SPOILERS FOLLOW...
So I'm watching this past Wednesday's episode of Lost (#1 for the night, 22 million viewers, transcript here) and it hit me about twenty minutes in. This unusual pastiche of drama, mystery, sci-fi, horror - it's actually an allegory. The show's writers are doing an allegory for our fearful times.
Now the allusions to "Lord of the Flies" have always been obvious. But in one key scene, the show pretty clearly reveals its deeper thematic.
If you've seen the episode (SPOILER WARNING), the show's co-leads, Jack and Locke, the voices of science and faith, respectively, are watching a super 8 film which purports to be an orientation film for workers who find themselves in this underground bunker/lab.
The film's narrator, "Dr. Marvin Kandel," describes the "Dharma Initiative," an experimental program to pursue research in scientific fields. Kandel says the program's founders followed in the footsteps of B.F. Skinner, the famed pioneer in behavior research. Kandel continues on, offering this inexplicably ominous set of instructions to the orientation film's viewers:
"Not long after the experiments began, however, there was an incident. And since that time the following protocol has been observed: every 108 minutes the button must be pushed. From the moment the alarm sounds you will have 4 minutes to enter the code into the microcomputer processor [splice] induction into the program. When the alarm sounds, either you or your partner must input the code."
That's when it hit me. "The incident?" "Every 108 minutes the button must be pushed?"
We're talking about 9/11, folks. And the "button" is fear. The writers are pointing out that our government is continually pushing our button to remind us of 9/11. To make us fearful. Not necessarily a news flash, but for a top 10 TV program that reaches millions, it's a start.
Jack, the show's voice of sanity and reason, sees through it. He makes the following argument to Desmond, who's been driven very nearly mad by constantly having to push the button to avoid "the end of the world." Here's Jack:
"It says quarantine on the inside of the hatch to keep you down here. To keep you scared. Do you ever think that maybe they put you down here to push a button every 100 minutes just to see if you would? That all of this -- the computer, the button -- it's just a mind game? An experiment?"
"Every single day," Desmond says. So on an intellectual level, he knows what's happening, yet he's still helpless to overcome his fear. B.F. Skinner indeed.
Later, Jack tracks down the escaping Desmond, and says to him something that could literally be said to the American public:
"Why are you running? You don't even know what you're running from."
The ultimate irony comes at the end of the episode, when the button must be pushed again, otherwise the survivors will suffer unknown consequences. Locke urges Jack to push the button. Jack resists, saying it's not real. He's arguing for rationality.
LOCKE: You do it, Jack.
JACK: What?
LOCKE: You have to do it.
JACK: You do it yourself, John.
LOCKE: You saw the film, Jack. This is a two person job, at least.
SAYID: This argument is irrelevant.
LOCKE: Sayid, don't.
SAYID: Jack.
JACK: No. It's not real. Look, you want to push the button, you do it yourself.
LOCKE: If it's not real, then what are you doing here, Jack? Why did you come back? Why do you find it so hard to believe?
JACK: Why do you find it so easy?
LOCKE: It's never been easy!
KATE: Maybe you should just do it.
JACK: No. It's a button.
LOCKE: I can't do this alone, Jack. I don't want to. It's a leap of faith, Jack.
And what does Jack--the voice of science and reason--do? He pushes the button. Fear is that strong. At least, that's how I read it.