A scarecrow named Banjo: Glynn Wilson

The Big Picture – 
By Glynn Wilson – 

What America needs is another Seabiscuit.

What lifted the United States out of the Great Depression in the late 1930s?

Was it government spending on the Civilian Conservation Corps that hired out of work laborers to build the national parks and other government programs?

Was it a wildly popular president in Franklin Delano Roosevelt who, down but not out in a wheel chair himself, pushed through Congress those government programs?

Or was it the little underdog pony named Seabiscuit, which won more high stakes races than any horse in its time with more heart and will than size and ability?

If you’ve never seen the movie Seabiscuit you should call it up on Netflix. It’s a 2003 American sports film co-produced, written and directed by Gary Ross and based on the best-selling 1999 non-fiction book Seabiscuit: An American Legend, by Laura Hillenbrand.

The film, which was nominated for seven Academy Awards, is loosely based on the life and racing career of an undersized and overlooked thoroughbred race horse, whose unexpected successes made him a hugely popular media sensation in the U.S. during the Great Depression.

Thousands of down and out workers all across the country took heart from the success of the small, underdog horse at the time, filling the cheap infield seats at racetracks to get a glimpse of the miraculous horse, his popular but flawed jockey Red Pollard, and to get a dollar bet down on him to win.

His success became an American underdog story that lifted the spirits of Americans who were struggling to make ends meet, many simply trying to find enough work to pay for their next meal.

Seabiscuit on a workout with jockey George Wolf: Wikipedia

COVID-19

The coronavirus and economic downturn have so far just divided the country even more than it was before the crisis, with the partisan divide even creating political arguments about something as simple as wearing a mask and washing your hands.

There is no political figure on the horizon popular enough to bridge this divide, not even the common man from Delaware, former Senator and Vice President Joe Biden, although he appears to be headed toward a landslide victory over Donald Trump.

This partisan divide started by conservative talk radio and exacerbated by cable television news shows, which has exploded into a full on communications war on social media, seems destined to splinter the United States apart unlike anything in our 244 year history, with the exception of the bloody Civil War from 1861-1864 in which more than 600,000 people died.

More than 150,000 have now died in the U.S. from COVID-19, and we are still arguing about whether we should wear masks and reopen schools and businesses.

How many more will have to die before we stop arguing and everybody gets onboard? What symbolic gesture, news story, song, poem, personage or horse will emerge to bring a halt to this division?

Or are we all just so sick and tired of living this struggle that we would rather commit collective suicide than to swallow our pride and our own brand of narcissism to come together and fight to live?

Altruism

If I had the money to buy a race horse myself, I would name it Altruism. If it was a small horse that came back from tragedy to win the Triple Crown, maybe the mainstream media in this country would finally listen to what scientists are saying about the destructive nature of the selfish gene and start educating the public about the need to work together for our collective survival.

Related: It’s Not the Time for Selfish Competition Within Groups

All this competition for circulation, ratings, money and power is antithetical to human survival, especially the survival of the most vulnerable, the old and sick, blacks and Latinos, and yes, even white men, who die from the coronavirus more than women.

Maybe if Fox News would tell people that story, instead of constantly obscuring the truth for money, we could make some progress.

Meanwhile I will be here in the mountains in my camp chair watching the world come to a fiery end, in between working on this organic garden I’ve made, and waiting on some sign that people are ready to listen to reason.

I’m as tired of the social isolation as anyone else, and have taken to talking to a scarecrow named Banjo. At least he doesn’t argue with me like the trolls on Facebook.

I wish I could join the pundits and politicians in saying things like, “We will all get through this together.” Unfortunately, I’m still not seeing enough signs to say there is anything on the horizon to create a movement of “togetherness.”

Maybe something will happen between now and November 3 to prove me wrong. I hope so.