1. You Must Know the Source Code of Suffering to Debug It: Re-enactment vs. Faith
In my previous post, I examined the illusions held by democratic citizens who believe in progress, and traced the origins of this linear view of history, focusing on Judeo-Christianity, democracy, and the philosophies of Hegel, Marx, and Sartre. Although the scope was vast, the core converges into a single question: How do we resolve the existential dread triggered by the irreversibility of time?
In response, historicists believed that this dread would dissipate if they could prove the “laws of history.” For instance, Hegel conceptually posited a necessary structure realized by Absolute Reason. From a materialist standpoint, Marx was certain of the inevitable, law-bound arrival of a communist society. Meanwhile, Sartre wandered within the contradictions between existentialism and Marxism. Today’s democratic citizens have essentially cherry-picked Sartre’s ideas, demanding “progress without pain + freedom without responsibility” from the state. As a result, civilization is crumbling under the weight of extreme populism and debt addiction—to the point where simply watching the daily news brings a sense of dread.
Where, then, does this existential dread come from? It arises when we cannot interpret or control the phenomena we are currently experiencing, leading to questions like, “Why on earth is this happening to me?” Humans can endure meaningful suffering, but we cannot tolerate meaningless suffering. Therefore, to interpret a phenomenon, we must know its “origin,” not its “law.” In modern terms, we must know the source code to debug it. Historically, there have been two ways to secure this source code.
- First: Traveling back to the “primeval time” (in illo tempore) when this phenomenon first came into existence—just as ancient peoples did—and discovering the homology between oneself and a sacred being.
- Second: Having faith that these laws are guaranteed by God, as Christianity practiced. For example, the Gospel of Mark records: “Have faith in God. […] Whoever believes that what they say will happen […] whatever you ask for in prayer, believe that you have received it, and it will be yours.” Because it is spoken by God, the word itself becomes the source code.
For modern individuals, Mircea Eliade emphasizes the second method: faith. He argued that modern humans can no longer return to the era of re-enacting exemplary archetypes like ancient peoples did. This is because humanity has distanced itself from nature and the cosmos, choosing instead to live within civilization. Therefore, for civilized people, faith in God becomes the only way to be liberated from the terror of history. Through faith, we can optimistically await the “salvation” promised by God’s omnipotence, thereby transcending history rather than eternally recurring to the past.
However, there is something Eliade left unaddressed: faith does not simply manifest in just anyone. To believe in something through faith means accepting the presence of a being superior to oneself. What is the core of the Apostles’ Creed? It is faith in the Creator, faith in Jesus as a historical fact, and faith in the Church and the eschatological salvation. To hold these beliefs, one must first recognize how powerless and counterfeit they are—that they are nothing compared to absolutely sublime beings. One must realize on their own that a hierarchy exists in time, space, and the soul, and that they are at the very bottom of it.
To perceive this hierarchy, one needs an intense, jarring experience where the everyday world we live in ceases to make sense logically and empirically. For example, it requires sacrifices like Abraham being forced to offer up Isaac, the agony of the Temple being burned by Rome and a nation scattered, or the sense of contradiction and alienation that Valentinus, the Gnostic leader, felt from orthodox, institutionalized Christianity. When faced with inexplicable suffering, humans yearn for an overwhelming power that can destroy it all at once. When, by some turning point, they encounter a being that grants this “overwhelming power,” humans voluntarily submit to the hierarchy, becoming zealots to transcend their painful earthly existence.
Yet, citizens of modern democratic welfare states rarely experience this “Absolute Other” psychologically. Because a democratic welfare state derives its legitimacy from the support of its citizens, it operates as a faith-based entity that promises to become a god and solve all problems. In this worldview, the citizen becomes an equal 1/N sovereign and creator. Consequently, because they view themselves as the only authentic entity and the master of the world, they cannot accept any other hierarchical structure. In fact, from the perspective of a democratic citizen, hierarchy is synonymous with dictatorship and is therefore something to be dismantled. Thus, because the citizen is the “creator” of the democratic welfare state, the realm of faith inevitably shrinks. This has nothing to do with the advancement of science or capitalism.
If so, how on earth should we understand the fact that life remains painful despite the existence of this quasi-god (the democratic welfare state)? How are democratic citizens coping with this phenomenon?
2. How Democratic Citizens Seek the Source Code of Suffering: The Logic of Good vs. Evil
In a democratic society, faith degenerates into a simplistic and sensationalized form. Faith based on sacrifice—like Abraham being commanded to offer up Isaac (Genesis), the call to step out onto a stormy sea (Gospel of Matthew), or Paul’s teachings to realize that the seed of the Spirit dwells within (Romans, Corinthians, etc.)—has vanished. The vacuum has been filled by a counterfeit faith: the logic of Good vs. Evil (moral binary).
