Someday My Prince Will Come—who doesn’t know those words, that line? In the 1937 Disney movie, Snow White first sang the song, a sweet waltz to lull the seven dwarfs to sleep. The lyrics pack a promise alive still today in the hearts of many little girls and many who are not little anymore.
The song, one of most popular in movie history, also promises a carefree life in a castle and happiness forever, “someday when my dreams come true.” Somehow that song reminds me a lot of politics and I don’t think little girls are the only ones who believe extravagant dreams can come true.
Take the current US president, for example. Back when he was campaigning, he promised to “make America great again.” To do so, he was going to cancel Obama Care, pull out of NATO, ban Muslims from the United States, and build a wall all along the Mexican border. He was also going to “lock up” Hilary and approve “waterboarding” because “torture works.”
To his credit, he said he would elect a pro-Second Amendment judge to the Supreme Court and he did (I wonder what Neil Gorsuch thinks of the recent Las Vegas massacre, the deadliest mass shooting in US history); he also pulled out of the Paris climate control agreement, and has stepped up deportation of illegal immigrants.
As for “making America great again,” I suppose only time will tell. I’m not convinced Americans are going to be any better off at the end of Trump’s four-year term.
In France, our new president Emmanuel Macron calls himself “Jupiter,” King of the gods, who knows just what his subjects—oops, I mean, citizens want. Some Americans compared him to James Bond after viewing a July 2017 video of the French president being lowered from the air (like Jupiter) to the deck of a nuclear submarine. American political commentators see him as a bulwark against the populist politics gaining ground around the world.
While still a candidate, Emmanuel Macron proclaimed, “If anyone believes we are dreamers, rest assured. That’s exactly what we are.” As President, with a majority in Parliament, he is attempting to make his dreams come true, much to the chagrin of large segments of the French population:
Macron’s program includes increased taxes for the middle class and retirees, and decreased taxes for the rich. His labor bill, currently under discussion in Parliament, proposes fewer protections and rights for workers. In general, the new president and his majority hope to create a more technocratic government, and society, where those who know best decide for the rest of us. Apparently, there’s a name for this: “epistocracy,” the “rule of the knowers.”
“Someday when my dreams come true,” sings Snow White. We know she marries the prince and goes to live in the castle. But what happens afterwards? That part of the story was left unwritten, but for lots of girls who grow up to marry their prince, “afterwards” rarely means “happy forever.” In fact, they often wake up to a nightmare.
In his 2016 book Against Democracy, Jason Brennan coined the term “epistocracy.” He imagined a society composed of hobbits, hooligans and Vulcans, and argued not all of them should have the right to vote. Hobbits, according to Brennan, are those uninterested and uninformed about politics; hooligans root for their team, enthusiastically, even violently, but their understanding goes no further than easy slogans. As for the “Vulcans,” they are the ones who know and can decide for the others, but not because they’re morally superior. They’re simply better informed and trained.
A large percentage of millennials may agree with Brennan. Many recent polls in the US, Canada and Australia indicate that only between 30 to 40 percent place their faith firmly in democracy. Many millennials mistrust political leaders and feel elections rarely change anything. They also believe there could be alternatives to democracy.
In another recent book, Democracy for Realists: Why Democratic Elections Do Not Produce Responsive Governments, the authors C. Achen and L. Bartels contend that popular sovereignty may be a concept as questionable as the divine right of kings. As for the American ideal of a government “of the people, by the people, and for the people,” that’s the stuff, they say, of “fairy tales.”
Which brings us back full circle to Snow White, her prince, and mine.
I met him in early September, an unexpected encounter (the best kind) and an awakening because I have been forced to very directly confront myself. My prince is older, already retired, tall, lean, and weighs about 1,000 pounds. He is also Arab, a pureblood Arabian. My prince is a retired racehorse, chestnut brown with a black mane.
I wonder if any readers remember Booie. He used to have stables at the end of North Centre Street in Pottsville and you could often find him and his ponies at block parties. Sometimes he trucked the horses to fairs; at others, he simply led them through the streets of town. When I was near those ponies, I got sick. My face swelled, I couldn’t breathe, and usually I had to go straight home to bed.
Thanks to Prince (that’s my prince’s name), I know I’m not allergic anymore. I’ve also discovered a horse can teach me a lot about myself. I call my riding lessons “horse therapy.” Thanks to Prince, I’m trotting, cantering and even galloping back through my life, coming up against fears, doubts and obstacles that are barriers to inner peace today.
Above all, I am constantly confronted with what I cannot control, an intermediary zone, where Prince and I must learn to communicate and negotiate. My signals are not always clear, nor are his to me, and we often have to start over, finetuning our relationship.
This new experience is personal, but, just like Snow White’s song, it somehow reminds me of politics. With a horse, you get nowhere if you don’t observe and listen, negotiate and compromise, skills all too absent from the political arena today. With Prince, there’s no name-calling or shouting; instead there’s constant give-and-take.
For the moment, I’m thinking and learning, thanks to “my prince.” And I’m not in the world of dreams. My feet are firmly planted in the stirrups of reality.
