[quote=“Ecmandu”
It’s impossible to be perfect in any zero sum reality.
So no. I’m not perfect. I’m more perfect than those two however. Lots of people are.[/quote]
K: and completely missing the point…
Kropotkin
You want to talk about the point? You can’t handle the point.
Having sex in a negative zero sum reality, no matter who you have sex with … always crushes millions of hearts (if not billions). Same with getting married. Same with simply seeing someone naked in a non global public way. Same with having children.
You, like others like you, think you’re the conqueror. Billions of people think this way… amongst 2, you and Donald Trump. Look in the mirror Peter. You are your worst nightmare. Selfish, greedy, narcissistic, psychopathic.
And to boot, you’re a moral nihilist like Trump, which is why your hatred of him seethes through your posts — he’s you in the mirror. You’re yelling at yourself.
You fucked up, you fucked up big. For once in your life, own it.
[quote=“Peter Kropotkin”]
[quote=“Ecmandu”
It’s impossible to be perfect in any zero sum reality.
So no. I’m not perfect. I’m more perfect than those two however. Lots of people are.[/quote]
(MLK and Gandhi among others)
K: and completely missing the point…
K: and I shall ignore Ecm for the moment as he is on one of his random tangents…
and return to this point…
the false belief that “I’m more perfect then those two (MLK, Gandhi) however.
lots of people are”
and people feel good about this… but think about it… who remembers you?
how many status are built do you? are you considered to be great?
NO, NO AND NO…and that is the point… the false belief that one is “more perfect”
then MLK and Gandhi… and this means you are “better” then MLK or Gandhi…
you can feel a sense of accomplishment or pride in this… false pride or false
accomplishment…
the point isn’t about whether you are “more perfect” then two of the icons
of the 20th century… the point is they achieved something you wouldn’t even
dare in your wildest dreams…they changed history… something very few of
us will ever achieved… I most certainly won’t change history…
they found greatness… who among you has achieved greatness?
and how did they achieve their greatness? not by following ism’s or ideologies
or by seeking baubles like fame or wealth or titles or power…
the old familiar path of those without any imagination or possibility of
greatness…
they found greatness by following values, not baubles…they sought to
achieve something by the pursuit of values like love and hope
and non-violence and justice…they achieved greatness by
holding firm to the values of justice and love and non-violence…
remember the word Satyagraha… that word is a compound word.
Satya: meaning truth…agraha: polite insistence or holding firmly to…
holding firmly to the truth…Satyagraha…and this is what Gandhi
himself writes about Satyagraha… in regards to “passive resistance”
“Therefore it is different from satyagraha (passive resistance)
in three essentials: Satyagraha is a weapon of the strong; it admits
no violence under any circumstances whatsoever; and it ever insists upon
the truth”
He didn’t fudge or adapt this “truth” to fit the situation…he hung
onto the “truth” regardless of the situation…
most people exists on the lowest level of existence… seeking food,
water, shelter, education, health care… a few exists on a higher level,
seeking love, safety/security, esteem… but who among you seek
to pursue something greater and beyond yourself? few to none…
at least none here…who dares to fly like Icarus… in pursuit of
greatness…to become something more then just animal/human…
but to become human, fully human…
it doesn’t matter if Gandhi or MLK were animals in some aspects of
their lives if they attempted to reach greatness in their pursuit
of values… who among you has tried to reach greatness?
none because you are mired in the muck of day to day existence
and you can’t see the possibility of greatness that lies outside of
your vision…outside of pursuing the lower level of existence,
food, shelter, water…etc. etc…or pursuing the baubles of existence,
wealth or power or…etc. etc…
there is a third path of existence and that path was followed by those
whom we call great…the Gandhi’s and MLK’s of the world…
the Goethe’s and Einstein’s and Shakespeare’s of the world
they pursued something beyond just mere lower levels of
existence… they pursued values… not ism’s or ideologies…
or food or safety/security…
they pursued what it means to be human and they explored the
possibilities of existence in ways most of us haven’t even dreamt of…
do I see greatness today? no, I see pursuit of the lowest levels of existence
or the pursuit of modern day baubles…and I won’t see greatness until we
begin to pursue the path of seeking what is possible for human beings…
to become human, fully human…
Gandhi and MLK are human beings in the finest sense of the word…
and the rest of us? we are just mere animals seeking the lowest levels
of existence… we don’t even realize that existence has many different
levels of existence, many different paths in which we can walk down…
my path is to seek greatness through my possibilities of philosophy
and understanding of what it means to be human…
and the exploration of values…
and what is your path? what are your possibilities?
what path will lead you to greatness?
