Monster Resistance
Friday, the last day of the work week. I a retired old guy, am reluctant to bid farewell to a past and youthful time. Psychologically my routine is patterned by a world-of-work which I suffered, and enjoyed too, for over 40 years. Work continues to be the terrain of my life, while I no longer anticipate a paycheck. Work is important for other reasons. Fridays are looked forward to with gratitude. I’ve survived another week. I mean days of responsibility, of fulfilling my role in this society, that in part, – I helped to create.
I sat with a few friends yesterday and we explored the notion that morality is sourced from culture. That is – the scale of standards, those indicators of comportment, those behaviors we permit ourselves, that we expect from others — as well as the obverse, valuations and actions forbidden. I am satisfied. Of course our standards of behavior are the consequence of conclusions drawn by the body over the arc of a person’s life. The body (not the mind) is the pivot point for ethical formation, which is relative to time’s passage, consequences of a life lived. Other explanations are less convincing.
A friend seated at our circle of amateur philosophers proposed that we imagine the Nazis had prevailed to conclude World War II. In that case, a relationship between Germany and America, no doubt one favorable to Germany, would have commenced. History bears out – victors, winners define for subject peoples, the winner’s standard of morality.
The thought experiment struck me personally, with hammer force.
I intuitively felt everything represented by Auschwitz-Birkenau, a racial purity nationalism certainly would have been incipient to the law of this land. The winner-takes-all proposition as a standard of values felt like an electric shock. I cannot recall if I have ever felt so uncomfortable in a philosophy discussion…
And so it is, as has been demonstrated over and over in the annals of history.
Some hours have passed since the conversation of yesterday and I have recovered my equilibrium. However the course of future events develop, I will naturally participate. What choice do I really have?
And yet… I always aspire to be a minority voice, seeking that lay-of-the-land overview, to see from the edge, from the periphery. That’s just me. I desire a view, that of the outliers.
The view is better from the edge.
Among outsiders, is to feel the friction, the heat, rousing me from lassitude, – to resist monsters within!
5 thoughts on “Monster Resistance”
The question that comes to my mind from your post today has to do with our potential baser nature, that seeming monster that could emerge at any time. Does that monster exist at birth or does it manifest from a skewed version of life and culture taught to us be a dysfunctional society? Is curiosity and kindness squeezed out of us by the pressures of conformity?
I suspect that greed, fear, insecurity, and lust do linger somewhere within us at birth but I truly believe they are lesser traits that only emerge when faced with a corrupt system. Just a few cents worth of opinion.
What exists at birth has been the point of much speculation. Perhaps a rudiment of instinct and a great deal of potential? I think likely we are taught, and we learn many things in the course of a year or so. There is a lot that is overtly violent, and a great deal of emotional coercion. How much must we unlearn in order to show kindness to ourselves and to others?
We have abundant evidence what corrupt systems do to the minds and emotions of those trapped for many years in such circumstances.
Let me add that once the monster in us emerges our moral compass ceases to function.
I agree with your view.
In the fighting which occurred after D-day, counter to official policy, SS soldiers were often killed outright. As a rule these hard-core believers had made up their minds, and were not amenable to reconsider Nazi ideology.
Gentlemen ponder this as humans we are born without knowledge. It’s our parents, family, friends, neighbors and neighborhood that shapes and molds us as we grow. A child is not born to hate but is taught to be a racist, anti LGBTQAI+, anti fat, anti short, anti old, anti rich, anti poor, anti christian, anti jew or anti establishment to name but a few evils. From time to time a child, young adult or adult will escape the need for conformity and become their own person striking out against injustice. More often than not these thinkers will divorce themselves from the poison of parents, family, friends, neighbors and neighborhood in order to get off the merry go round we call society.