In “The Year of Lear,” about how the events of 1606 are reflected in the works Shakespeare produced during that year, we are told about an Elizabethan divine who preached in 1577 during a time of plague, when the poet was 13. “The cause of plague,” he said, “is sin. The cause of sins are plays.”
That’s right, too much drama causes God to send disease to make mankind shape up. Luckily, few paid attention and the great age of Elizabethan theater produced Marlow, Kyd, Jonson, Webster, Tourneur, and the greatest if them all. Finally, after the Puritan Revolution of the 1840s, the playhouses were shut down, and many other frivolities such as dancing and card games were banned. History does not record if God was happier or that the next 20 years were notably less sinful, but they were surely a lot less fun.
“The plague is due to plays” notion speaks to the bottomless human weakness for easy explanations, and the readiness of monomaniacs to provide them. To hear Bernie Sanders tell it, almost everything that ails America can be attributed to Wall Street, fat cats, and greed.
Donald Trump offers a smorgasbord of villains to despise, but all of his rants boil down to “the other.” Good, hard-working, poorly educated Americans are having their lives ruined by raping and murdering Mexican immigrants, Muslims, Washington insiders, wily Chinese competitors, stupid people who don’t appreciate Trump, and on and on.
Hitler had the Jews to blames for Germany’s defeat in World War I, the rise of communism, hyperinflation, booms and busts, “bad” art, his failure to win praise for his “good” art, and for anything and everything wrong with life.
The Grover Norquist, Paul Ryan, Ayn Rand, Charles Koch wing of the Republican Party says big government with its big taxes is the root of all evil. Want to spur the economy? Cut taxes. Improve education, renew our infrastructure, provide healthcare for all? Cut taxes. Defeat ISIS? Cut taxes.
The neocon Republicans believe there’s no foreign policy problem that can’t be solved with a good invasion. The hardcore left believes a government program can make your dog behave better, your neighbors nice, your kids eat their vegetables.
Radical Islam knows why paradise is not at hand. Impure Muslims, infidels or both. Sunni’s blame Shias for betraying the faith and vice versa. This has been going on for 1,400 years, give or take. Westernized Muslims let their women behave like infidels, dressing immodestly, driving cars, having opinions. Off with their heads. Christians and Jews have violated the holy places. The heathen west is a pollutant. Purify via jihad.
Perhaps such monomaniacal closed mindedness accounts for why some Muslim countries, once leaders in science, mathematics, art and philosophy, are poor, backward, and uncompetitive. They have become places that murder doctors trying to give free smallpox vaccinations in an effort to eliminate an ancient scourge. It must be an infidel plot. Unclean.
The beauty of easy answers to complex problems is that they let the listener off the hook by providing an all-purpose scapegoat. Your life isn’t all you might wish? It’s not because you’re hopelessly lazy, dropped out of school, had kids you couldn’t afford, live beyond your means, get drunk every Saturday night, beat your wife and keep losing your crummy jobs.
No, your misery is due to Wall Street, illegal immigrants, taxes, terrorists, Jews, Washington, unions, Democrats, Republicans, Chinese, African-Americans, Obamacare, welfare, intellectuals, not enough religion, or maybe because of too many plays. The plague can’t be far behind.