(1) Why Christianity Came to Rely on the Moral Binary
In the archaic era, gods were the embodiment of overwhelming power and sacredness (the Numinous) itself. They were not “moral” role models for humans to emulate. Furthermore, the Greco-Roman myths recorded by Homer thoroughly desacralized ancient gods. They depicted Zeus and Hera’s jealousy, wrath, and lust without filtration, never forcing them to play the role of absolute “Good.”
The trajectory of Judeo-Christianity, however, was different. The Hebrew people endured overwhelming, collective suffering manufactured by civilization and history: slavery in Egypt, the Babylonian Captivity, Roman invasions, and the Diaspora. In a reality where their lives were crushed by secular rulers, Hebrew prophets interpreted historical events differently to imbue their suffering with meaning. They asserted that all these trials occurred not because foreign powers were strong, but because Yahweh had intervened in history to judge and awaken them for losing their faith and growing complacent.
According to this logic, only an omnipotent God could orchestrate such monumental trials, making them a token of the promise of salvation. While the gods of the archaic era dwelt in the heavens, merely contemplating human time, the God of the Hebrew people was reborn as a historical entity who directly descended into human history to control the timeline. Yet, while Judaism gave birth to a linear view of history, it did not rely heavily on a moral binary. They believed their duty was fulfilled simply by keeping the Law created by Yahweh and propagated by Moses.
Christianity, while sharing this linear view of history, rejected Judaism’s laws and covenants that emphasized outward actions and procedures. Instead, Christianity shifted the root of suffering to human original sin and individual moral corruption. For example, the Gospel of Matthew states: “You have heard that it was said, ‘You shall not commit adultery.’ But I tell you that anyone who looks at a woman lustfully has already committed adultery with her in his heart.” This elevated the moral binary and moral purity as the first principle, asking: “Is your inner disposition Good, or is it Evil?” rather than focusing on whether you outwardly follow the law.
Christianity approaches the state through this very lens of the moral binary. From their perspective, Jesus was a figure who spiritually explained why Roman oppression was inevitable and promised salvation. He did so by bearing the cross, acting as a vicarious atonement for humanity’s original sin and the suffering of all nations. However, the crucifixion and resurrection ultimately compressed the complex political and economic suffering generated by history into a single, stark concept: “Evil.”
Although Jesus cried, “Render to Caesar the things that are Caesar’s,” the believers who interpreted the event took a different stance. What kind of entity must the Roman Empire be to have crucified and killed such a noble and good Son of God? It could only be explained as the incarnation of absolute evil. Rome, having slaughtered the holy Jesus, became an eschatological adversary that had to be destroyed. This narrative of vengeance is vividly illustrated in the Book of Revelation. Revelation defines Rome as the Whore of Babylon, drunk on gold and luxury, drinking the blood of the saints. It prophesies that God will bring a judgment of sulfur and fire to burn Rome without a trace, sinking it into the depths of the sea.
This is where the blind spot of the moral binary emerges. By shifting the entire blame for all life’s deficiencies and suffering onto a massive external enemy, it completes a narrative of blind hatred—one where my salvation can only be achieved by annihilating that demonic foe.
(2) The Modernized Moral Binary and the Psychology of Democratic Citizens
The moral binary of modern democracy fully inherits Christianity’s narrative of moral judgment and salvation. However, shedding its religious garb, it covertly dominates the minds of democratic citizens in subtle ways.
First: Primordial Debt Consciousness and Secular Vicarious Atonement.
Modern society does not shove the doctrine of original sin directly in citizens’ faces. Pronouncing someone a sinner from birth would be an insult to the sovereign democratic citizen. Instead, the system takes a detour through historical debt consciousness.
Taking South Korea as an example, democracy continuously and systematically injects people with a sense of debt toward the 1980 Gwangju Democratization Movement. It teaches that the sacred origin of the affluence and welfare democratic citizens enjoy today lies solely in the bloody sacrifices of Gwangju, and that the military dictatorship that resisted it is a demon to be eternally cursed. This is a theological framework asserting that the country became a developed nation thanks to the vicarious atonement of the pure. The minds of democratic citizens exposed to this narrative from youth lose the courage to verify whether it is true. Questioning what truth lies hidden behind the sacrifice, or whether the aristocratic privileges enjoyed as a result are justified, becomes a demonic act. Consequently, anyone who criticizes the unfairness, inefficiency, or majoritarian exploitation of the democratic system is branded by democratic citizens as a “demon who defends dictatorship and commits blasphemy”—an entity that must be destroyed.
(On a global scale, this is similar to the debt consciousness regarding the Civil Rights Movement and the martyrdom of Martin Luther King Jr., the debt toward the youth, progress, and justice symbolized by JFK’s death).