Kropotkin
Peter,
You’re a fucking moron.
Plants suffer, even rocks suffer as much if not more at times than cows or people do.
Gandhi was a moron. MLK was a moron.
You have no fucking clue what the cosmos is Peter.
You’re blind like they were blind.
You still think you’re the conqueror.
You cannot be great until you make everyone great.
You cannot be interesting until you set up an impossible task for yourself.
Both of your icons are neither.
K: and what is your path to greatness?
Kropotkin
Working with the entire cosmos to establish positive non-zero sum hyperdimensional mirror realities attached to individual desire matrices for all, forever. Infinite heaven for every being in existence.
It’s been a collaborative project from the brightest spirits in existence.
and I rest my case…
Kropotkin
Fuck you man. I’ll explain how existence works to your puny brain.
Have you ever woken from a dream and thought to yourself while in the dream, “that makes PERFECT sense!” And then you wake up and say, “what the fuck was that weird shit?!”
That’s how existence WORKS!! It only has to make ENOUGH sense!
Another thing you don’t understand about existence is that we all made this together… actually, to be more precise, there were spirits who spent trillions upon trillions upon trillions of years to make the reality we currently live in.
Let me explain more… none of us were never born and none of us ever die. We all looked at the plan (because we get bored with forever) and said “fuck it, why the fuck not?” That ALL this is.
I found a loophole in the system that we chose that sends us all to hell forever.
Thus, were working on a NEW plan! Dig it?
I’m not trying to be mean to you Peter, I’m trying to wake you the fuck up!
When you’re one of the beings sent by all of us to test the new system, it’s 24/7 work on a scale people don’t comprehend. You’re lazy as fuck. That’s fine. You’re not one of those beings. I am one of those beings. I work more in one minute than the entire species has worked in thousands of years (and then some).
So, when you come at me with your condemning enlightenment … of course I’m going to say fuck you. You’re part of the problem, not the solution.
You’re blind, you’re asleep, you’re lazy.
I tried to jar your mind into being awake. It’s your choice to be awake or asleep, not mine.
According to Safranski, Heidegger was, for several years,
invested in the idea of Germany and what it meant to be
German…nationalism at it worst…to make judgements
about people, ism’s, philosophy, justice… in regards to
such a silly idea as nationalism… really makes no sense…
I have little interest in working out the nationalism of being
an American…I am interested in the values and meaning
of being human, of being an American, no…no such interest…
But why Kropotkin? Isn’t nationalism one of the ways/means of
defining us and who we are?
no, because nationalism is about exclusion… who isn’t part of
your little club and who is part of the club…I dismiss you because
you aren’t American, you are British or Swedish or French or German…
and in the Nazi’s days, they defined others by their nationality…
the Nazi’s, Aryan’s were the “superior” race by the very fact of
being German or being Aryan…no need to have wisdom or
knowledge or information or even of being a decent human being…
the value of people were being decided upon racial and national values, or
color of their skin, or who they loved or perhaps by their religion…
all invalid ways to judge a human being… by either accidental traits or
by a method that lead to irrelevant judgements… by what standard does
one judge the Germans as being superior, or by what standard does one
decide that loving a specific gender is better then loving someone?
how do I decide that one’s skin color is better then another?
or how do I decide that one religion or none religion is better then
another’s religion? to wit, that to decide having hatred toward one religion,
say the Jewish religion is to make a judgement upon it, it is to make some
standard upon it…on what grounds are you going to make a judgment about
one religion or another? what standard are you going to use?
