funds. We just want to fit in, belong, find intimacy, and we’ll cut down others, scapegoat them (usually the vulnerable), to do it.

Towards the end of the discussion Ash Williams make a comment ‘the truth will set you free’ after one caller rang in and exposed the fact that the Swinger was judging the Cougar because of a feeling that everyone else judges her. His comment seemed to imply that you’ll be ‘free’ when you just allow everyone to see and know you, let your swinging lifestyle out in the open, thus the ‘truth’ will set you ‘free’. It’s really good of him to quote Jesus from John 8:32, but what Jesus is talking about is this mimetic rivalry motivated by the desire to have what others have, all in an attempt to ‘belong.’ Jesus is talking about being slaves to sin, that if we hold to his teaching, we will be set free from this mimetic rivalry and scapegoat mechanism.

Kate also made a very insightful comment saying that ‘we all judge.’ Which is true, but to make judgments about behaviour, or ideas, or morals is not wrong. What is wrong is to make judgments about others thinking that we are somehow superior to them, that we are not susceptible to doing exactly the same things that they are. Jesus puts it like this:

3″Why do you look at the speck of sawdust in your brother’s eye and pay no attention to the plank in your own eye? 4How can you say to your brother, ‘Let me take the speck out of your eye,’ when all the time there is a plank in your own eye? 5You hypocrite, first take the plank out of your own eye, and then you will see clearly to remove the speck from your brother’s eye.

The ‘Swinger’ was trying to justify herself that she wasn’t as bad as the ‘Cougar’, and vice versa. Really, given the same circumstances, we are all just as capable and susceptible to the same sorts of evil. We have all sinned, and participated in the evil of humanity, that selfish desire to own and control. Realising this truth will indeed set you free, and the only way to see it, is in the sinless life, death and resurrection of Jesus.