Second: The Secularized Promise of Judgment and Trial by Public Opinion.
In the past, Christianity blamed the suffering of earthly existence on the wickedness of monarchs or the ruling class, promising that on Judgement Day, they would inevitably burn in the eternal damnation of hellfire. Conversely, the hellfire promised by modern democracy is elections and trials by public opinion.
Those deeply addicted to the religion of democracy become bizarrely excited on election days, resembling zealots falling into collective ecstasy at a religious revival. In bars and plazas, election broadcast screens run 24 hours a day, and the masses stay up all night watching the TV. The moment the victory mark appears next to the messiah they support, they leap from their seats and cheer as if salvation has manifested. The winning side distributes bread and wine to the congregation that awaited salvation, while the losing side resigns en masse, and everyone—including their supporters—plunges into an economic and social hell. They suffer from a sense of helplessness until the next election, vowing revenge to ensure the destruction of their opponents.
The doxxing and witch hunts occurring on YouTube and online communities are extensions of this judgment. It is a collective madness aimed at digging up, debugging, and executing the “source code” of the demon causing suffering in one’s life. The moment a single moral flaw is captured from someone’s past, that trial allows for no appeals or tolerance. The blade of the digital guillotine does not stop until the target is socially ruined or driven into retirement.
Third: The Endless Search for Scapegoats and the Routine of Repentance.
Despite judging the demons and achieving victory for the political faction they support, the lives and wallets of democratic citizens do not improve. The reason is self-evident. From the very beginning, the origin of suffering and deficiency in their lives did not lie with the opposing party or a specific politician. The true causes of suffering are individual incompetence, dependence on others, failure in risk management, and a welfare system that encourages debt over saving, triggers inflation, and plunders to prevent reinvestment. Therefore, no matter how many times the regime changes, or how many demons are endlessly executed via public opinion trials, individual bank balances remain empty.
Each time this happens, democratic citizens experience massive cognitive dissonance, regret, and doubt. They begin to suspect that the salvation promised by the false god (the Demiurge) of the democratic welfare state does not exist in reality, and that something is wrong with the system. Yet, due to the primordial debt consciousness filling their heads, they dare not criticize the system.
Ultimately, the only escape route they choose is to find a new scapegoat and place them on the guillotine. They rotate through themes—large corporations, foreign capital, specific immigrant groups, the far-right—and blame them for all misfortunes. To justify their own suffering, these targets must be “born demons.” No matter how smart modern people pride themselves on being, that feeling of catharsis the ancients felt when executing or exiling a scapegoat still remains. Then, weeping in repentance for having temporarily doubted the sacredness of democracy, citizens walk right back into the voting booths. This is why modern democratic citizens rely on the moral binary to evade the harsh realities of life.
(3) Why Producers Must Not Approach Business Through a Moral Binary
As democratic citizens became addicted to the moral dichotomy, some producers in the market followed suit. They began shouting for the realization of justice as if they were Yahweh or a messiah themselves. In South Korea’s creator and self-employment ecosystem, these fake feudal lords are popping up everywhere. They pose as saviors wiping away the tears of small business owners, judges of drunk driving acting in place of the law, or advocates of private justice substituting for the state’s penal system. To gain moral sympathy from the public, they stimulate a sense of debt by proving how much they have dedicated and sacrificed to reach their current standing. They then promise judgment upon the villains who provoke public outrage. If their own business mistakes or moral errors are caught, they find an external scapegoat to ignite the flames of a witch hunt. This bizarre theater is primarily observed in the creator industry and green-marketing businesses.
However, for a producer who needs to sell proper goods, drifting into the business of a spiritual medium is a self-defeating move. There is a single reason why the historical Jesus could remain the pure Jesus for two thousand years without ever getting caught in a frame of hypocrisy: he bore the cross and physically died when his narrative reached its zenith. Because he exited into the realm of the afterlife, the church organization—which claimed to be his earthly agent—could continue doing business based on the “promised apocalypse and second coming.”
For instance, in Dostoevsky’s The Brothers Karamazov, the Grand Inquisitor (a cardinal of the Catholic Church), who holds the supreme power of the Church, arrests the returned Jesus and locks him in a dungeon. He tells him: “Why have you come to hinder us? Borrowing your name and authority, we are controlling the people well, building an empire, and ruling them perfectly. If you come and speak of ‘freedom’ again, our system will collapse. Therefore, I will burn you at the stake tomorrow.” This Grand Inquisitor narrative cynically highlights that the masses desire “bread” over “freedom,” but consequently, it clearly shows that a messiah must depart for the business to become an immortal brand.