I would submit that the standard used, in Germany and later to denigrate
the Jewish religion is simply part of two steps, one is bigotry and prejudice…
which is taught by our family, our state, our religion, our schooling, our
society…and we have to overcome our childhood indoctrinations…
to achieve values that actually represent who we really are, not the values
we were taught/indoctrinated with…
the second standard is how do I judge or compare one religion to another?
what standard would I use to compare the Jewish religion as opposed to
the Jain religion?
how do I decide what religion is “better?” better for whom and why?
what standard should I use to make that decision?
I don’t see any possible standard that can be used to make such a determination as
to what religion is somehow better then another or one nationality is better then
another or one race is better then another…I object to any possible
standard that one might use to make such a determination…
I think the French are a inferior people because they speak French
and I flunked French in High School… that is about the logic one might
use in this pretend use of standards we might use to negate a race, people,
religion, those by the color of our skin or who they love…
the very standards one uses to negate a people is based upon
a false and dangerous standard that is utterly useless in providing
any real idea of the value of a people, race, religion… etc, etc…
and I reject any such use of standards to judge a people, a religion,
the color of one’s skin as a value, or who they might love…
now we may be able to judge individuals, as being jerks or failures or
tightwads but once again, it comes down to a standard that cannot be
defended…we judge as much based upon emotions and feelings as
we do upon some rational and logical base…
to judge Germans or Americans as superior is to allow emotions
and feelings to make a summary judgement that has no rational basis…
in other words, we make declarations based on nothing more just a feeling…
and we all know how false and wrong feelings can be…
so I call into question the very idea that a standard can be found to judge
a people/Americans or a religion/Jewish or a gender/male or female
or who we love, men or women…the very notion of a standard to judge such
matters must be called into question… how would I judge someone to be
superior? and what standard would I use? I say that standard is subjective
and based upon feelings and emotions…because there are no facts which
can be judge upon to make such a judgement…
Kropotkin
I see nationalism and state as being as temporary as the
notion that once drove human behavior which is the “tribe” that
we once belonged to and then the “city-state” that drove Socrates
and then the small estates that littered the countryside in Medieval
Europe and then the rise of the nation…and then some other format
will rise and replace the nation… I hope for a unity of purpose that arises
when people, not nations, not religions, not social created means that
are only true for a moment and then gone…
the one and true vison of who we are is a vision of us as human beings, not
as beings of color or of a religion or of race or of nationality…no, no, no…
when I look into a mirror and I don’t see an American or a Jew or a man
or a white person or one who loves women or men, for that matter…
when I look into a mirror, I should only see a human being… the other traits
are not important… and when we all look into a mirror, the only thing
we should see is our humanness… we are human beings…
the global world to come… that is the future… as we have gone from a family
unit to a small tribe to a small city to a city-state to a larger group known as Empire
to nation and soon we shall add, we are one… a global society that engages us
as human beings, not as any accidental traits like man or white or Jew or homosexual…
that is a world worth waiting for, worth living for, worth dying for…
not mere religion or race or nationality or who we love…
but a celebration of being human and a world that engages us as human beings
and nothing more or less…
this dream of mine is many centuries away… but I await it arrival with the
same hope as I await the sun arising in a few hours…
Kropotkin
I admire your ideals, I have worked for my own for a while and now, being a pensioner, I reflect on the things that were. I have found that the development I had assumed we were all making, building the world to be a better place, was all illusion. At the best, it was the development that I was making with a few others. It doesn’t mean that we stop, but that we assess what is possible and do that.
Of course, the COVID situation is making a mockery of such idealism. At present it is important to gain control of the spread of the virus and get back to a normal state of affairs. Only then can we begin to communicate one on one, trying to overcome misunderstanding and enmity. The forums of this world, inasmuch as they are anonym, can’t help us unless we do away with the brutality of closed minds. Forums can only help us when our minds are open and we are willing to argue our case in a civilised manner. I have changed my mind many times on ILP due to good arguments made by others - including you. I have had to revise my ideas in the light of verbal attacks, because I noticed that my wording was inappropriate.
As far as the political arguments are concerned, we can’t remain dualistic, but must find common ground in what we want to achieve. There are different ways to achieve that, but the more extreme our demands on others are, the bigger the divide becomes across which we have to communicate. Instead, sticks and stones are thrown and not arguments. Both sides have done their fair share of this and we need to stop. The extremes only cause opposing extremes. The left has been demanding things that a society based on compromise is difficult to accept on the right, and vice-versa. A democracy is built on compromise. We need to know that. We need to be prepared for that and not try to destroy each other.
