Loss of the Creature Outside Analysis

People in society today have influences throughout their life that help structure and dictate their thoughts. Choices are made based on these influences, and when these influences begin to take shape as different labels, no real choices are made. People begin to compromise their right to think on their own and instead turn to the most convenient choice. This is how a great deal of society has acts today, choosing the easiest path just so that person can get a given task out of the way and continue on with their life.

These influences are frequently seen in politics today. People become so wrapped up in political parties that they become more interested in who is running in which party, instead of which candidate, at any level of government, has the stances that the voter agrees with the most. According to “The Loss of the Creature” and “Ways of Seeing”, multiple aspects of having the labels the political parties have inhibit voters from making sovereign decisions.

When a candidate is running for an office, they should not have a political party label attached to them because that label can inhibit voters from choosing a candidate who they think will best serve the position to better the region they are running for. Walker Percy constantly reiterates the importance to avoid the beaten track and to not allow experts to control the experiences and dictate the ideas someone may have. Having the labels that political parties have allow different political experts to dictate the way people vote and because of the labels people are losing their ability to make sovereign decisions.

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These labels are symbolic complexes because they act as pre-made assumptions that get in the way of the voters ability to make a vote based on personal standards alone. “The highest satisfaction of the sightseer (not merely the tourist but any layman seer of sights) is that his sight should be certified as genuine” (Percy 487). The American voter takes the position of the sightseer, and the voter is losing the ability to have that high satisfaction because the vote is not a genuine vote.

This is what Percy refers to as a loss of sovereignty, and the sovereignty is frequently lost due to the impact of the experts. “He too could use an instructor and a book and a technique, but he would use them as subordinates, just as he would the jackknife” (Percy 489). Percy conveys to the reader that the experts must not be used to form and manipulate any experiences or ideas, but instead used as tools to help guide a person as that person has a genuine experience or forms an idea of their own.

Voters who do not take the time to research candidate’s specific views tend to assume that because they belong to a particular party the candidate’s views will align with the voter’s view. If voters aren’t paying attention to specifically who they are voting for and instead voting out of convenience, they aren’t making their vote count and the candidate that the majority of the people share the most views with might not be elected. Similarly to Walker Percy, John Berger stresses the importance of making your own decisions not based on what others endorse; to do so will bring the power back to the people.

This comes with the implications that the people are not in complete control, and John Berger uses mystification to show that the art critics are in control of the art world because they are making art less accessible (Berger 103). According to the Campaign Finance Institute, out of a random sample of 100 candidates that were elected to the House of Representatives, 20% of their total campaign finances came from the states party funding. That shows a great representation of how much influence the party label has on politics today.

In general, the more funding a campaign had, the more likely that candidate was to win the election (Malbin). The funding of political parties takes away the power from the people because the more a voter who does not research the stances hears about a candidate from different campaign strategies, the more likely the voter will like what he/she hears, base their opinions off of those endorsements, and in turn vote for the candidate. “A people or a class which is cut off from its own past is far less free to choose and to act as a people or a class than one that been able to situate itself in history” (Berger 118).

The voters who do not take the time to research the stances of the candidates are the type of people the Berger is referring to. When the people listen to the critics and choose to not place themselves in the history of politics where they can institute their own decisions of who to vote for, they are not “acting as a people” as Berger refers to. This is because they are not always basing the decision off of which candidate would represent the individual best, who would in turn represent the people the best.

People are being cut off from acting as a people, and this is in part because of the negative influence political party labels have on the overall scheme of politics. As I finish up high school and close into the age to vote, I have become increasingly interested in politics because soon it will be my civil duty to vote. Growing up a fairly independent student, I grew up assessing situations and creating my own opinions like Percy advises people of all ages should do.

My parents never forced their political views on me, and because of that I am able to side with candidates based on my own stances. The more I became interested in politics, the more I began to realize that not all candidates at any level shared the same stances as other members of their equivalent political parties. This is where the idea of calling myself Republican of Democratic became incredibly distasteful and unappealing because every year when elections come, stances of certain representatives change and I have found myself siding with both sides of the party.

Berger would find these labels unappealing as well because labels can be reproduced through media and what the candidate stands for can be altered because of the party they represent. These political party labels are similar to the camera because they are destroying the uniqueness of the candidates like the camera does to paintings (Berger 106). Only so much personal research could be done, so I decided to turn to others to learn more about politics and about their views and stances and different issues. The more I spoke with adults, the more I began to realize how prominent the influence political parties have in our society.

Three different parents of close friends told me they voted either completely democratic or completely republican for the election in 2009 because they were working too often to take the time to research the stances of every single candidate. This is exactly what Percy would not want in this day and age. People are losing their sovereignty as voters because they are following the beaten tracks and following the tour guides without having unique experiences or opinions in this situation. The American voters have the right to have a title that describes the general trend of their political stances.

However, those titles should explain how they morally stand in most circumstances, in most cases conservative or liberal, instead of automatically identifying themselves with a particular party. The importance of eliminating the labels that political parties possess will substantially improve the political system in America because it will cause voters to take the time to truly know who they are voting for, and not base their decision off of a mere title. Walker Percy explains that we as a society can not allow symbolic complexes such as these titles stand in the way of having a sovereign experience.

In this situation, the sovereign experience would be for a citizen to cast a unique vote based solely on personal stances and how much that person agrees with the candidate in question. John Berger would wish to eliminate the labels as well because eliminating the labels would be one step closer to the people truly being in power. Political party labels need to be removed from the political system in America so that the citizens can truly make what they believe to be the correct choice when voting.

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