One of the many phenomena in contemporary America which puzzle me is the abundance of yellow ribbons that say “Support Our Troops” on vehicles everywhere I go. If anyone has the temerity to state that they support the troops by advocating for their withdrawal, they are often savaged as traitors, liberals, and supporters of terrorism. I’ve posted several items that offer more information about George Lakoff’s ideas on framing, a sociological term that may have been introduced by Erving Goffman. Like all academic pursuits, the field of frame analysis is dense and difficult for anyone outside of academia to understand and I certainly don’t have a good grasp of the concept. There is no one definition of framing, so it is hard for a non-specialist to grasp the nuances of the term. However, framing may be easier to understand by understanding the term “cognitive miser.” Here is one definition of the term, provided by Jeffry Ricker:

“A mental characteristic in which the least amount of attention and mental effort needed to process information is used. This concept assumes that humans are limited in their capacity to process information and, therefore, make use of automatic processes (mental shortcuts, formally referred to as cognitive heuristics) that simplify complex problems. In other words, all other things being equal, we are motivated to use relatively effortless and simple mental shortcuts that provide rapid but often inaccurate solutions rather than effortful and complex mental processing that provides delayed but often more accurate solutions.”

Thus, since we all have a finite amount of time to absorb an infinite amount of information, we use shortcuts that provide rapid but often inaccurate solutions rather than effortful and complex mental processing that provides delayed but often more accurate solutions. This method of making sense of events drives thinking people crazy and leads to all manner of stereotyping, including, most recently, the accusations of many, both Republican and Democrat, that the recent presidential election demonstrated the rise of anti-intellectualism. I don’t think that is particularly accurate, given that there is a peculiar American strain of anti-intellectualism that likely pre-dates the Founding Fathers. An address to the American Historical Association in 1954 by Merle Curti makes this abundantly clear.

So what does all this have to do with yellow ribbons on the backs of cars? Everything. Yellow ribbons are simply another manifestation of cognitive miserliness (if I may coin a phrase) in action. They are yet another piece of evidence, to intellectuals, of the decline of American education.

Is there a solution? Probably not. But recognition of the phenomenon may provide some understanding and lead to less stereotyping and finger-pointing. A recently released book, Male Armor: The Soldier-Hero in Contemporary American Culture, by Jon Adams, presents some interesting challenges to the myth surrounding the American warrior, a myth that drove many voters in Southwest Virginia to vote for John McCain. Here is a short review of the book, provided by the University of Virginia Press:

“There is no shortage of iconic masculine imagery of the soldier in American film and literature—one only has to think of George C. Scott as Patton in front of a giant American flag, Sylvester Stallone as Rambo, or Burt Lancaster rolling around in the surf in From Here to Eternity. In Male Armor, Jon Robert Adams examines the ways in which novels, plays, and films about America’s late-twentieth-century wars reflect altering perceptions of masculinity in the culture at large. He highlights the gap between the cultural conception of masculinity and the individual experience of it, and exposes the myth of war as an experience that verifies manhood.

“Drawing on a wide range of work, from the war novels of Ernest Hemingway, Norman Mailer, James Jones, and Joseph Heller to David Rabe’s play Streamers and Anthony Swofford’s Jarhead, Adams examines the evolving image of the soldier from World War I to Operation Desert Storm. In discussing these changing perceptions of masculinity, he reveals how works about war in the late twentieth century attempt to eradicate inconsistencies among American civilian conceptions of war, the military’s expectations of the soldier, and the soldier’s experience of combat. Adams argues that these inconsistencies are largely responsible not only for continuing support of the war enterprise but also for the soldiers’ difficulty in reintegration to civilian society upon their return. He intends Male Armor to provide a corrective to the public’s continued investment in the war enterprise as a guarantor both of masculinity and, by extension, of the nation.”

I would like to emphasize the last sentence of the review:

He intends Male Armor to provide a corrective to the public’s continued investment in the war enterprise as a guarantor both of masculinity and, by extension, of the nation.

Our “investment in the war enterprise”, by voting for politicians who promote American imperialism, is but one component of our current financial crisis. It is important for all of us to look beyond the “rapid but often inaccurate solutions” provided by cognitive miserliness.

I would add that our investment in the “rapid but often inaccurate solutions” provided by the religious right, the liberal left, and the extremist groups tracked by the Southern Poverty Law Center only exacerbate the problem. We all need to slow down, cultivate community, and reach out to those we would not ordinarily reach out to. We need to think long and hard about what policies are in our best interests and stop supporting demagogues who harm us and our communities in so many ways.