Bob
Peter Kropotkin"]I see nationalism and state as being as temporary as the
notion that once drove human behavior which is the “tribe” that
we once belonged to and then the “city-state” that drove Socrates
and then the small estates that littered the countryside in Medieval
Europe and then the rise of the nation…and then some other format
will rise and replace the nation… I hope for a unity of purpose that arises
when people, not nations, not religions, not social created means that
are only true for a moment and then gone…
[/quote]
[/quote]
Bob: I admire your ideals, I have worked for my own for a while and now, being a pensioner, I reflect on the things that were. I have found that the development I had assumed we were all making, building the world to be a better place, was all illusion. At the best, it was the development that I was making with a few others. It doesn’t mean that we stop, but that we assess what is possible and do that.
Of course, the COVID situation is making a mockery of such idealism. At present it is important to gain control of the spread of the virus and get back to a normal state of affairs. Only then can we begin to communicate one on one, trying to overcome misunderstanding and enmity. The forums of this world, inasmuch as they are anonym, can’t help us unless we do away with the brutality of closed minds. Forums can only help us when our minds are open and we are willing to argue our case in a civilised manner. I have changed my mind many times on ILP due to good arguments made by others - including you. I have had to revise my ideas in the light of verbal attacks, because I noticed that my wording was inappropriate.
As far as the political arguments are concerned, we can’t remain dualistic, but must find common ground in what we want to achieve. There are different ways to achieve that, but the more extreme our demands on others are, the bigger the divide becomes across which we have to communicate. Instead, sticks and stones are thrown and not arguments. Both sides have done their fair share of this and we need to stop. The extremes only cause opposing extremes. The left has been demanding things that a society based on compromise is difficult to accept on the right, and vice-versa. A democracy is built on compromise. We need to know that. We need to be prepared for that and not try to destroy each other."
K: thank you for your kind words… you are actually saying the same thing I am, just
using different words…the only way compromise can occur is with an open mind… and
few around here have an open mind…the problem with most people is they get invested
in their own thinking… they find there own understanding and self worth in
their ism’s and ideologies… we find our self worth in being Americans or in nationalism
or in the ism of religion or in the religion of hate, be it the hate of blacks or jews or women
or other nationalities…we become invested in this thinking…
the right holds their self worth in their ism’s of god, country, guns, (in America anyway)
and to deny that is to deny these people their self worth…
we on the left don’t hold as much to ism’s and ideologies as being a measure of
our self worth… as an example, I have held 3 different and distinct political
stances and a couple of different economic ones and at least 4 different
philosophical stances…I can change my mind without compromising my
own understanding of who I am…my self worth isn’t tied into my
faith in god, country or guns…for I don’t believe in any of these…
I believe in justice/equality (for they are the same thing) and I believe
in freedom and I hold that all people are connected in a basic and fundamental
way… I cannot be unless you are as free as I am…
but that basic understanding means that we act for the greater good…
I wear a mask when I go outside… and why?
because to keep me safe, I must keep you safe and mask do that…
I follow the laws, traffic laws for example, because if I don’t, say
stop at a stop sign, I might hit someone or some car… and I
engage with people in light of the fact that I believe that
justice and equality requires me to engage with people equally…
I hold to the principle that “all men are created equal” and so, with the
notion of “all men are created equal” I stop at stop signs… I allow
people to walk in the crosswalk…I obey the laws because I am
operating under the principle that “all men are created equal”
and to be treated equal requires I follow the laws…
my right to act isn’t above you or below you, I act equally with you…
the statement that “all men are created equally” isn’t just words
on a piece of paper… it is a call to arms…to engage with
all people equally… to engage with justice, for equality is justice…
and within this notion of equality, I reject petty beliefs like
nationalism or bigotry or prejudice or superstitions…
I hold that “all people are created equal” and the way, the only
way to reach this is to expand our notion of being human…
and we do this by seeing such small and limited ideas of tribes,
city-states, nations… as steps to the next step which is
globalism…
you call it idealism, I call it the natural progression of what it
means to be human…and we can achieve the potential of
being human under globalism as we can under nationalism or
Catholicism or any other bias or ism…
we look at other people and we see the differences and instead we should
look at other people and be seeing our similarities…
“if you prick us, do we not bleed? if you tickle us, do we not laugh?
if you poison us, do we not die? if you wrong us, shall we not seek revenge?”