The same applies to producers who inject the moral binary into their business. If absolute evil or deep-seated corruption truly existed in reality, heaven would arrive the moment it was eradicated. However, because the moral binary is merely a concept, absolute evil does not exist. Therefore, at some point, the producer standing at the apex of that altar will face a moment where they must hang from the moral cross they built themselves.
This is because they grew their business in the first place by raising the public’s moral standards. A typical trigger is the emergence of a new god. The new god will brand the producer as a fraud masquerading as an angel of light, or dig through past records to defame them as an immoral Satan. Since they achieved success by framing competitors as evil, their own minor business mistakes or human flaws will be viewed by others as evil.
Simultaneously, democratic citizens are always sharpening their knives, harboring jealousy and questioning, “Are you really that clean?” Being 1/N sovereigns, they do not easily accept that someone else is morally holier than they are. When these factors align, the very democratic citizens who opened their wallets for the producer just yesterday will instantly morph into brutal executioners, demanding that they bear the cross.
Inevitably, they face the irony where the organization they left behind can only endure if they die for the sake of justice and become a myth. Take the democratic/progressive camp in South Korea as an example. Leaders who met tragic ends, such as the late President Roh Moo-hyun, former Seoul Mayor Park Won-soon, and lawmaker Roh Hoe-chan, all succeeded by framing the opposing camp as demons and casting themselves as moral entities implementing justice. Yet, being human, they also suffered terribly from policy failures, internal rifts, and moral or legal flaws. Ultimately, they chose death, and through that sacrifice, the sins they committed were evaporated. Their successors, claiming to be the “legitimate line,” exploited the public’s sense of guilt to elevate their brand to the status of a sacred sanctuary.
Unlike politics, however, the contradiction faced by real-world producers is that almost no one wants to die just to protect their organization. People do business to make money and live well; why on earth would they choose death? And even if they did, how many successors could systematize and perpetuate a leader’s legacy the way the Apostles Paul and Peter did? Therefore, if a producer wishes to stay in business for a long time, they must never sell the moral binary—no matter how intensely democratic citizens crave a religious catharsis.
3. How Democratic Citizens Seek the Source Code of Suffering: Eschatological Optimism
On the other hand, certain democratic citizens acknowledge that earthly existence itself is inherently painful and deficient. Consequently, rather than digging for the source code of suffering within this life, they place their faith in eschatological optimism—scouting for a messiah who will bear the burden of suffering on their behalf. Let us examine this phenomenon.
(1) The Origins of Optimistic Eschatology
To ancient peoples, the passage of time meant drifting further away from the absolute bliss and fulfillment of the primeval time (in illo tempore). It was a pessimistic view of history, dictating that as time progressed, humans, institutions, and entire eras became polluted and stripped of their sacredness. Therefore, the annual New Year reset ritual, which reverted all cosmic time back to its inception, served as an existential shield.
However, as humanity left mother nature behind to depend on highly structured civilizations, the grime of time could no longer be easily washed away by simple magical resets. This is because the very essence of “civilization” is the sheer rigidity where human events and collective customs accumulate like heavy sediment. Magic, such as one-off sacrifices or the recitation of myths, was powerless against this inertia.
From this friction, eschatology naturally reared its head. It is a hardcore worldview positing that to plot a fresh start, every prior social footprint and civilizational sediment must be utterly annihilated. Yet, this eschatology was not a pessimism of doom. It inherently harbored a potent streak of optimistic character: the conviction that once the world is thoroughly slaughtered and processed, the realm that follows will once again become as sacred as it was in primeval times.
The universal myth of the Great Flood serves as a prime archetype. Humanity interpreted the Deluge as an optimistic catastrophe—one that washed away human sin to recreate the world and secure a promise of resurrection. In fact, ancient Mesopotamian Marduk worship and Jewish Yahweh worship synthesized this Great Flood narrative into their annual New Year festival systems. These were highly developed civilized societies ruled by megacities and complex hierarchical bureaucracies. Thus, lighthearted songs or mild rituals could not recreate that overwhelming, sacred terror of the inception. Only by re-enacting the destruction of the mythological flood and injecting the terror of renewing the covenant with God each year could they strip away the grime of time, ensuring the awakening of the entire nation and maintaining the integrity of the system.
(2) Who Bears the Responsibility for Opening the Future?: The Dilution of the Proof-of-Work Ethic
Because the cosmos itself was birthed atop someone’s holy sacrifice, the notion that human-made microcosms—houses, ramparts, cities—also required a blood sacrifice for completion was a universal concept in the pre-Christian archaic world. For instance, legends of burying humans alive as sacrifices to prevent city walls from collapsing are commonly found across both Europe and Asia. However, while the Judeo-Christian tradition inherited an optimistic eschatology based on a linear view of history, it discovered a loophole: a detour to save the world “without direct human bloodshed.”
