Canto 28: Dante & Facebook
Canto 28: Bertram de Born in the ditch of the schismatics - Gustave Gore
It is easy to be pessimistic. A pessimist can always find something about which to complain. Looking at recent polling, roughly 63% of Americans[1] think that the country is on the wrong track. For more than the past ten years, over 50% of Americans have felt this way. I should note a slight dip to 49% in May of this year, but the rate has gone back up since then. The cause of this negative outlook is the result of a pandemic more lethal than Covid. A virus whose carriers do so willingly, happily. Dante describes these people in the Inferno.
In Canto 28, Dante takes us through the ninth bolge of the eighth circle of hell. As many of you may know, Dante describes hell as composed of nine concentric circles that form a cone whose vertex is at the earth’s center. The deeper you go, the more serious the sin, bringing you closer to Satan while taking you farther from God. The eighth circle that Dante named Malebolge, evil sacks, is reserved for the fraudulent. The Malebolge is itself divided into ten ditches which are the sacks referred to in its name. In each of these ditches are sinners guilty of different types of fraud, from Seducers to thieves, to forgers with others in between.
The sinners punished in this ninth bolge are the schismatics, people who create division within their society by presenting a fraudulent version of the world. They are sowers of discord. In this canto, Dante provided examples of three different types of dividers; religious, political, and familial. Where people should have been united in faith, patriotism, or family love, they created division, a split within a body.
The horrors that Dante sees in the ninth ditch are too much for him to describe. According to John Ciardi’s translation, Dante says, “Who could describe, even in words set free / of metric and rhyme and a thousand times retold / The blood and the wounds that were now shown to me! / A grief so deep the tongue must wag in vain.” Even if freed from writing in rhyme, he could not accurately describe what he saw in that ditch. What he saw there was gore more incredible than seen in any battle.
At one point, a demon stands with a sword. Just as these sinners divided others, divided what God had intended joined, they are likewise split throughout all eternity. After being ripped apart, they continue their trek around the great circle of the bolge; some carry their severed body parts, others dragging their hanging entrails. As they complete the circuit of their course, their bodies heal, and they present themselves whole again to the demon with the sword. The cycle then begins anew.
Mohammed, who divided the faithful, is split from chin to anus and is followed by his son-in-law Ali who split Islam into Sunni and Shiite. We see Curio, whose advice to Caesar led to a civil war. His tongue was sliced down into his throat, making him mute. Then there is Bertram de Born carrying his severed head like a lantern. He encouraged Prince Henry to rebel against his father, the king. There are others within this ditch listed by Dante that I will not review here.
As modern readers, we may wonder why. Is this sin as grave as all that? These sinners will be hacked and physically split throughout all eternity, creating gore so repellant that Dante is at a loss to describe it. They are damned to just about the very end of the penultimate circle of hell. Their sins are worse, in Dante’s estimation than almost all other sins. Think of this for a moment. Their sins are worse than those of the heretics, the violent, the simonist. They are worse than all the other sinners we have already encountered in hell. Is he correct in his estimation?
Dante’s view seems antiquated, contrary to how today’s guardians of righteousness evaluate sin. If a public figure falls prey to lust, they condemn him or her as unfit to lead. Yet, these same people cheer on those who sell hate and division. Rather than see it as a dark sin, they see it as moral and good. They see attacks on others are a crusade against evil. Are they correct? Is it a virtue to create hatred towards others? Are we to appoint ourselves the instruments of God’s wrath?
Dante, perhaps due to his life experience, had an insight that many today do not. What makes the schismatics worse than these others is that so many sins flow from their own. In dividing others, they encourage others to sin. Think of how many sins flow from hatred of others. Shakespeare’s Iago drove Othello to murder by turning love into hate. Beyond violence, hate could move a person to just about any sin against another. Many feel it acceptable to lie about a person you hate, cheat them, and steal from them. If they are part of a group you hate, all the better. You don’t have to deal with the individual; simply being part of a hated group is a fair target of abuse. This is why sowing discord is such a serious sin.