Shakespeare, the Merchant of Venice…
and if you prick human beings, do they not bleed? or if you tickle all of mankind,
do they not laugh? and if you poison human beings, do they not die?
and if you wrong human beings, do they not seek revenge?
“We the people in order to create a more perfect union”…
WE THE PEOPLE…
in seeking justice and equality and freedom isn’t about any “idealism” but
about seeking that which all, ALL human beings desire…
“WE THE PEOPLE” isn’t about American’s or Catholics or the French or
about the haters of Jews or or people whose self worth is found in
their hate of others… “WE THE PEOPLE” is about all of us…
as people, not about nationalities or religions or race or gender or creed
or who we love… it is “WE THE PEOPLE”…
and the only way to hold to “WE THE PEOPLE” is to engage in
globalism…
to accept we are all one…THE PEOPLE… that isn’t idealism,
but in fact, that is reality…
any other ism or ideology is to exclude people and we can no longer
abide by any ism or ideology that exclude others… because
our motto is, “WE THE PEOPLE”… not we can’t accept you because
you love differently then we do or you hold different beliefs then
we do or you pray to a different god then we do… that is excluding…
based upon false and outdated beliefs like nationalism and
religion and hate of others…
“WE THE PEOPLE” rises above nationalism and religions and race
and other exclusion practices…
“WE THE PEOPLE” that become the only judge of
what it means to be human…
all other beliefs pale in comparison to this one basic belief…
because other ism’s and ideologies don’t include all human beings…
they exclude in some manner…
and that is the seeking that we must finally reach…
to push past ism’s and ideologies to push back to the beginning…
we begin as “WE THE PEOPLE” and then formed tribes and cities and cities/states
and nations… and in the end we return to where we began…with the realization,
that we are not Americans or Catholics or homosexuals or women or white or
any other description of human beings…
we finally arrive at the point where we started…
“WE THE PEOPLE”…
Kropotkin
Hi,
I’m not such a prolific writer like you but I understand what you’re saying. I appreciate the spirit with which you bring it across, but I think we have to be open to what others are saying about us. I have long seen myself on the left of the political spectrum, but I have come to realise that we also have our blind spots and fail to see, especially when we lack the overall picture.
In the past, especially here in Germany, the left vote has been split between rivalling parties, which in the 1930’s gave rise to the entrance of the National Socialists and strengthened Conservative parties, although the left, together, would have had a majority. History tells how that went wrong. Another aspect that we have to see is how Marxist policies created a with us or against us conspiracy theory and killed many of their own people, much like the French Revolution did, only on a vastly greater scale.
I still see myself on the left side of the political spectrum, but I am aware of the dark shadow that we all have and try to ignore. The lurking dangers are there, which can lead to chaos and war, suffering, and further poverty, if we are not careful. Of course, the right side of the spectrum has its own shadow and we have also seen that in action. It has, even today, the same methods and we have seen it lurking, waiting for its chance, as a book from Philip Roth described about ten years ago.
This all may be the reason why I have embraced Christianity, which helps me combat the shadow whilst holding on to my ideals and helps me focus on the people in need. Nothing is perfect, but some things are better than others to take on the problems we are facing and the separation we are suffering in western democracies. A liberal society may be the best we can achieve, but it is also tender and needs to be cultivated. At the present I feel that many people are too preoccupied by sub-cultural influences to be concerned with cultivation of society. There are too many people pushed out on the edge who become militant and dangerous. It will take a lot to bring people back together.