Originally, according to the laws of the Old Testament, returning to God by reversing polluted time demanded a steep price: the Korban (sacrificial offering). The sovereign individual had to surrender livestock, which constituted their most valuable property and primary means of production. The person offering the sacrifice performed the Semikhah (laying on of hands) ritual, placing their hand upon the head of the sheep or ox. Through this brief touch, the sacrificial animal was converted into a synchronized proxy of oneself. Immediately following this, it was not the priest, but the individual who brought the offering, who had to personally slit the animal’s throat and skin it. By visually and physically absorbing the raw agony—blood splattering on their hands, the animal crying out its final gasps—the individual thoroughly embodied the visceral resistance and gravity of their wrongdoings. Only when the completely dismembered offering was burned atop the altar, ascending as smoke, were human sins dissolved, allowing the severed cogs between man and God to interlock once more. This was vicarious atonement operating via direct skin in the game.
However, the Korban system, which demanded strict proof-of-work for a reset, gradually decayed, and cheap loopholes began to run rampant. To defend their private property rights, some Jews evaded their legal obligations to support their aging parents by falsely declaring their assets as Korban—claiming, “This is dedicated to God.” This was the very incident that provoked Jesus’s wrath when he rebuked them, saying, “You nullify the word of God by your tradition.”(The Gospel of Mark)
The Korban system met its historical demise in 70 AD, when General Titus of the Roman Empire completely demolished the Jerusalem Temple. The Deuteronomic law of the Old Testament strictly mandated that sacrifices be offered exclusively at the single venue chosen by God. In Judaism, this designated location was solely the Temple Mount (Mount Moriah) in Jerusalem. Spilling animal blood at any other location was structurally branded as idolatry and an illegal sacrifice under the law. Since the Islamic Dome of the Rock stands firmly on that Temple Mount today, Jewish people remain unable to perform lawful animal sacrifices to this day.
Following the destruction of the Temple, Judaism underwent a massive transformation for survival. To approach God, it instituted a spiritual Korban: replacing animal bloodshed with prayer (Tefillah), the burning of grain with Torah study, and material offerings with charity (Tzedakah). This was an asymmetrical turning point where the intensity of the hardcore Proof of Work (PoW) required for a cosmic reset was drastically lowered.
The rise of Christianity aligns perfectly with this easing of proof of work. Christianity introduced a ultimate cheat code: because Jesus, the Messiah, performed a vicarious atonement for all humanity’s sins on the cross once and for all, the only debt humans had to pay for salvation was mere faith (Sola Fide). The gravity of physical and practical repentance (Metanoia), which originally existed in early scriptures, was gradually abraded and erased during the subsequent popularization of indulgence sales and the doctrine of cheap grace.
By dissolving Judaism’s demanding obligation to observe 613 commandments, there was no better business model to capture the hearts of the global masses and expand institutional power. However, the sweet logic that “mere belief guarantees eternal future salvation” simultaneously undermined the authenticity of the reset. Because no tangible, material sacrifice was made, the visceral sensation of the primeval sacredness being restored within one’s life was bound to be diluted.
Ultimately, medieval society became stained with blood—marred by endless mini-messiahs (heretics) who continuously questioned, “Why is my reality not resetting despite believing in Jesus? When on earth is salvation coming? Your interpretation is wrong,” and the Inquisitions of the Catholic Church fighting to defend the established status quo.
(3) The Mini-Messiahs of Modern Democratic Society
This history endured by Judaism and Christianity yields profound insights into the lifestyle of modern democratic citizens. Opening a new era in the future demands risk-taking (skin in the game) where one must bleed by their own hands. If you weaken the intensity of the ritual like Judaism, or entice people by claiming salvation arrives through free-riding belief alone like Christianity, you may succeed in building a massive ecosystem of masses, but the efficacy of that salvation evaporates.
The operational principle of the modern democratic welfare state functions exactly like this. It entices citizens by handing them a fragmented 1/N slice of sovereignty and then promises a system where it proclaims, “Just vote; the state will take full responsibility for all survival and welfare.” However, more than a century after administering this sweet anesthetic, error messages are popping up across the system. Questions are surfacing: “Is this welfare actually protecting my life? Why is my bank account empty despite working hard exactly as the state told me to, and why is life getting progressively harsher?” (Naturally, the state makes excuses, claiming that ‘the greedy market and capitalism are the problems,’ and that it can be fixed by brewing a remedy of more sophisticated regulations.)
