IMPERFECTION AND
OPPORTUNITIES OF PEACE
Nobody is perfect. I am
sure you agree with this phrase. Everybody does. But I don’t think we pay
enough attention, I think we don’t always realise what this consciousness that
nobody is perfect should imply. If nobody is perfect, there is no reason for
wanting to punish anyone that comits the smalllest mistake. This conscience
should make us have more mercy towards one another, in all aspects. In
relationships, in our jobs, everywhere.
But we look at this
divided world, and see that nobody wants to listen nobody, nobody wants to put
himself in other people’s place. When someone has a different opinion, people
immediately start to find flaws in that person, anything so they can not
listen, they can silence the other. As if only perfect people had the right to
speak. Or at least the ones that seem to be perfect in certain aspects. Of
couse this will only benefit the ones that have the gift of gab and can pretend
a certain perfection, since in fact, as we know, nobody is perfect.
An the world goes on
divided, with the different sides of each matter being incited with hatred
against their “oponents”. Of course it is important to have an opinion, it is
important to discuss things, but we can’t forget that there must be different
kinds of reaction for different kinds of disagreement.
For instance, if we walk
on the street we may see something that is so wrong that there is no other
solution but calling the police, or we may see something that is not the case
of calling the police, but of talking to the person, or something that is not
even the case of intervening, and all we
can do is go on with our lives according to what we believe is right,
give our opinion when appropriate and pray for the world to get better.
I know that expecting
that everybody dresses in white and hold flowers all of a sudden is naive.
Nowadays pratically everybody agrees that, in World War II, it was necessary to
fight the nazi-fascism. I think so too. War is never good, but in that case it
was justified. But we can’t use this extreme situations as a justification to
go around making total war about everything.
The way I see, being a
pacifist is not to believe that it is possible to carry only flowers, but to be
in favor of embracing the legitimate oportunites of peace that appear.
For instance, I have some
things in which I disagree with the scienstists. But I like Science in general.
I have my disagreements, basically in theoretical fields, but I would never
wish to knock down the academical world or anything like that. Science helps
people greatly in so many aspects, and I am happy for being able to articulate
my questioning concerning certain theories and to publish it in my blog, and
that is enough to me for now.
Now, something I really
don’t like, the big press. I don’t like the big press in a lot of aspects, but
I also don’t want it to disappear all of a sudden. Imagine if you receive a
message from a friend saying that a hurricane destroyed a certain country, and
from another friend you get a message saying that it never happened, and you
have no place to check. That would be terrible. So, even not liking the general
bias of the big press, at least for now I hope it stays there. And today I
think good journalists even exist.
This is just an example
of the kind of trouble we can get into when we only think about retaliation. We
need to have a little bit of pacience sometimes, and don’t run over the
oportunities of peace that exist.
And I don’t think this
has been cultivated in the world. At principle, it seems obvious that there are
different kinds of reaction for different kinds of disagreement, but it’s not
hard to realise that people have been pushing more and more things to the level
of fight at any cost.
Some people have the
tendency to define in detail how they think human life should be, and then
oppose radically to anything that goes against that vision of perfect life.
But in this case you’re
discarding the possibility that maybe you don’t know all about everything. I
personally think you don’t, neither do I. And also, defending radically the
smallest details of this vision of perfect life, you will tend to agree with
any punishment on anyone who “slides”, even if it’s a disproportionate
punishment on someone who actually didn’t commit a crime, only “deviated” of an
ideal of perfection. That is not fair.
And more, how can you be
sure that this position of yours will really lead to general well? Is it
possible to impose an ideal all of a sudden? Things have their time, people
have their time. We need to reflect to know exactly how we can help mankind in
a given moment. To know what are the most urgent pains that must end, and to
believe in the human being’s capacity to find the best way by and by.
When you get attached to
a very specific ideal of perfection, you end up cuting dialogue with ones who
think a little diferent, but can’t it be that in fact there are things in which
people could agree with there weren’t so many artificial divisions being
imposed?
Even the things in which
you are sure that you are right, you have to think if you are really wishing
the good of mankind of if you are just justifying yourself, saying “look how
commited I am with the right side”. Because who really wants the good don’t
think it’s a crime to have patience with certain things.
But there always willl be
someone who, in order to get in a leadership position, will sell a radical
vision as the only one acceptable. It’s always easier to discourse as the
champion of zero tolerance than doing something practical to make people’s life
better.
They will try to press
you making you feel ashamed in case you don’t accept the iron hand. They will
say that, if you are tolerant in the smallest detail, it will lead to a chain
reaction that is going to destroy everything.
But that doesn’t seem
very smart. Because this way, it gets very hard to detect the cause and effect
relations between things. To know what causes what, and what can be changed.
For example, prostitution is far from being an ideal thing, but imagine a king
that, when his kingdom is starving, blame the prostitutes, saying that they
cause a chain reaction destroying society. Okay, but this way, as long as there
are prostitutes, no king will ever be guilty of anything.
