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The series of articles about loyalty last week in the Post did what good journalism should do -- make you think about the topic.
My first qualms about loyalty came when I was a mere adolescent. At the time, we lived in Evans, just south of Greeley. Naturally I attended Evans Junior-Senior High School, where I was a loyal Ram who cheered loudly at every game.
(I was also manager of the wrestling team and scorekeeper for the baseball team, so I managed to get varsity letters in two sports without ever facing an opponent from Erie, Berthoud or Lyons -- the other teams in the North Central Conference.)
Since I was 14 years old, all this school-spirit stuff seemed important. Then the schools consolidated. Suddenly I was a Greeley West High School Spartan. In the spring of 1965, our teachers urged us to be loyal to Evans High; three months later, the same teachers wanted us to be loyal to Greeley West.
I pretty much gave up on school spirit, along with believing anything that teachers said. If Evans was important last year, why was it meaningless this year? If Evans mattered, they should have kept the school open. Obviously, it wasn't, since they closed the school, and we'd all just been played for suckers. When I look back, I just feel stupid for believing in something as evanescent as a school that could be terminated in an instant by a board of education.
This sorry process apparently continues, since the Post series featured some parents who worked hard in an election to give the Denver public schools more money so they could save their neighborhood school, only to have the school board close it.
Our educational system tries to instill loyalty in its patrons, while extending none in return. Little wonder that people are so suspicious of the public schools.
While a student at Evans, I had to read Shakespeare's
Julius Caesar,
a drama which explores conflicting
loyalties.
Marcus Brutus was a friend of Caesar's, but Brutus was
also loyal to the concept of a Roman republic, rather than
the dictatorship that Caesar threatened to impose. Torn
between these conflicting loyalties, Brutus elected to
assassinate Caesar: Not that I lov'd Caesar less, but
that I lov'd Rome more.
I don't recall any lengthy discussion of this in class
then, and I doubt there would be any now. It might fall
under the category of values clarification
and the
right-thinkers would be out in arms.
But by modern American political standards, Brutus did the right thing. We expect our politicians to be loyal to ideals, not to people, as evidenced by the furor over President Harry Truman's attending the funeral of an old Prendergast machine crony, or more recently, Patrick Buchanan's refusal to fire a devoted campaign aide who had breathed the same air as some white supremacists.
Politicians who stand by their friends are denounced for
cronyism
or insider dealing,
whereas we
esteem those who, in the course of advancement, treat
people (including their spouses) like so many rungs on a
ladder.
To move from politics to something important, like
commerce, there's brand loyalty.
As I've mentioned
earlier, we always tried to get Kenmore when we could
afford new appliances. But then Sears demonstrated its
loyalty to customers in rural areas by closing its catalog
operations and catalog stores.
This seems to prove that in modern America, your reputation on Wall Street is a lot more important than your reputation on Main Street. It's kind of like cheering for Evans High -- you just feel like a sucker.
And if you really want to feel stupid, there's corporate
loyalty. Perhaps the most profoundly subversive scene in
American cinema occurred in Butch Cassidy and the
Sundance Kid.
They're robbing a train and preparing to dynamite the
express car. They're urging the express messenger to get
out before the blast, and he keeps saying I work for Mr.
E.H. Harriman.
Finally there's the question: Look, kid, would
Harriman die for you?
The kid jumps, moments before the blast.
That seems like the best way to decide on loyalty these days. Don't die for Harriman if he wouldn't die for you.
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