Yet, due to the cozy comfort provided by the democratic welfare state, democratic citizens have lost the wildness required to kick open the fence and endure risks on their own. Consequently, they yearn for mini-messiahs wielding powerful, dictatorial authority to reset their lives for them. This explains the rampant idolatry surrounding investment gurus who promise to fix a market crash in a single stroke, political demagogues who slice through grievances like a blade, and influencers who beautifully package narratives on behalf of the masses. These idols merely strive to craft an image onto which the masses can project themselves by appearing to take risks.
In other words, if democratic citizens had taken risks themselves and carved out their own Proof of Work (PoW) paths, idols would never have been necessary in the first place—much like how the Jewish rabbis of ancient Jerusalem swiftly cut down Christianity, which promised salvation through words alone without any physical proof or sacrifice for the nation, declaring, “Jesus is not the Messiah.”
(4) The Technological Optimism of Elon Musk, the Secular Savior
Analyzing the behavior of Elon Musk—whom devotees of modern democracy hail as the president of the world and the cult leader of a tech empire—through this religious studies matrix yields fascinating results. Musk continuously injects the public with three primary doomsday scenarios:
- First: Population Collapse. He argues that due to global low birth rates and aging populations, human civilization will collapse like a row of dominoes.
- Second: The Backlash of Artificial Intelligence. The dread that an AGI completely escaping human control will emerge to rule over humans or target them for elimination.
- Third: Asteroid Impact. The doomsday premise that a massive asteroid impact, akin to the one that drove dinosaurs to extinction, is historically bound to repeat—it is strictly a matter of time.
Yet, in the face of this apocalypse, Musk does not demand a Korban-style sacrifice from his devotees where they tear apart their private property, nor does he demand a practical repentance (Metanoia) that fundamentally alters the trajectory of their lives. He is well aware that demanding raw risk-taking from the masses would cause his popularity as a messiah to plummet to the floor. Instead, he claims that all these doomsday scenarios are merely preparatory stages required to evolve into an optimistic future, demanding that the masses follow him with blind faith since he monopolizes the solutions. Thus, he asserts that implanting chips in human brains (Neuralink), expanding territory to Mars (SpaceX), and achieving an ageless, immortal humanity are all within reach inside a technological utopia. He frames himself merely as the priest representing that future.
Charmed by this sweet hope, devotees of democratic society buy up stocks of Tesla and SpaceX, much like medieval citizens purchasing indulgences issued by the Church. The cold facts of a P/E ratio of 600 or 1000 have already been rendered obsolete by faith.
Try drop-bombing these devotees with facts: Why has Tesla’s autonomous driving narrative failed to achieve mainstream commercialization even after a decade? Why do the vehicles suffer from poor build quality and subpar ride comfort? Hasn’t the humanoid robot Optimus been caught being remotely operated by engineers behind the scenes for years? Can SpaceX even survive without US government subsidies?
The moment such counter-evidence is presented, devotees erupt into tantrums and exhibit aggression bordering on a reaction to blasphemy. This is structurally homologous to the historical landscape where early Christianity declared “Jesus’s resurrection and miracles are historical facts,” and when secular scholars nitpicked by demanding material evidence, the Church flared up to defend orthodox dogma. For example, Justin Martyr, an early Christian apologist pressed by intellectuals to provide proof of Jesus’s birth, put forward the unverifiable claim that “Jesus’s name officially remains in the Roman tax registry from 150 years ago.” Devotees of Tesla and SpaceX will likewise craftily reframe the narrative and engineer mental-victory detours whenever they confront material facts—much like how Origen anciently argued that scripture must be decoded allegorically, or how Rudolf Bultmann argued for separating historical facts from Christian myth.
Looking back at this history of ideological warfare, one realizes how structurally fragile a fact-free, optimistic, cost-free eschatology truly is. In the world of the Old Testament, people personally skinned the animals they cherished like life itself to offer them to God. Because their tangible assets and pain were bound to their faith, their faith did not waver. Conversely, a secular faith based on facts and technology crumbles like a sandcastle when struck with even a minor counterargument or data metric. Because the masses did not grind away their own lives and risks, they stand ready to betray the messiah and abandon their faith the moment a minor error message flashes. Recognizing this, Musk, the secular messiah, misleads his devotees with increasingly radical optimistic scenarios each time to prevent their defection.
This strategy is excessively high-risk, high-return for a small business producer to adopt. The conclusion of this matrix offers only two polar extremes: succeed, and you become the cult leader of the universe; but fail due to a single piece of counter-evidence, and you will be slaughtered as the most vulgar fraud in history.
4. How Democratic Citizens Seek the Source Code of Suffering: Regression and Submission
Now, let us examine how democratic citizens who do not rely on the moral binary or eschatological optimism cope with the suffering of life. These individuals primarily depend on “regression” (returning to the past). However, instead of returning to a sacred primeval origin as ancient peoples did, this manifests in an economically and socially homologous time-traveling context, or as a romanticized submission to contemporary powers.
