The Age of Compassion

 

We are living in times where we are told that society is becoming more compassionate. With new ‘tolerances’ of things such as skin colour and mental health and gender. However, how true is this?

 

In the global game of football, we are reading more and more about the racist abuse of African players in predominately white cultures. The debate rages but not on how to stamp it out but whether it has always been there and is now only being highlighted as there is growing awareness of it in the media. The media, it is important to note, has been complicit in some of the most racist actions not only throughout history but also now. But this week we will be focusing on mental health.

 

A friend of mine has recently been diagnosed with a mental health problem, or, to be more ‘accurate’, disorder. Already we have a problem as this friend of mine is being singled out as having ‘something wrong with her’, denoted by the very words used, ‘problem’ and ‘disorder’, as though her being herself means there is something wrong with her. She told me that she was told, after disclosing her ‘condition’, ‘not to feel ashamed’.

 

Before there were two categories- normal and not normal. Understandably these terms were deemed to be offensive and were replaced with ‘neuro-typical’ and ‘not neuro-typical’. Readers may notice that the words used to replace the ‘offensive’ words are synonyms of the words they are replacing with neuro-typical meaning neurologically normal. Already our ‘age of compassion’ is getting off to a bad start as people who are ‘different’ are still being singled out, i.e. their humanity is being drowned by a small part of their personality.

 

Employers have a duty of care to their staff to protect them. the 2010 Equality Act, building upon the 1998 Data Protection Act, means that medical information, such as health conditions, can only be divulged with consent, to not do so is technically illegal. However, my friend told me that hours after disclosing her diagnosis to her work place many, many more people knew about it. She arranged a meeting with her managers and asked me to attend. I went along and sat there as the simpering HR representative and her Line-manager explained how it was in her best interest for them to disclose her confidential (yes, confidential) medical information. The representative of the Union was also there to agree with them. I tried to explain, on the behalf of my friend, who you can imagine was very upset by this, that they may have thought they were acting in her best interests, but they were, in fact, not doing so. This is why, I explained, there is a consent law, as my friend knows what is best for her, as opposed to people who are not her. Not surprisingly my comments fell on deaf ears (to quote Andy Warhol, ‘you can’t tell anyone anything’) and this behaviour was defended as being in my friend’s best interest. I then asked who had disclosed the information (we had already worked out that it was a senior manager and an assistant-director) and we were told that that information would not be disclosed. I pointed out the hypocrisy of them protecting what is illegal behaviour and that if they did not want that information disclosed then maybe they shouldn’t disclose confidential information. This conversation cycled and my friend started to cry. She, as well as I, knew the situation. Illegal behaviour had taken place and instead of admitting this and taking steps against one of their own, the management defended the bad behaviour and criticised the innocent party, as it usually goes.

 

When, disdainfully, my friend was asked if the actions (i.e. the disclosure) had a negative impact on her now she replied that of course it did as a) her privacy had been raped numerous times, b) she was powerless to stop it happening again, c) information she didn’t want to be made public was now public and d) she could not longer trust anyone in management. She is still struggling with the emotional impact of these actions as I write and this story took place a few weeks ago, so much so she had to go off work sick with anxiety, depression and stress. Yesterday she received a letter summoning her for a disciplinary for being sick and that she must be referred to Occupational Health as she was causing problems for people. Merry Christmas, indeed.

 

We are told that with new policies and initiative we are living in an age of compassion and empathy, however, policies are one thing, but human behaviour is another. Based purely on the case study above would you say we are living in an age of compassion or are we still the selfish cave dwellers we have always been? An age of compassion is possible but only if people learn to take responsibility, be brave enough to stand up to the crowd and, above all, learn to display that rarest of all things for humans, humanity.

 

‘till next time (unfortunately)

The Duality of Women

 

‘…in her woman’s body

And in her child’s soul’

(origin lost in memory but, likely, a Leonard Cohen poem)

 

As a wise man once wrote (it was me), a secret that every man knows yet few dare to mention aloud is that, in general, women are the superior of the species and that civilization itself is nothing more than a massive (sigh) male inferiority complex.

