McMusing: Toasting the Emperor

A Reflection on Trust, Truth, Tenacity, and . . . Toast?

Disclaimer: This Substack post was written on Tuesday, February 18 and is therefore not in reaction or response to any social media posts on Wednesday, February 19.

I woke up thinking about “T” words and how my story of survival both creates and complicates them.

Trust
Truth
Tenacity
Toast

What? Toast? Sorry, that word simply insisted on being on the list. I might need breakfast. But there are two meanings to toast and the other one might apply.

Toast
To drink to the health or in honor of (someone or something)
by raising one's glass together with others.

I was raised—and then spent most of my adult life—in a world of teetotalers. Toasting was not common—not even with grape juice. That did not mean that the intent of the toast did not happen in other ways. It was almost always men “toasting” men. One time it included men handing other men roses. Yes, it was awkward.

Note! The word “men” is like the word “church.” Not all churches or men are the same and patriarchy harms both men and women. The fact that no roses were handed to women that day was the result of a hierarchal/patriarchal system that diminished the work of the women in the room—not an indication of the character of the men who for the most part treated the women employees with appropriate levels of respect. Still, that men handed men roses completely unaware of the strangeness of the gesture normally reserved for women demonstrated that men in patriarchal systems will—most often—do what is expected. And most women in these systems accept it as the way it should be. Most often, the problem is the system—not the people.

Another amusing “toast” occurred when all the important men were lined up on the stage at a meeting and the media guy “accidentally?” shared the following words to the wrong song on the screen behind them: “Years I spent in vanity and pride.” There was a hush that fell over the audience—along with a few obvious snickers.

Another time a male leader, while addressing a staff meeting, said, “I didn’t feel I deserved for people to lavish me with gifts. I was going to tell them not to, but then I remembered that I was a child of the King and I deserved them.” There is a particular kind of hush that falls over a room of people who dare not roll their eyes.

Last week I was in a Zoom meeting when a participant began to talk about something that was uncomfortable for me. Only one other person in the meeting understood this was true and she later said, “You didn’t even flinch! No one could have even known that you were affected by it at all—even though I knew you had to be. How do you do that?”

Lots. Of. Practice.

In benign situations, my face is an open book but not when it comes to people fawning over men with feet of clay. I have been practicing this skill of expressionless expressions since I was three years old.

But I digress . . . kind of.

The story of the oblivious naked emperor is one of my favorites. He begins the procession because no one tells him he is naked. Power does that to both the observers and those being observed. In all of the situations I described above, I understood that the emperors were exposing weakness and not strength by either applauding one another or remaining silent. I also remained silent because it didn’t feel prudent or necessary to speak.

No one was being explicitly harmed, right?

In the emperor’s story, an innocent child proclaims what no one else could. I say innocent because children are innocent, but this child in particular had not yet learned to be silent. I wonder if that changed after that day.

Some who watched the parade likely saw exactly what the emperor wanted them to see. Their devotion was so strong to the one in power that they only saw what they were told to see. Pesky little child to state the obvious!

But I digress again. Back to two of my “T” words—trust and truth.

Truth builds trust—at least that is how it is supposed to work. The fact that I learned—at a very young age—that not all adults could not be trusted is both a blessing and a curse.

I learned to recognize red flags long before I could be conditioned to blindly trust and obey those who held more power. This makes me a great survivor, but also less trusting in situations that warrant trust. Healing has helped me to pause and review the red flags, to determine if my first reaction is correct. I occasionally realize some who I might have rejected, really are trustworthy. It does happen, though most of the time, my suspicions are confirmed.

Knowing that this trust and truth radar began so early in my life helps me to understand why I—like the child watching the emperor’s procession—so often saw far more than many others did. I watched through a lens of distrust and unfortunately was proven right quite often. Two of these times stand out among many other similar stories.

• Scott was unusually quiet after a church service that required him to remain on the platform. “I opened my eyes,” he said. The preacher was leading an altar call. “He kept saying that he saw hands raised. There were no hands raised.” I was stunned. Had all the emotion I heard displayed over the Holy Spirit working in the hearts of those whose hands were raised all been for show? Or for effect? To elicit emotional responses? I wasn’t sure of anything except that the emperor was naked.

