[ExI] Prudes, Protestants, Progress, and Profit

[PJ Manney]

On Tue, May 20, 2008 at 5:36 PM, Lee Corbin <lcorbin at rawbw.com> wrote:
> Ah, once again a carefully phrased subject line---my
> "Prudes, Protestants, Progress, and Profit"---has been
> hijacked to talk about something entirely different!
> I wanted criticism concerning the idea that the West's
> relative dismissal of fun (i.e. frivolity, playfulness,
> uninhibited conduct, sexual activity, etc.)---think
> Amish farmer or Puritan---may correlate with the
> greater technical progress of the West, and its
> domination (1600-2012) of the world.
>
> Unfortunately, no takers, so far.  I would even like
> criticism of my (somewhat admittedly ignorant)
> claim that the West truly is this way. In one post
> I read later, PJ did discourse on Puritanism as an
> alternative explanation or description of American
> "hypocracy" (I think that she was right on).

Thanks for the shout out, but I suspect there's no conspiracy of
silence.  I think I'm just the lone American Studies scholar of the
bunch.

To answer your "no fun" question is rather easy and connected to my
previous answer on Puritans.  Ask first, who came to America and why?
And who stayed behind in the Old World and why?

First group: the religious.  And not just Puritans, but religious
immoderates and "protestants" (meaning they protest) of every
persuasion, fleeing religious persecution and wanting to create their
own "city on a hill aka New Jerusalem".  Hard-core Protestants (with a
capital P) are by doctrine a "no fun" bunch, with a belief in Original
Sin and without the sense of humor or willingness to turn a blind eye
that some older denominations have had in history.  Hell, they don't
even have confession or Yom Kippur to get a clean slate!  If you're a
sinner now and forever, life is tough and only gets tougher!

Next group: those who lacked capital or class who wanted a chance to
succeed.  Life on the new frontier was a bitch.  Hacking their version
of civilization out of the wilderness left little time for fun and
frolic.  It was not for the faint of heart, weak of arm, lonely or
lazy and survival was a daily roll of the dice.  Those who worked
hardest, with the fewest distractions, had a better chance at success.

Another group: The perpetually dissatisfied.  Don't ignore these guys,
we had a lot of them.  These are your revolutionaries, capable of
imagining and creating systems of governance or industry that never
existed before and convincing others they're not crazy to create it.
Granted, some of them knew how to have fun (like Franklin and
Jefferson -- both would have said their fun was a healthy, balancing
moderation to their other hard work!).  But guys like Paine and Adams
represented the "no fun" contingent.  Adams was lucky enough to have a
smart and sexy wife at home.  Paine wasn't so lucky -- all he had was
too much alcohol and I understand he was a miserable drunk, especially
at the end.

Add the previously mentioned layers of social violence (btw, I highly
recommend Richard Slotkin's now classic trilogy, Regeneration Through
Violence, The Fatal Environment, and Gunfighter Nation if you're
interested in the mythological underpinnings of the US) and America is
just one big no fun party.

FYI -- the classic work on the relationship between Protestantism and
capitalism is by Max Weber.  While later scholars have found minor
discrepancies in his specific arguments, IMHO the generalities still
hold.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Protestant_Ethic_and_the_Spirit_of_Capitalism

PJ