America has, of course, its own special way. In Europe we have struggled to understand the social policies for a long time. The poverty and suffering should make people care more, but we sometimes get the feeling that the opposite happens. I think that the biggest problem is that the dialogue concerning social policies has broken down and ideology seems to rule. Without that dialogue and the attempt to bring people together, especially those with common interests, there will be no progress. There is a lot to do.
thank you Bob for your thoughtful post…
let me tell you my goal in what I write…
I am trying, trying to get people to engage in one of philosophy
key maxim… to know thyself…I am trying to get people to wake
up and rethink their own beliefs, hopes, thoughts and what is “meaning”
in their life…
my engagement is not to convert anybody, but to get others to think, to
engage with their own thoughts, to reimagine what it means to be human…
I write so much because I feel the weight of my years pressing upon my soul…
I am older, 61, and I feel the years left to me are growing short and I must
engage while I still can…I can foresee a point where I am unable to engage
as I do today and it, to be honest, frightens me
the frailty of life, the illness and the suffering of old age, the constant
reminder of death lies in my head and heart…I am not afraid of death as
much as finding out I have more to say and because of my age, being unable
to say it… what I fear more then death is the loss of mind, dementia and
Alzheimer’s are far greater fears to me then just mere death…and I so I write…
my own thoughts are not very original but if I can get even one person to
reevaluate who they are and what is their meaning and purpose in life,
then I feel my thoughts and time spent writing them to be worthwhile…
I have never thought of myself as the chosen one, the bringing of the
new idols… I have always thought of myself as more of a John the Baptist,
kind of guy… I just herald the coming one who will bring about the new
philosophy and the construction of the beginning of the new philosophy…
my name and place in history is not today or even tomorrow…
those who will be my champions are probably not even born yet…
I am a posthumous man… think of me as being like Nietzsche…
my fame will arise after I have departed from the scene…
but when will that be has yet to be determined and so I write…
Kropotkin
As the political season winds down and we have our winners and losers,
ummmmm, anyway, it is time to return to philosophical matters…
in our own little world, we have seen the, uh, intensity of beliefs play out
over these last several months and we have seen downright delusions…
but I ask, have we, you and I, learned something over this last political season?
I see this intensity of beliefs and ask myself, why this engagement over the political
and not in the philosophical… you don’t see having this type of engagement over,
say, Hume or Kant or even Heidegger… this type of passion is common in the
political and the religious world, but not in the philosophical world…
now one might suggest that in academia, they have these types of engagements
that we see in our political/religious world… but how many people really engage
in this type of passion in academia? a couple of hundred, tops… whereas our political
engagement or our religious engagement can engage, well, millions of people…
so why does the political or religious engagement hold millions in that engagement
and philosophy might have a couple of hundred, maybe?
I would say it is because philosophy isn’t engaged with the things that really matter
in people’s lives… in philosophy engagement with academia, has reduced the
influence of philosophy to just academia… it doesn’t hold any influence outside
of academia and that is too bad… for I see philosophy being impactful in
everyone’s lives, not just those of us on ILP or engaged in academia…
the questions of existence, “how should I live my life?”, should impact everyone
or the question of “what should I believe in?” should engage in everyone’s life…
and perhaps the deepest question of all, “what values should I/we hold?”
we shouldn’t have to deduce our values from who we voted for in the last election,
we should declare our values, both private and public, straight out and then
engage in some debate within ourselves as to if we are right about the values
we have decided to engage with…
not just deduce our values from our rejection of Trumpism, but as a
platform of values publicly stated and debated both individually and
collectively…in our rejection of Trumpism, we have rejected
the values of racism and hatred and anger and greed, but we never
really announced it out loud… as a mission statement…
"We the people, in order to create a more perfect union, hearby
now and forever, renounce the lower values of racism, hatred, greed,
bigotry, intolerance among other values we have rejected. A nation divided
by such intolerance cannot and will not survive its own bigotry and hatred.
This new “Declaration of Independence” mirrors the old in being a mission
statement that gives us some deeply held principles that we should pledge
our lives upon; principles like tolerance and equality for all, the right to
achieve our goals as we see fit, the right to have equal opportunity under the law
and within the spirit of human cooperation. We, each of us, has the possibilities
of greatness within us and we should be given the chance to reach that greatness,
by means selected by us and within an engagement selected by us.
We reject being classified by the amount of money we might have or the cars we
drive or the number of homes we might have… NO, these baubles do not
answer the question of our greatness that we might hold within us, if we could
only find a means of engagement to reach our greatness.