(1) Traveling to a Similar Historical Space-Time and Reinterpreting it for Today
If one could enjoy the privilege of having their existential suffering suspended purely through the power of faith, it would be, as Mircea Eliade noted, utter bliss. In a secularized modern democratic society, however, the world is filled with people who want to believe in the existence of a sacred, absolute being but simply find it impossible to do so.
I was no different. I was born and raised in a welfare state—a nation constructed by democratic activists that promised to guarantee an individual’s entire life. There was never an absolute inception (illud tempus) to return to, unlike the archaic experience. While living as a model student inside this Matrix, faith was a luxury, and I was thoroughly intoxicated by the petty self-importance of being a fragmented 1/N sovereign.
This perception shattered when I confronted the system’s betrayal. The 2008 Great Recession, failed contract renewals, layoffs, and the coercive vaccine mandates and mandatory business closures executed during the COVID-19 pandemic. Only after being pushed outside the protective fence of the welfare state did I finally realize that violence and hierarchy—forces far too overwhelming for a solitary individual to bear—still actively exist in modern society.
Yet, the method I used to overcome this existential crisis was not a faith that conforms to a divine order. Nor was it a ritual mimicking the mythological gestures of cosmic creators, as primitive humans might have done; I am a modern democratic citizen, so that was impossible. Furthermore, being neither of the Hebrew nation nor of ancient Greece, I could not discover a homology within their narratives to save myself. Instead, I attempted to debug my suffering through a different path. While not retreating all the way back to a primeval mythological era, my strategy was to regress into a historical space and time that mirrors the present, thereby interpreting today’s suffering more richly and meaningfully.
(2) My Case Study: Regressing into Eastern Classics, French Philosophy, and New York Music
I immersed myself in Eastern classics and French philosophy. Within prose written during eras when state power ruthlessly overwhelmed individual existence—within those raw records crying out in agony—I discovered a structural homology to my own situation. For instance, the reason tears of deep emotion welled up while reading the Mencius was because it was not an ancient fairy tale; it was the very source code decoding my current struggle.
Art was another potent weapon. The New York of the 1970s through the 2000s synchronized with the matrix of Seoul, where I stand and struggle. The burning desire for success, the maddening competition, the wealth gap, the envy toward others, and the anonymity inflicted by a megacity. Through the art and music of New York—spanning from Billy Joel to Nas, The Notorious B.I.G., and Sean Price—I traced the historical background and the origins of suffering from that era, reinterpreting them within today’s context.
In the grand scheme of things, this is admittedly an archaic approach, as it traces the source of suffering and seeks a structural homology. However, I did not regress by simply re-enacting their lyrics or rap as ancient peoples did. Instead, I took a phenomenological approach: layering my own suffering and memories atop their narratives, thoroughly dismantling and reinterpreting the music in a way that was uniquely meaningful to me.
I am confident that this experience is not unique to me. Even within a democratic society, there must be individuals who refuse to chant hypocritical slogans like “progress without pain” or “freedom without responsibility,” choosing instead to unearth and debug the source code resting at the absolute bottom of reality. This diverges sharply from the eschatology of Christianity or the historical materialism of Marxism, both of which believe salvation will eventually arrive. Rather, it aligns with a phenomenology that steals a structural homology from past origins to experience present life with a richer sense of meaning.
The crux of this strategy is that one must not stop at mere sentimentality; one must actively craft tangible output—such as writing or videos—based on that reinterpreted source code. Because ancient peoples could completely reset time through mythological rituals, they needed nothing more than the most authentic archetypes of myth. In contrast, modern individuals, locked within the prison of a linear view of history, cannot reverse time. Consequently, they deploy a tactic of expanding their territory of imagination horizontally, gathering as many fragments as possible that imbue their suffering with meaning. They engage in a bricolage, aggressively scraping together past source codes to cobble a new program into existence. Therefore, without the active intervention of the creative practice, no matter how exceptional a source code may be, it will merely scatter into fragmented memories and fail to convert into a coherent perceptual framework.
Phenomenologists explain this mechanism through the concept of intentionality. Intentionality refers to a state of alignment: when a human rushes with their entire being toward a specific objective, their past experiences, physical skills, accumulated knowledge, and utilized tools all organize simultaneously toward the world represented by that objective. The act of creation is the trigger that explodes one’s intentionality toward the suffering of earthly existence. The moment intentionality is activated, the world is reconstructed entirely around that single purpose. My purpose—the exploration of a producer’s philosophy and a sovereign survival strategy—moves toward a world liberated from the predatory matrix of the democratic welfare state. Ever since choosing this path, every social phenomenon unfolding before me is decoded exclusively through this lens. All the intellectual assets I possess align in a meaningful pattern, weaving themselves into a single, definitive statement.
