As Girard had it, we are defined and constituted as a species by our reliance on imitation. But we are not mere first-order mimics: When we ape what someone else does, or covet what someone else has, we are in fact trying to want what they want. āMan is the creature who does not know what to desire, and he turns to others in order to make up his mind,ā Girard wrote. āWe desire what others desire because we imitate their desires.ā Unable to commit to our own arbitrary wants, we seek to resemble other peopleāstronger, more decisive people. Once we identify a model weād like to emulate, we train ourselves to make the objects of their desire our own.
The emotional signature of all this imitationāor mimesisāis not admiration but consuming envy. āIn the process of ākeeping up with the Joneses,āāā Thiel writes, āmimesis pushes people into escalating rivalry.ā We resent the people we emulate, both because we want the same things and because we know weāre reading from someone elseās script. As Girard would have it, the viability of any society depends on its ability to manage this acrimony, lest it regularly erupt into the violence of āall against all.ā
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