Introduction
This is something I’ve been meaning to write for a while. But I haven’t gotten around to it and now that I’ve had a bad week at work and I don’t feel like sleeping and I’m stuck on chapter 7 of Magic for Beginners, I think I will.
It refers to one of Beckster’s blog entries. And if you’ve ever read any of my comments on her blog (I would love to start a blog which collects all the comments I write on her blog), you probably have some idea that her writing, to me, is a source of both constant entertainment and constant annoyance. (And you could argue that annoyance is its own form of entertainment.) This is no slight on her or on what she writes. I respect her for her convictions, whether they annoy me or not. And besides, I am simply stating my opinion.
And herein lies my gripe.
Context
To quote:
Censorship is such a distasteful concept, and defeats the purpose of a blog. I thought about whether I should scale back. I thought about whether I’m sorry I wrote what I wrote. I thought about apologising for being honest, on my forum, with my own thoughts. But I’m not. I am sorry I caused distress, but my writing is my own, and isn’t representative of any other moral, social or ethical standard bar mine. I’m not sorry that I have an opinion and chose to express it here. I’m not sorry that my opinion doesn’t agree with everyone else’s and that those who don’t agree with me chose to interpret my writing in the worst possible way. Despite the fact that ‘those’ eople are held near and dear to me and I hurt over the fact that I hurt them unintentionally, I can’t change anyone’s views except my own. I can’t – won’t - pretend I don’t have one.
Tocca’s Orion is not the place for lies.
(Lam, 2006)
Censorship and freedom of speech are two very well-tread roads within the Blogworld. Fitting really, considering the nature of the medium. So I don’t mean to single Beckster out. It’s simply that hers is the latest example and ‘I’m far too lazy to look at and quote from old blogs’ (Harimanow, 2004)
My gripe about this topic is that it invariably ends with some cliched and inane realisation that opinions are what you hold to be truth and you should stand up for truth, integrity, etc. And to me, this is just crap.
Truth is overrated.
Lots of things are overrated.
Actually, anything not underrated is probably overrated.
Anyway, I digress.
Discussion
Self-censorship is not necessarily bad. In fact, it’s often necessarily good.
To illustrate:
If you have thoughts like: "When I see a pretty girl walking down the street, I think two things: One part of me wants to take her home, be real nice and treat her right; the other part wonders what her head would look like on a stick." (Kemper, 1973) then you probably shouldn’t be saying that out loud.It has been my belief for many years that morality is not about an objective right or wrong. Nor is it about a subjective right or wrong. I believe that morality is about feelings.
You should probably also seek professional help.
I would go as far as saying that the notion of natural rights (e.g. a natural human right to live) is nonsense, but that may be beyond the scope of this discussion (although I’m guessing that I’ve gone beyond the scope already).
To take it back into context, how you decide whether you want to air an opinion or not is not really about whether it’s right to do so, or about integrity. It’s simply about care factor. It’s about how much you care about the possible adverse consequences of airing those opinions.
Here’s a thought experiment:
Ergo, Beckster (and other bloggers – myself included) posts controversial opinions only because she doesn’t think that her doing so will create any kind of consequences that could seriously have an adverse effect on her.If you strongly believed that Elvis is overrated (well, he’s certainly not underrated…) but you had good reason to believe that if you were to post that opinion on a blog, then a crazed Elvis fan would react to reading it by killing twelve little boys and their pet rabbits, would you still still go ahead and post that?
First principles
I would like to suggest that the story of humanity is the constant struggle between a natural compulsion to survive and keep oneself happy, and that niggling voice over your shoulder that you should be nice (i.e. make others happy).
And if you literally have a niggling voice over your shoulder telling you to be nice – again, maybe you should seek professional help.
Every other philosophical moral world view comes from how humans deal with this constant struggle.
Examples:
Why this is important to point out is that these concepts (e.g. justice, socialism) are often taken as having intrinsic (and universal) moral value when they really don’t. They’re just compromises. They're ways with which our humanity can handle the eternal struggle between self preservation and being nice.If there was a linear scale between 1 for self-preservation and 4 for ‘being nice’, hedonism would be a 1 and altruism would be a 4. Pure socialism would be about a 3 and capitalism about a 1.5 or 2 (depending on how extreme). The concept of justice would be smack bang on 2.5 and utilitarianism would be about 2.8. Surrealism would be a throbbing numeral 1, absurdism would be about 374.9 and feminism would be about butch women with hairy armpits (but hey, that’s just my opinion).
Being fed or feeding.
Fallacy
It is often the case that a ‘morally good’ principle is really just saying ‘be nice’ but disguised as something much grander.
Example:
‘You shouldn’t pass judgements on people you’ve just met.’
False meaning: human beings are complex creatures and so you shouldn’t presume to know them only from a few minutes of meeting them.
Real meaning: be nice.
Explanation: here’s a thought experiment.
How often do you hear this?
‘I just met Joe Blogs’ new girlfriend. She seems like a bitch.’
‘You shouldn’t pass judgements on people you’ve just met.’
Probably lots of times. But how often would you hear this?
‘I just met Joe Blogs’ new girlfriend. She seems like a really cool person.’
‘You shouldn’t pass judgements on people you’ve just met.’
Probably not often.
This is because the phrase ‘You shouldn’t pass judgements on people you’ve just met’ really means ‘You shouldn’t pass unkind judgements on people you’ve just met.’
Ergo, this is about being nice. Nothing to do with the general passing of judgements at all.
Conclusion
So here's what it all means to the context.
People who claim integrity or any other moral principle to justify their actions (e.g. blog writing) and believe them to be basic and universal, are mistaken, in denial or annoying.
Postscript
I realise that this discussion is incomplete and, in parts, incoherent. My apologies. This is a big subject so no zealous scrawling at 3:25 am on a Saturday morning is going to do it justice.
So please, be nice.
References
Harimanow C, 2004 Zen and the art of blogging Sleepwalker Books Pty Ltd
Kempers E, 1973 Heads on sticks and other fun summer ideas Psychopathic Bastards Publishers
Lam B, 2006 My own private Chinese Tragedy Tocca’s Orion Publications Pty Ltd