So Becker argues that "to become conscious of what one is doing to earn his feeling of heroism is the main self-analytic problem of life."
This is no easy task. "Self-knowledge is the hardest human task because it risks revealing to [us] how [our] self-esteem was built: on the powers of others in order to deny ... death."
Doing a little analysis on the hero myths provided by culture, he finds that "every society ... is a 'religion' whether it thinks so or not: Soviet 'religion' and Maoist 'religion' are as truly religious as are scientific and consumer 'religion,' no matter how much they may try to disguise themselves."
All wars are holy wars.
Put that in your pipe and smoke it, Bill Maher.
Merely realizing the fundamental need for a heroic purpose, which society is built to meet, will not somehow cure humanity of this need.
Instead he suggests that we need "healthy repressions, ... explicit immortality-ideologies, myths of heroic transcendence."
Next: Unfreedom
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