 

However, the question must be, how can it be that the dim-witted of the species found itself in a position of being deemed superior to the superior of the species? The answer is simple, as I have written above. It was the men who created the rules (note: whenever you hear a rule being quoted, ask yourself, who created this rule and what was their intent?). In her landmark book, The Second Sex, the French philosopher, Simone de Beauvoir wrote that a woman is not born, she is made. By that she meant that a girl is born and then shaped to be what is acceptable within the context of the ‘woman’ (note: contra to popular belief the same happens to boys) and thus the cycle continues. The natural feminine qualities are repressed as they are shown as being a weakness and any male qualities (oxy-moron if ever there was one) are seen as being ‘unnatural’ and thusly vilified. So, unable to be women and unable to be men, women were left stateless.

 

The natural instinct for herd creatures (ugh) is to ‘fit in’ and thusly girls assumed a role where their purpose was to be ‘pleasing’ to boys, pandering to their patheticness, with the hope of validation. Those who chose not to, are seen as being too ‘boyish’ and not ‘suitable for marriage etc.’. Thusly the myth grew up that women are very complex creatures and men, well, can cluck like old maids (tee hee, see what I did there?) and say ‘well, we’ll never understand them’, ‘they are a mystery’, when in reality this could not be further from the truth.

 

The very reason why women are superior to men is that they have greater qualities- kindness, compassion, etc, the very things which are lacking in society. Yet these qualities are abused or misunderstood and women are forced, when displaying true emotions, to be labelled as being insecure or jealous or etc. (note: most people, regardless of gender, are immensely insecure). Whilst men are superior, in general, at some things, these are usually the things which really don’t matter and thus the insecurity of the male ego (think china, glass and a thin crust of frost) elevates these qualities without quality into the fore and women, those who in many cases should be leading, are related to the shadows.

 

Contra to popular belief, women are not complicated. Indeed, within every woman there is the fine balance, the balance which, allowed to thrive is incredibly healthy, and that balance is the duality of women- the sophisticated, grown, sexual being- a lady in full blossom and the sweet, innocent child who just wants affection (as does everyone). It is with this duality that women can have that mythological thing which is called ‘female intuition’ which is, of course, nothing more than greater empathy, but don’t get this wrong, this naturally ability, of most women, for empathy is what sets them apart from us mere mortals. It is what makes them angels and goddesses, it is what makes them the greatest thing to inhabit this dust and rock which we call life.

 

 

‘tll next time and merry Christmas

The Fictional Reality of Existence

 

 

From an early age we are taught that there are two types of literature- fiction and non-fiction. Fiction is story books- fantastical things made up to entertain children and non-fiction is serious stuff for serious people built, not on imagination but, rather, important things- facts.

A fact, we all know, is an opinion enough people like and so it becomes axiomatic. The fact that facts (tee hee) change seems to be irrelevant to the underlying principle, sanctity one might say if one was trying to be mischievous (me? Really? Never!), of the ‘fact’ as being axiomatic.

 

We make the assumption that our lives are factual- that everything in it, as we are not storybook characters, is factual. This extends also to our interactions with other people. If we see someone doing something we instantly make the assumption (fiction) of a fact that they are doing X or Y for reasons F and G (I have never known why X,Y, and Z are the defaults) for example someone starts wearing a scarf. One can say- o he is wearing a scarf that is because a) he is cold b) he is rude c) he thinks he is above dress codes when, in reality, it may be reason T- he has a skin condition that has flared up that he is trying to cover. Or vice versa- he is wearing a scarf as he has a skin condition when really, he might just be fashion-illiterate. Subsequently the fact is that our life steadily descend into fiction. When we see something, for example a panoramic view, we don’t actually see it all, rather we see fragments and our imaginations fill in the blanks, all colours are illusions created by light and many more things. Thusly, we can say that in many, if not, possibly, all, cases what we call non-fiction actually contains more than a small amount of fiction.

 

‘Imagination is more important than knowledge. For knowledge is limited, whereas imagination embraces the entire world, stimulating progress, giving birth to evolution. It is, strictly speaking, a real factor in scientific research.’

Thus spake the scientist Albert Einstein, a man who balked at established facts and asked himself, what is really happening? To do so, he had to move beyond established ‘fact’ and try to imagine what was really happening. The American writer Carson McCullers wrote in her memoir, ‘imagination leads to understanding’ and thusly we have, with the help of these two dead giants (we are only really dead when we fade from memory), reached the crux of the matter. If our lives are actually fictions in the guise of facts, then in order to try to establish ‘facts’ one must remove one’s self from the subjectivity of one’s own self and this is where fiction comes in. The German philosopher Nietzsche said that Dostoyevsky was the only psychologist that he had learnt anything from. But how can this be? Dusty was a novelist and not a psychologist or sociologist or even a scientist- he was a writer. By being a writer of extraordinary (no hyperbole) sensitivity Dusty could not only see people’s actions but, to use the Native American adage, put himself into their shoes and thusly try to, through imagination, glean understanding of who they were and why they did what they did. Dusty was so successful that the eminent psychiatrist Fraud (tee hee) refused to read his books after a certain point as the characters were too mush like his patients, too lifelike- or in other words- Dusty had managed to subvert some of the subjectivity of his self to try to reach an objective understanding of the subjectivity of ‘the other’.