That we might find our value, our worth in our engagement within principles
of equality, of understanding, of justice. We seek our classification/values in terms
of the worth of our soul, not our pocketbook. We hold that money alone, cannot
tell us our worth, our value as human beings, but we find our value, our worth in
being the best possible human we can be. We find our value and worth in seeking
our own possible greatness. We the people, in order to form a more perfect union,
have come to the realization that we cannot succeed in our current framework
of Capitalism and our pursuit of wealth. Our pursuit must engage us as human beings,
not as economic beings, not as political beings, but as human beings.
This new mission statement of America calls for us to reach our potential
as human beings, as we see fit, not as is expected of us. Our new mission
statement seeks to define people within terms of their soul and their
attempts to reach greatness, not by the baubles of existence.
Our new mission statement seeks to redefine what it means to be human,
to seek out what is great within us, not outside of us.
We can only become who we are if, if we have a new understanding of
what it means to be human. Not as economic beings, not as political beings,
but as human beings.
We hold these truths to be self evident, that all men/human beings are created
equal and that among the truths we seek are, Life, liberty and the pursuit of
Greatness. That to secure these rights, government is instituted among men,
deriving their just powers from the consent of the governed.
In our new mission statement, we reject the baubles of existence,
we reject the bigotry and hatred that drive people to deny equality
to other people. We hold that the highest principle of the land is
justice, and justice is just another word for equality.
That I don’t stand apart or separate from my fellow human beings.
I am part of, and equal to my fellow human beings, regardless of
their race, creed, color, sex and who they love.
We the people, stand equal in front of the law and stand equal
in the eyes of each other and of justice.
Kropotkin
there are many here who have their “truths” and they
even want to start a “ministry of their truths”
(personally I find the religious context to be of
particular interest)
anyway, I do hold that there is no such thing as an “objective” truth…
we all have our own private “truths” but that leaves an interesting point…
we don’t have objective 'truths", but we can discover if our own
private “truths” have some value…
so, we have various scientific laws such as gravity and evolution…
these laws are not objective nor are they subjective, they simple
are…now we have our own private “truths” and how can we discover
if our subjective truths have any merit?
for example, my subjective “truth” is that I can fly…
how does one understand this “truth?” in regards to my subjective “truth”?
go to the top of any building and jump off…your subjective “truth”
does not allow one to fly… gravity which is neutral, not objective
nor subjective, it simply is…the checks on our own private “truths” is
the laws of science…
so I can understand my own “truths” in terms of what the science
allows…I cannot suddenly grow wings and fly…for that violates
evolution… which is…evolution limits our possibilities…
science limits our possibilities…regards of what our private “truths”
might be, science simply acts as a limit upon those private “truths”
we cannot be something that science or the laws of science has limited…
we might hold to our own private belief that “I am the smartest man on earth”
but reality limits our possibilities to the point where I might believe I am
the smartest man on earth, but we can assume, no matter who you are, there is
someone smarter living right now…
we are limited by the reality of the situation…even Einstein, was most
likely not the smartest man on earth during his time on earth… the odds are
against it…it is not a question of objective or subjective, it simple is…
so we have our own private beliefs and the laws of science provide us
with some sort of reality check upon our own private beliefs…
Kropotkin
I am deep in my study of Heidegger “Being and Time”…
here are some random thoughts… some from Heidegger and some
a combination of my thought and Heidegger…
Heidegger is big on the concept of disclosure… we can disclose and
we can have things disclosed to us…think about who you are…
I am Kropotkin…I have aspects of my life I haven’t disclosed here…
and yet, I believe I disclose more of my own personal life then just
about anybody here…I believe in being open about one’s life…
I believe in disclosure…and yet there is a personal line I won’t cross…
this leads me to having a private Kropotkin and a public Kropotkin…
when we talk to people… are we showing them the private side of us
or are they getting the public version of who we are…
we have a very well traveled public vision of who we are…
we practice that public persona all the time… at work, we
have a public persona… but we don’t or we rarely ever engage
in our private persona at work… why? because it isn’t “appropriate”…
whatever that means…
this division of private and public selves is important…
if I were to represent human beings, I would pick the god Janus from
Roman mythology…Janus is usually depicted as having two faces looking