Thus, my philosophical citations or economic analyses might not align 100% with the original context of phenomenological “intentionality” as spoken of by Husserl and Merleau-Ponty, or the “purposeful action” of praxeology that Ludwig von Mises maintained throughout his life. While I study the teachings of these masters diligently, the survival frontline where I clash today differs from their eras. What matters is not a flawless, static preservation of an archetype. What matters is the meaningful Proof of Work (PoW) expended to lead one’s life to victory.
(3) Submission to Contemporary Authority
Ultimately, the act of tracing the source code of suffering converges into three forms: completely regressing to a primeval origin like ancient peoples, blindly believing without questioning the causal chain of that origin, or traveling through time to reinterpret reality in a modern context, as seen in my own case. The routes vary. One might feel a homology while studying cosmic myths or nature, or trace the lineage of ancient music and philosophical texts. No matter which route is selected, the underlying yearning remains identical: to regress toward greatness, alleviate existential anxiety, and achieve oneness.
All these actions involve tracing back into the “past.” Because the past is time already spent, it stands in stark, vivid contrast to the present suffering we experience. Consequently, the more one comprehends the past, the more clearly the meaning of the present comes into focus. This is not my arbitrary assertion; it is the core principle of “contrast” emphasized by Maurice Merleau-Ponty in his Phenomenology of Perception. For a practical application of this principle, refer to the following article.
However, this process demands a rigorous, intellectual proof of work from the individual. Rereading books, savoring sentences, decoding lyrics, and recreating them into one’s own meaning is an intensely grueling task. One must accurately grasp the context in which a specific school of thought was birthed, accept the inevitable risk of being wrong, and endure criticism. Seeking to regress from this heavy intellectual labor, some individuals choose instead to submit to contemporary authority.
Particularly, as emphasized repeatedly, individuals with an extremely high time-preference—such as typical democratic citizens—place no value on a past to trace back to, nor on a distant future. Therefore, they voluntarily submit to the very centers of power that trigger certain modern phenomena. Instead of reinterpreting reality to create meaning, they drop to their knees purely for survival.
The contradictions exhibited by progressive democratic activists in South Korea offer clear proof of this. Ideologically and politically, they fiercely denounce American imperialism and domestic interference, screaming for the withdrawal of US troops. To maintain ideological consistency, they ought to reject the presence of America across every spectrum of life, including economics and culture.
Yet, the moment these hypocrites face the terror of the market, they voluntarily bend the knee. They exchange their wealth into the dominant currency of the global market (the US Dollar), purchase US big-tech stocks, send their children to study abroad in America, and consume American-made platform infrastructure. No matter how much they praise the French-style welfare state, empathize with the Parisian taxi driver, or rave over the slogans of the May 68 revolution, the ghost of Jean-Paul Sartre cannot protect the value of their modern assets. Consequently, they submit to the living reality that holds absolute power over life and death in the capitalist market: the United States.
This is no different on a global scale. Do the so-called “Limousine Liberals”—who routinely demand justice by advocating for the legal redistribution (or soft-confiscation) of other people’s wealth—ever invest in unprofitable public-utility corporations when they face the terror of the market? Absolutely not. They buy stocks of Apple and Nvidia in Silicon Valley just like everyone else, leveraging non-public information to protect their own portfolios without a shred of hesitation.
This phenomenon yields a compelling insight: no matter how thick a democratic citizen’s veneer of ideology and belief may be, if an entity proves it possesses the overwhelming strength to conquer the terror of the market, citizens have no choice but to open their wallets and submit voluntarily. This tendency expresses itself in its most extreme form within arenas of raw competition where majoritarian intervention is barred and winner-take-all dynamics rule—such as trading, sports, entertainment, and physical crafts.
5. Conclusion
The methods by which democratic citizens attempt to debug the source code of suffering primarily rely on moral illusions, such as the binary of Good vs. Evil, or blind faith akin to eschatological optimism. However, neither approach is suitable as a strategy for producers. Guided by my own experiences, I have examined the concepts of ‘Regression’ and ‘Submission.’ In particular, while Regression does not imply a literal return to the past, it serves as a method to meaningfully interpret the present based on its structural homologies with history. In the next article, I will explore strategies that expand and apply this regression to origins, specifically tailored for producers. The next installment will feature an array of practical case studies, so please look forward to it.
6. Related Series
- [The Democratic Citizen’s Brain 1] The Market Landscape Hidden by the Democratic Welfare State: Why We Must Abandon ‘Making’ and Sell ‘Romance’
- [The Democratic Citizen’s Brain 2] Why a Linear View of Time (Judeo-Christianity, Historicism, Democracy) Threatens Modern Producers
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