 

It is all very fun to break the world down into simple categories but, unfortunately, life cannot be broken down and it seems axiomatic (a fact- tee hee) that our very lives, our very existence is a fiction.

 

‘till next time

Go Tell The Young Messiah What Happens To The Heart

 

I was always working steady

But I never called it art

I got my shit together

Meeting Christ and reading Marx

It failed my little fire

But it’s bright the dying spark

Go tell the young messiah

What happens to the heart

 

Thus spake Leonard Cohen on his new posthumous album Thanks For The Dance, a collection of vocal recordings then set to music, overseen by Mr Cohen’s son as a last request of his father. The first song, based on the lyrics of a poem in his posthumous book The Flame, sets the tone- a life wisdom in which the only truth is

 

It ain’t pretty, it ain’t subtle

What happens to the heart

 

A theme carried on into the next song,

 

I loved your face I loved your hair

Your t-shirts and your evening-wear

As for the world the job the war

I ditched them all to love you more

 

And now you’re gone, now you’re gone

As if there ever was a you

Who broke the heart and made it new?

Who’s moving on, who’s kiddin’ who?

 

The third song is a fitting epitaph to a Leonard Cohen’s life, based on a poem by Federico Garcia Lorca, Mr Cohen tells the tale of a one night stand down by the river (check back for more information on the link between Cohen and Lorca) in which Mr Cohen reminds the world why his novel Beautiful Losers was consider too pornographic for Canada

 

I touched her sleeping breasts

They opened to me urgently

Like lilies from the dead

Behind a fine embroidery

Her nipples rose like bread

Then I took of my necktie

And she took of her dress

My belt and pistol set aside

We tore away the rest

 

The song is addressed to an unknown person- maybe even the husband of the lady, maybe even God greeting Mr Cohen for his final judgement

 

She said she was a maiden

That wasn’t what I heard

For the sake of conversation

I took her at her word

…

And yes she lied about it all

Her children and her husband

You were born to judge the world

Forgive me, but I wasn’t

 

The next song made its debut on the album Blue Alert by Anjani Thomas. Ms Thomas went through her partner’s lyrical scraps and asked if she could set them to music- he said no, she won, and then a whole album was made with lyrics by her partner who, luckily for the world, happened to be Leonard Cohen.

 

The song, from which the album takes its name, is deceptive. One reaches the great feast of life in one’s costumes and soon one finds one’s self tiered, but that’s ok, after all, for maybe one night only

 

 

…turn up the music

Pour out the wine

Stop at the surface

The surface is fine

We don’t need to go any deeper

…

And there’s nothing to do

But to wonder if you

Are as hopeless as me

And as decent

…

It was fine it was fast

We were first we were last

In line at the Temple of Pleasure

But the green was so green

And the blue was so blue

I was so I

And you were so you

The crisis was light

As a feather

 

The next song sums up my feelings for the album as a whole

 

You smile at your suffering, the sweetest reprieve

Why did you leave us, why did you leave?

 

Leaving us in a world where everything is torn, a theme which brings to mind his about a baffled king composing Hallelujah.

It’s torn where there’s beauty, it’s torn where there’s death

It’s torn where there’s mercy but torn somewhat less

…

Come gather the pieces all scattered and lost

The lie in what’s holy, the light in what’s not

The story’s been written the letter’s been sealed

 

But as with all true gifts, as with all true loves, no matter the damage, the brokenness, it will always grow

 

You gave me a lily but now it’s a field

 

The brokenness continues in the next song where the narrator states

 

I sit in my chair

I look at the street

The neighbour returns

My smile of defeat

 

Not because he/she has failed in life but rather taking a form of weltschmerz as coined by the German writer Jean Paul Richter in which there is nothing but a world where there is

 

No one to follow

And nothing to teach

Except that the goal

Falls short of the reach

 

A lesson in which our ambition is too thin, we can do more but settle for less.

