End-of-Year Reflections on "Bad Faith"

"Che follo a si fonda hinka gana."

"One foot cannot follow two paths.” —Songhay proverb

During the many years I lived among the Songhay people of the Republic of Niger, the elders loved to recite to me the “one foot cannot follow two paths” proverb. Maybe they wanted me to know that no matter how well I learned to speak the Songhay language, no matter how long I lived in rural Songhay villages, no matter how much of the Songhay way of being I might understand, I would never become a Songhay. I apprenticed many years to Songhay healers, who taught me a great deal about the healing properties of plants, about magical incantations and rituals, and about how the social and spirit worlds intersected at sacred crossroads in the bush. Even so, they’d always remind me, “one foot cannot follow two paths.” They’d tell me to never forget who I was, an American trying to learn about Songhay ways. They’d tell me that it was dangerous to live a life shaped by illusion.

Following the revelatory path in Zurich

Source: Paul Stoller

Wise talk about the profound danger of existential illusion compelled me to read Jean-Paul Sartre’s masterwork, Being and Nothingness, once again and to refresh my memory of his concept of “bad faith” (la mauvaise foi). In Sartre’s admittedly gloomy view of life, in a world shaped through “bad faith,” people feel they must construct fictitious selves that adhere to social convention. In so doing, they relinquish their freedom of thought and action. Put another way, in a “bad faith” society things are never what they appear to be, facts become fiction, scientific truths are transformed into conspiracy theories, and authenticity yields to inauthenticity. In short, what is real is replaced by fantasy— a way to avoid the painful truths of the “who is,” the "what is,” and the “there is."

As my Songhay mentors well understood, “bad faith” has long been a central element in social life. Social convention is a powerful force. It has always been easier, after all, to blend in than to stand out, to adhere to the norm than to fight against it. Consider the tragic consequences of “bad faith” in Arthur Miller’s classic play, Death of a Salesman, in which the protagonist, Willy Loman, lives in an illusory past. In this way, he avoids confronting his lack of success, the greatest social virtue of the American Dream. When events force him to acknowledge his failure as a salesman and a father, his protective “bad faith” dissipates and his life unravels into suicide—the tragic result of living his life as an illusion.

The social conventions and mythic constructions that build patterns of "bad faith" are especially strong in an era of social media. In many respects, our society is like a house of cards, built on small and large mythic illusions. The dream of success is still with us, and the will to succeed has made gaining a competitive edge, sometimes ruthlessly, a virtue. It’s important to be a “winner.” It is catastrophic to be a “loser.” These notions permeate social life in America. For most of my university students, the competition for good grades has become seriously stressful. Many of them have never been intellectually challenged or constructively critiqued, measures that give them a truthful glimpse into their real intellectual capacity. Such a glimpse can undermine a carefully constructed foundation of self-illusion. Some of my students are so stressed about taking an exam they’d rather miss it than risk the shame of performing poorly. Some of my students are so fearful of critical insight, they fail to turn in their research papers. Like Arthur Miller’s Willy Loman, it is much safer for many of my students to dwell upon a past that protects a “bad faith” illusion of their intellectual capacity. For my students, the issue of "bad faith" is compounded in the media-saturated world of Facebook, Instagram, and Snap Chat. As Shelly Turkle (2016) reminds us, it is now easy to create and maintain a perfectly edited flawless digital image of ourselves—the very essence of “bad faith” and the antithesis of authentically coming to terms with an inconvenient truth. This digital development increases the stressful need to excel, to be perfect, to be a "winner."

“Bad faith” has also a major impact on our economic, social and political lives. As my Songhay mentors like to say, a society in which people speak with “two-mouths” and “two-hearts" is one that is about to unravel, one that is about to lose its social harmony. In a “two-mouth, two-heart” society, the trust between people or between a population and its government fades away and is replaced by chaos in which social and political life is rife with distrust, alienation, cynicism, and hate. Such chaos makes space for “perfect” phone calls, campaigns of disinformation, and “alternative” facts.

Living in a society whose social and cultural foundations are being swept way disrupts the social and psychological contours of everyday social life. Fiction becomes fact. Fewer and fewer people listen to reason. The rigors of science become suspect and we lose what my friend and colleague A. David Napier calls “social trust.” Such are the social costs of ‘bad faith.”

How can we confront the social disruption of “bad faith?" Philosophers like Jean-Paul Sartre would argue for personal authenticity and the brutal freedom of troublesome choice. Many scholars would suggest that we accept inconvenient scientific truths—our climate is changing at a dangerously rapid pace. Educators would say that we need to teach our students how to understand the economic, social, and political implications of scientific findings. Through such teaching, they would argue, some of the severed bonds of social trust might well be restored. As an anthropologist who lived among people who have faced existential challenges beyond our imagination, I would also suggest that we look elsewhere for new ideas and explore the wisdom of people like the Songhay whose elders say that society can only work if its members avoid using one foot to walk two paths.

In 2020, can we confront “bad faith” with robust honesty? Can we renew our search for wisdom in the world and begin our journey on a straight path that will secure the future? The answer will determine the fate of forthcoming generations.

Although the stale odor of "bad faith" permeates contemporary social life, I remain optimistic. After all, when the wind shifts its direction, will it not sweep away the mustiness of illusion and replace it with the fresh air of innovation and invention?