when a call to link arms comes from a friendly, woolly thing: it’s time to take notice
In Britain, if somebody calls you a ‘muppet’ one of many things may have happened. Perhaps, you’ve just put thirty litres of the wrong type of fuel into the car you’re staring at. Or, maybe, that new red T-shirt swirling with the pink ‘whites’, won’t be your favourite any more. Either way, the accolade is usually embraced in humble recognition of a lack of smarts, as it sits at the genteel end of calling someone out. Yet, this week, a real or rather an official muppet thanked his lucky stars for his furry DNA, as a torrent of angst rained down hard. Surely, no human could have processed it all.
Elmo, the famously loud-pitched, red muppet from Sesame Street went viral with a simple message on a social media platform. In checking in, to ask how everyone on the network was doing: he unleashed a tidal wave of pain stored up, in so many people’s lives. Without a doubt, as thousands upon thousands of replies built up, his red coat coat could have joined Santa’s in visiting each and every one, to offer a smile and a much-needed hug.
Clearly, his reaching out had merely exposed what we already know in that today’s world seems fraught, with existential worry. The dread of escalating regional conflicts; the cost of living in trying to make ends meet; the heartache and repercussions of global crime and the relentless march of climate change. As we try and make sense of all this to simply change what we can, existentialism reminds us that ultimately, living in an irrational universe requires the effort of acceptance of self and human nature.
‘Self-acceptance, too often is intertwined with attempts to rationalise ourselves as being right or justified in our mistakes instead of embracing our humanity as imperfect creatures. Authentic self-acceptance requires that we are honest with ourselves about responsibility: instead of seeking to justify our mistakes, we embrace them.’
Louis Hoffman, A Cultural Crisis of Responsibility: Responding To A Denial Of Our Humanity
It possibly means recognising strings that are holding you up as more of a puppet than a muppet, to the dance of anxiety. So, with fear tugging on your head, wrists and knees, take in the absurdity of the untold alongside your moves as well as the belief that you can’t do much about it. That may, of course, be truer and harsher for some depending on circumstances but then dealing with that element of helplessness is a gamechanger, in a world where vulnerability is written into our DNA.
Yet, existentialism asks you to think beyond it and through to the idea that you carry some if not all of the tools, to make good your escape. In fact, it comes back to the spectrum of responsibility time and again but especially in relation to your place, in the cosmos. So, we’re nothing and everything in the time it takes to cell divide and emerge by accident or intent, before blowing away into infinity as dust.
‘We are capable of bearing a great burden, once we discover that burden is reality and arrive where reality is.
James Baldwin, 1962, The Fire Next Time, p.91
Well, maybe, just maybe, Elmo the muppet is an existentialist if he doesn’t mind the label, and with Bert and The Cookie Monster stepping in to support him: it’s clear that they’re all muppets but then again, perhaps not.
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Images
Pumpkin Heads, by Katia Miasoed, Pixabay – Main Image
Pensive Pose, by Engin Aykurt, Pixabay
References
‘Muppet’, Collins Dictionary (Glasgow, HarperCollins, 2023) accessed 1st February 2024, https://www.collinsdictionary.com/dictionary/english/muppet
A.J Willingham, ‘Elmo asked people online how they were doing. He got an earful’, CNN, 31st January 2024, accessed 1st February 2024, https://edition.cnn.com/2024/01/31/health/elmo-checking-in-x-wellness-cec/index.html
‘Global Conflict Tracker’, Council on Foreign Relations, 2024, https://www.cfr.org/global-conflict-tracker
Statista Research Department, ‘Global Inflation Rate From 2000 To 2022, With Forecasts Until 2028’, 2024, accessed 1st February 2024, https://www.statista.com/statistics/256598/global-inflation-rate-compared-to-previous-year/
The World Bank, ‘Intentional Homicides (Per 100,000)’, UN Office on Drugs and Crime’s International Homicide Statistics Database, 2024, accessed 1st February 2024, https://data.worldbank.org/indicator/VC.IHR.PSRC.P5?end=2021&start=1990
NASA’s Jet Propulsion Laboratory, ‘Global Climate Change: Vital Signs of the Planet’, Earth Science Communications Team, 30th January 2024, accessed 1st February 2024, https://climate.nasa.gov/
Louis hoffman, ‘A Cultural Crisis of Responsibility: Responding To A Denial Of Our Humanity’, Saybrook University, 6th May 2014, accessed 2nd February 2024, https://www.saybrook.edu/2014/05/06/05-06-14/
James Baldwin, ‘The Fire Next Time’ (London, Penguin Classics, 1990)
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