• Hands were raised and people were emotionally overtaken by a blessing that had been provided to the church. God had provided funds for a missionary project that the pastor was promoting. The amount of money was not something the congregation could even imagine raising—kind of. It had actually been raised for a completely different use. It was the exact amount. I looked around the sanctuary and realized that I seemed to be the only one who recognized that the emperor was naked. The others who knew this had either left or been forced to leave the church. It wasn’t long before I was also forced out with a significant dose of character assassination.

My truth-seeking tendencies may have been seen as a threat in both church situations. Like the child in the story, I often spoke the truth where it was not appreciated.

Eventually, I began to recognize an aspect of church culture that was so intent on the church's mission moving forward that many things could be—and were— overlooked. Many assumed that as long as that mission was moving forward the truth was being told.

Surely God would not bless lies.

Trust placed before truth creates its own illusion. When people place trust ahead of truth it is only a matter of time before they lose the ability to discern when those in power are unclothed. Survival of the mission depends on believing in those they trust to carry the mission forward. Even if they realize the emperor is naked, speaking up will only put their survival (belonging) at risk.

In the video of the story (included below), there is a moment when everyone recognizes the truth but the powerful king—after a temporary moment of shame—returns to the illusion that he is clothed and that only the wise ones can see the clothes. One of the illustrations doesn't seem to be a correct portrayal of what most likely occurred. In the illustration, the crowd continues laughing as the king—naked but fully owning the illusion of being clothed—continues down the road.

People differ in their responses and a crowd’s reaction to an event is always multifaceted.

• Some may have laughed to themselves or exchanged glances with trusted companions, but few would have laughed publicly.

• Some would be so determined to believe the illusion that they imagined him clothed.

• Some knew it was an illusion, but their well-being depended on playing along with the emperor.

• Some would have focused on shaming the child for not remaining silent.

• Some would likely condemn the parents for raising such a wayward child.

• Some who believed keeping the kingdom intact was important would have begun searching the crowd for those who did not believe the illusion so they could mock their lack of discernment.

Meanwhile, the weavers of untruths who were only in it for the gold, laughed their way all the way to the bank.

But wait that is not the end of the story.

The child did grow up and never wavered in knowing the emperor was naked.

This is the part of the story when the final “T” word arrives: Tenacity.

The child—who would not be silenced—grew up and had observed people long enough to know they often believe —or pretend to believe—in the illusions that powerful emperors create. Standing in the crowd that day, gave her compassion because she understood that the thread that tied them together was the need to survive. She had also overlooked so much when either the mission of the church—or her survival—was at stake.

One important aspect of the story is often overlooked. The emperor knew the people had seen him naked. The illusion he built was strong because it needed to hide the overwhelming shame he felt. He especially needed to hide the shame from himself. Unresolved shame is the very worst kind of pain. One wonders what happened when everyone returned to their home or castle.

Without the emperor coming to terms with the fact that his worth was not dependent on the clothes he wore, the illusion of power he built, or the number who followed him holding his “imaginary mantle,” the naked emperor’s search for worth may have eventually burned his kingdom down. It would be a tragic and unnecessary ending to the story because it didn’t need to end that way.

There was power in the crowd that day. If they could have accepted that the king was naked and had been fooled, they could have—at the very least—stopped the weavers of imaginary cloth from leaving town with the gold. Instead, the emperor was toasted. No, not as in drunk; as in honored. English is so complicated.

Without the crowd standing up and proclaiming that the emperor was naked, the thieves left with the gold, and the kingdom likely crumbled. Eventually, when the ashes dissipated, the tenacious child who refused to be silent was remembered as a truth-teller.

That is likely how this story will end. There is always a chance that I am wrong; it would go against all I have observed in my seventy-one years, but it is possible.

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"The Emperor Has No Clothes" is a folktale by Hans Christian Andersen, first published in 1837 as part of Fairy Tales Told for Children. Inspired by a Spanish tale from Libro de los ejemplos (1335) by Juan Manuel, Andersen adapted the story with his own twist. It tells of an emperor obsessed with fine clothing, who is tricked by swindlers claiming to make fabric invisible to the incompetent or unworthy. Afraid of appearing foolish, the emperor and his court pretend to see the nonexistent clothes, until a child innocently exclaims that the emperor is, in fact, wearing nothing. The story has since become a metaphor for collective denial and the courage to speak the truth. (Source: ChatGPT Summary)