at opposite ways, one toward the future and one toward the past…
but in reality, of our two faces, one is looking outward and one is looking
inward… the public self, looking outward and the private self, looking inward…
the public face, the one looking outward is a troubled face…this public
persona is impacted by forces outside of our control…we are impacted by
what Heidegger “the Other”…at work, I have co-workers, supervisors,
managers and various outside venders I have contact with…
I have to keep my outside face, my public face acting in a certain way…
for example, I cannot insult or verbally attack or sexual harass anyone at work…
that is made very clear… and I have to watch and sign off on many video’s
about the appropriate behavior at work… regardless of my inside persona,
I must engage with my public face in a certain manner or I will be fired and possible
face lawsuits… as I like to eat, I do engage in a publicly acceptable fashion…
what my private self feels is not only irrelevant but unimportant…
the company goal is to make profits and I must act in a fashion that
gets the company to its goal of making profits…
the retail company makes a big show, a public show about caring about
customers and that is a lie… it cares about profits… the corporation I work
for doesn’t even care about its employee’s… we are nothing more then cannon fodder
to this company… expendable in every way, shape or form… even though I have
worked there over 13 years… If I die at my check stand, I would be written up for
dereliction of duty and my body pushed outside the front doors and promptly
forgotten… I served my purpose… to make profits and after that, I have
no use…the company has its public self and its private self… and may the two
never meet…
so what of my private self? does that have any value at work? only in regards
to making a profit… it has no other value…so we reach the point of
investigating what is certain existential beliefs that have been held over
the last 150 years… angst, alienation, discontentment…so what is
angst, alienation and discontentment? In reality it involves in some
fashion, the interactions between our public selves, our private self
and the outside world…
I am alienated from work because it doesn’t fulfill any of my needs
outside of paying me money to work there…at work, I have to keep
my private self, my private face, silent and hidden from everyone at work…
work engages in practicing an superficial engagement with me…
what does work promise me? the useless baubles of existence…money,
titles, material goods, possible fame?..the useless vanity of power…
I have some modest power that is allowed to me by my position…
but it can be overruled and quite often is… so what exactly do I get from work?
the worthless baubles of existence… these baubles serve no useful purpose
to my private self… I am not interested in them… I am alienated from work because
outside of a paycheck, which just another bauble, I get no satisfaction of any kind
from my work, my job… for me, work is a waste of time…it only purpose
is to get a paycheck and medical benefits…
in thinking about it, at times we have varying uses of our private self
and our public self…when we are younger, and we are trying to accomplish
things or get things like getting laid or making money or impress people,
we go with our public face far more… as we get older and we care less and
less about those things, we use our public face, our public self less and less…
I am less and less alienated from work because I just don’t care about it
anymore…I use my private face, my private self more and more at work,
because I am not interested in what work has to offer me…I have less
of a need to offer up appearances at work…as long as I don’t steal
or commit the greatest crime in the business world which is insubordination,
I can’t be fired and at this stage, I don’t even care anymore…
so what keeps me from telling everyone to fuck off?
my own personal code of conduct, as it were…I hold that
people deserve to be treated with respect and with dignity…
not because they might be white or men or American’s, but
because they are human beings… and every single human being
has value… …I am not driven my public concerns… I am driven
by my own private values and that is the value of having these
private values…I no longer hold “public relations” values because
they make my public persona look good, I hold certain values
because I believe in these values, regardless of how they look or
are disclosed to the public…because of my age, I no longer care about
my public face or my public appearances… I don’t have to pretend
to hold public values which makes me look “good” or impress people…
so what values do you hold because it looks “better” to the public
you are trying to impress or what values do you hold that you hold because
it works better in the public or private image you are trying to create…
and we all have certain private imagines we are catering to…
and hopefully I can get to this aspect next time, which will be in a
while as I have work over the next several days…
Kropotkin
What’s so new about it?
K: I know to a clueless young one like yourself, it all seems to be nonsense,
but hay, I too was young and dumb, once upon a time, just like
you are now… don’t worry… you will get it at some point,
when you grow up…
Kropotkin