 

Yet, are we to blame? Or is it the world? After all the next song lays it out

 

German puppets burned the Jews

Jewish puppets did not choose

…

Puppet Presidents command

Puppet troops to burn the land

Puppet reader shakes his head

Takes his puppet wife to bed

 

One can rise above this and stand up for it, but an apathy has taken over and we now set our targets so low- not to stop being a puppet or to resist the puppets, but to play our roles as grotesque marionettes without crickets as consciences.

 

The next song returns to Mr Cohen status- down form the mountain ala Moses or Nietzsche’s Zarathustra- to talk to the common man (I’m just like you, brother)

 

I’m living on pills

For which I thank G-d

 

As he lays out that

 

My animal howls

My angel’s upset

But I’m not allowed

A trace of regret

For someone will use

The thing I could not be

My heart will be hurt impersonally

…

My will cut in half

And freedom between

For less than a second

Our lives will collide

The endless suspended

The door open wide

…

I know she is coming

And I know she will look

And that is the longing

 

The last song in the album which clocks in at just under thirty minutes is interesting. During one of his last interviews Mr Cohen said ‘wanna hear this poem I just wrote?’ His son then tracked down the journalist with the recording and it closes of the album with Mr Cohen’s usual profound dignity and wit, sublime and beautiful, devastating and life affirming, the end of forty years in a desert (well, 82 actually…)

 

Thank you, Mr Cohen, for one last dance

 

Listen to the hummingbird

Whose wings you cannot see

Listen to the hummingbird

Don’t listen to me

 

Listen to the butterfly

Whose days but number three

Listen to the butterfly

Don’t listen to me

 

Listen to the mind of God

Which doesn’t need to be

Listen to the mind of God

Don’t listen to me

 

Listen to the hummingbird

Whose wings you cannot see

Listen to the hummingbird

Don’t listen to me

 

‘till next time

 

 

Who Am I?

 

I used to believe that which we call free will is merely freedom of interpretation. Things happen of which we have no control and how we react is up to us. The more I thought about it the more I doubted my conclusions. To check the validity of my hypothesis one must first answer the question, ‘who am I?’. We can say that ‘I’ is unique and that is true, however, one must ask, how is/was ‘I’ created?

 

In a previous work I compared the mind to a cloud- disparate threads which are somehow held together (possibly merely by proximity) to form a ‘whole’, a mind, a person. Yet where do these threads, wisps of cloud, thought, come from?

 

The question of nature and nurture is misleading as it is clear that both play a role. From this we can conclude that ‘I’ is formed by both nature (genetics etc.) and nurture (interpersonal, environmental, sociological, cultural etc.). The inferences from this would suggest that our actions and thoughts are not of our own design, rather are formed by the synthesis of nature and nurture and that our personality, whilst there is clearly some ‘individuality’, is primarily created by the aforementioned (including experience). As our personalities dictate how we react to situations (fight, flight and all of the nuance missed by such a simplification) it is very possible, almost likely, that that which we call ‘freedom of interpretation’ is merely contingent on and dictated to by our personalities formed by both our nature and nurture. This would mean that our interpretations are not formed by some omnipotent ‘I’, rather it is merely the by-product of nature and nurture.

 

The obvious question raised by this is one of language. What does ‘I’ mean, what is it etymology? The next question, possibly the prior question, would be does/do ‘I’ even ‘exist’? And in order to create the concept of ‘I’ does ‘I’ need to exist a priori (to use Kant’s word) independent of experience/experiential awareness (or in other words, is there an ‘I’ which exists beyond the conscious notion of ‘I’) and once one formulates (consciously or unconsciously) the concept of ‘I’ does one, as Camus hypothesises with the concept of the rebel, become the concept of ‘I’ rather than a conscious ‘I’? or to put it another way, once I say that ‘I am’ am I only be the concept of me rather than an individual removed from/beyond the concept of ‘I’?

 

Eastern philosophies posit the notion of ‘non-dualism’ (dualism- body and mind, non-dualism- nothing of corporeal or conscious form, just ‘being’) in that there is no ‘I’ or even consciousness of the individual but we don’t have time to go into that now but next time you look into the mirror to ask yourself ‘who am I?’, once you have stopped screaming, think , if the Eastern philosophers (and western one influenced by Eastern thought) are correct then it is possible that not only is there not a ‘you’, but also there may not even be a mirror (doesn’t that make looking into the mirror less concerning?)

 

‘till next time