we are divided and passionate and yet, and yet,
we find ourselves staring into Nietzsche’s abyss…
we have thrown ourselves into seeking the baubles of
existence… money, titles, fame, material goods, power…
isms like nationalism and catholicism…
we know on some level, that these baubles are simply shiny toys that
we play with today but have no real basis for us in our examination
of existence today…
we seek these baubles to escape the recognition that existence for us,
is pointless and empty…
we exists in “a tale told by an idiot, full of sound and fury, signifying nothing”
and those bauble are our attempts to hide from that “tale told by an idiot”
our modern existence is built upon the distraction that is our current existence
which act much like the “bread and circuses” acted for Rome and does so today
for our modern masses…look at what that Kardashian did today…or how much
money did Brad Pitt pay for that Hollywood mansion?
distraction and circuses…all designed to keep us from thinking about the big
questions of existences…what is the point of existence?
“what am I to hope for?” “what am I to believe in?” “what am I to do?”
and if we are distracted enough, we forget we are living empty, hollow lives,
“most people live lives of quiet desperation”…
and so we frantically seek those baubles of wealth and fame and titles
and power and material goods… to fill that void that exists within our life…
we long for that certainty which would dispel our empty, hollow lives…
so we practice living within our ism’s and ideologies like nationalism
and hatred of the GOP and we call it a day… we have “lived”…
we think we are whole because of the false, empty promise of the baubles of our time…
which we accept as being a complete and full expression of being human…
and it is not…
if my valuation of who I am is based upon the hatred and vitriol
of the right wing hate machine… I am not living a “complete
and full expression of being human”
and what is our simple explanation of what is moral? doing no harm
and what is our simple explanation of immoral? doing harm…
we could find a true expression of who we are and what is possible by
living “Moral lives”… by avoiding doing harm…we could become
more complete and more whole by engaging in what we might call “Moral”
beliefs, actions, behavior and philosophies…doing no harm…
perhaps instead of seeking baubles of money, fame, material goods, titles,
power, we might begin to seek an escape from our empty and hollow lives
by living our lives, Morally… do no harm…
and of course, IAM will want to engage in what happens as often happens
in life when one is forced to take an action that does harm others… sometimes
we have but two choices and both will harm another… how are we to choose?
if we have engaged with real and honest reexamination of values, a
reexamination of what we truly believe in and try to see what values
have been installed by the state, family, society, the media, the church…
and explore those values to see if they are in fact, really are our values…
and we have done that to the best of our abilities, that might, might give
us the grounds upon which we can then decide upon which course of action
we take that will harm no matter which action we take, we can then
make a “better” choice based upon our own real, true values… not
the indoctrinated values of society/state/family/church/media…
I would rather make a clear and firm choice based upon my own known values
to decide upon which of the two evil’s choices I should make…
in other words, if we are clear and open about who we are and what
we value, it becomes easier to make those tough decisions that are
we sometime have to make in which every choice harm someone…
the certainty I need lies in the certainty I have in who I am and
what my values are, my real values…by becoming who I am, I
can then better make choices and decisions…
so, instead of focusing on the “bread and circuses” of our modern world,
we focus on who we are and what is our possibilities…
and we work out our true, real values by a reexamination of values
to determine what values are really our values… not the indoctrinated
values of society/state/church/media/ education…but our real values…
who I am based upon the values I hold… that can make choices
and decisions much easier because we make those choices and decisions
based upon who we really are…
Kropotkin