As grave a sin as this may be, it has become common in our society. It began with talk-radio and 24-hour news networks. In the guise of seeking to inform, they seek to gin up hate. Understand that they know what they are doing. If I can get you to feel morally superior to some other group through hatred, I can get you hooked. When done right, listeners get a little dose of dopamine; they feel good about themselves and their team. They want to feel good like that again, so they tune in again the next day to get another hit. They tell their like-minded friends, who also get hooked.
Of course, the purveyors of this poison understand what they are doing. They don’t care about the issues, not really. What they say is driven by what their listeners want to hear. There is no consistency in what they say, no core guiding principles other than driving ratings. The higher the ratings, the more money they make.
Allow a brief digression here to note that no one group is guilty. To quote the scripture, all have sinned and fall short of the glory of God. All sides of all arguments are at fault. Liberals. Conservatives. Environmentalists. Climate-Change deniers. Vaxers. Anti-Vaxers. No one can claim purity here.
Social Media was the proverbial gas on a fire, making us all into willing accomplices. Social networks such as Facebook and Twitter realized that we could do their work for them. They didn’t have to dream up new ways to get us to hate one another. We could do that ourselves. We could create hateful memes and provocative statements. All they needed to do was provide the platform and encourage the hate. They made a science of triggering you, getting you angry. They make sure you see the things that create the most heated debates. They know what you will spread and what you will ignore. It is all to generate more clicks and run up that all-important like count.
Is it any wonder we are so angry with one another? Listening and spreading hate has become our entertainment. There seems to be no limit to what we say of one another. Kathy Griffin once appeared holding the bloody head of former President Trump. Representative Paul Gosar posted an animation of him attacking Representative Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez with a sword. How is this at all acceptable?
I recently heard one Dante commentator note that perhaps Dante felt this way because he was guilty of this sin himself. The faults we tend to hate most in others are the ones that reflect our own. When I heard this, I realized that I, like Dante, am guilty of this sin. I was once a fierce keyboard warrior, arguing with anyone and everyone about anything. Whether I knew anything about the subject or not, I had the one valid opinion. I have since repented of my sin. I try to resist embroiling myself in online debates. If I do get into a discussion with a person, I endeavor to be positive regardless of the subject. Even when I disagree with an individual, I attempt to focus on the thing being debated and not the other person.
If we would like to avoid facing the demon with the sword in the ninth bolge, we should follow the example of Socrates. Before he spoke, he would ask himself the following questions:
1. Is it true?
2. Is it kind?
3. Is it useful?
4. Is it necessary?
Few of us consider these points when sharing information. In the interest of a complete confession, I must admit that most often I did not. The truth, however, seems to be the thing that concerns people the least. To many commentators the truth is irrelevant. If something is antagonistic towards a group or person we don’t like, we share it. There is no fact-checking. Some people believe that the Clintons kill infants and drink their blood. Some claim, with no actual proof, that former President Trump is a Russian asset. Do the people who traffic in such statements take the time to test rigorously what they are repeating is true? Of course not. Critical thinking and fact-checking are things of the past. The only criteria are if you are on my side. If you disagree with me, then everything you say is a lie. The only truth speakers are those who agree with my already predetermined opinions.
Before we click share, we need to ask ourselves if something is true. Think about what you share and say on the web. There are many fact checking sites where you can validate any meme, comment, image, or even video on the web. It is has always been the responsibility of the person speaking to ensure the truth of what they say.
Suppose we follow these simple guidelines for our own communication and turn a deaf ear to those who would seek to create divisions between us. In that case, we will be taking a significant step forward in freeing ourselves and our society from the hate that is so pervasive today.
[1] Real Clear Politics - https://www.realclearpolitics.com/epolls/other/direction_of_country-902.html