Suspension of Disbelief

Novelists employ a common literary device known as 'suspension of disbelief' in order to draw the reader into the fictional world that the writer has created, in order to prevent the reader from objecting to the non-reality to the point that they cannot become emotionally involved in the story.

This is how good writers create a fictional world in which we, the readers, react as if we are in the middle of the story, although that story may be about creatures from outer space that like to use human bodies as incubators for their young.

Engage with me in suspension of disbelief for a moment. Suppose the reason our government and other governments around the world are engaging in a push to band together as a united entity because they know something we commoners don't know.

And suppose one of the things we don't know involves information held by only an elite few who head these various governments, and that this information has to do with extraterrestrials who have made contact someway and have hinted at our destruction.

Suppose, further, that these creatures are so highly advanced and intelligent that there is no way an individual nation on earth, not even the United States, could defeat them on its own, and that only by banding together with other nations in some sort of federation would give humanity one fighting chance at holding our new enemies at bay.

Granted, the concept is not new in fiction. These ideas form the foundation of some of our society's greatest and most recognizable science fiction, such as Star Wars, Star Trek, and others.

But the fact that these fictional concepts could become reality is the cutting edge, and this is where suspension of disbelief becomes essential.

It is to be remembered that cartoons from the 1930s and 40s depicted space ships that traveled to the moon. These fictional space ships bear a remarkable resemblance to the real thing that was developed in the 1950s and 60s. And we did actually go to the moon, when during the 1930s such an idea was fodder for laughter and frivolity--nothing more than a cartoon subject.

The question is, if we are headed for such a massive federation of nations on earth, where does liberty fit into the picture? Where is the demand that freedom be preserved? Do citizens maintain the right to keep and bear firearms? Do they have the right to self-defense?

In all of the hoop-la surrounding federations such as the EU and the proposed North American Union, never once have I heard prudent concerns being voiced about preserving the liberties of the people. The only concerns I have heard mentioned involve the issues of security and economics.

Security and economics--the hallmarks of totalitarian regimes that promise their constituencies greater security and better living. Only free societies place human liberty ahead of security and economics, though the latter two may be an important part of the mix.

When human liberty is not part of the mix, what you have is totalitarianism.

Now, come back with me to reality for a moment. Let's suppose that although there is NO such threat from extraterrestrials these governments manufacture a threat of some kind in order to scare their constituencies into submitting to giving up many of their liberties.

This manufactured threat could be just about anything, from economic collapse to terrorists holding us hostage to, well, extraterrestrials who are threatening to annihilate us. Governments are not above conjuring up such fiction, including employing the novelist's device of suspension of disbelief, in order to convince the citizens that only government officials hold the key to our survival.

The thing is, for many such a stark reality is more difficult to believe than the fiction of extraterrestrials threatening our destruction.

It is never a pleasant exercise to seriously consider the fact that people within your own government have everything but the citizens' best interests at heart, and that some of your favorite elected officials are actually engaging in a dark evil.

What is even more unpleasant is to seriously consider that some of your neighbors, fellow citizens, are aiding and abetting these dark and sinister subversives who wish to destroy liberty and turn America into something it was never envisioned to be.

The central question thus becomes, do you wish to remain as one of the uniformed masses who are being toyed with by the puppet-masters, or do you wish to be a fully informed and totally involved American citizen?

Of course, the easier of the two roads is to believe the fiction, fantastic and unbelievable though it may be. The hard thing to do is accept and deal with reality. But then, we are Americans. We've always done the hard jobs.