We need to be a little
deeper than that in order to investigate the relations between things, the acts
and their consequences. Who is actually responsible for what, who should be
contributing more. The fault is not always on those who can’t disguise their
flaws. We need to reflect a lot if we want to make this world better.
But the world doesn’t
want us to reflect a lot. It wants us to pick a side, a group, and take a fixed
position. And it is interesting how, as the human being goes commiting to their
“sides”, the ethical reflection goes withering.
We know that the greatest
principle of justice is impartiality. To analise a situation listening to both
sides without having definig beforehand who is right, based on our
preconceptions. And in this world divided in furious “sides”, impartiality
obviously loses.
For example, let’s
suppose there is a person that you loathe because of his opinions or whatever.
If this person is accused of something, and you know that this accusation
specifically is false, you should not get into the choir of this accusation. On
the contrary, you should admit that, in this specific case, the person is being
unfairly accused, don’t matter how much you dislike her.
This is called ethic,
decency. These are things that appeared with the human being long before even
the greeks and romans created these words. The wish to know how to act in a
correct, fair manner. And they always get lost with the world being reduced to
“sides”.
There are certain things
we know in theory but it seems that we never really take in consideration. As
for instance the idea that you can have reason in your arguments at the
beginning, but you cease to have reason when you act wrongly. Just like in the
case of someone who accepts a false accusation against someone because he don’t
like that person for other reasons. If you had some reason in the beginning,
you have no more. We need to think about this things, to know that when you act
wrong, you cease to have reaon, no matter which cause you say you were
defending at the beginning.
But if you defend someone
who is on the “other side” but is suffering a false accusation, people are
going to ask “which side are you on after all?”. In this and in many other
cases, the ethic loses when we forget that we must take care at each step, and
not go trusting that we are on the “right” side and hence we can never be
wrong.
That’s what people seek,
it seems to me. To find a right side, a right “leader” and then hop on this
rocket and go ahead at lightspeed without ever having to reflect about their
actions and arguments, because, after all, they are on the “right” side and
that’s it, it’s over.
Yes, I do believe that
there is good and evil. But the human categorizations and divisions are very
imperfect to say the least. And I take very seriously the fact that nobody is
perfect. I think that to be on the good way we need to think on ethics at every
moment, think if we are really being fair to one another.
Just as important as the
things you do are the things you don’t do. There must be things you don’t do in
any case. Otherwise, how to differentiate good from evil? At this point you
must already know that I believe that including with criminals you can’t do
“anything”. Everything must have limits. Society must be magnanimous when
possible, to show what it defends, what’s it’s dream.
But a lot of people think
that the political divisions or whatever, are so important, that, even when the
other is not even a criminal, there are no limits about what you can say, or
even do, against that person. This is one of the most important aspects of
ethics. There must be things that we believe that nothing justifies.
I know that the wounds
and wrongs of the world are big and many people believe they convictions are
worth everything. But we can’t fall into despair. It is despair to think that
there is no limits to war, and decency and patience have no place.
Like I said before, I
know that we can’t always be carrying only flowers, but we can’t stop believing
in good. We have the temptation to think that our opinions about everything are
perfect, but that would make us perfect too, in a certain way. And we know we are
not. We can’t take away the voice of others, we can’t think that the people who
don’t fit our ideal of perfection don’t have the smallest right to complain
about anything, ever. We must have faith in good, that is, believe that
situations of peace benefit good. Believe that, if people are allowed to
reflect and dialogue with more and more patience and freedom, truth with
prevail by and by.
When people work against
peace, you never know where things are
going to end. Just look at History. We can’t forget the tirannies of every
color that destroyed the lives of so many people.
Maybe the opportunities
of peace that present themselves nowadays are far from ideal, but it’s with
them that we must work, if we want to keep the minimum of faith and hope.
THE FREEZING
LAKE PARTY
When we are children we live in a world
of innocence, a world that seems so big, with so many opportunities for us to
be what we want. We are impressed with things, small things, we marvel with the
world.
It’s easy to believe in good, and in
fact we believe in general that people are good. This is good, it’s good to be
innocent, but, as we grow, many times no one prepares us for what is to come,
no one warns us that what we have, this freedom, this faith in good, is
something so valuable. We think it is granted, we don’t know that, in this
world, this freedom and this goodness are in danger.
Naturally, we are not going to be that
innocent forever, we will find out that not everybody is good, but nobody
prepares us to fight to protect our freedom, our capacity to marvel, our faith
in good. On the contrary, very early, society starts to bomb us with things
that they say we should wish for. And these are precisely the things that will
threaten our freedom and our most genuine joy.
We start to wish for these things, not
knowing that they will have a cost. They show us a world that seems so pretty
with it’s colors and flashing lights, and not a word is said about what these
things are going to cost us. They show us an image of happiness and success,
and we start to desire it, not having a clue of what these things really mean,
of the other side of this presumed happiness.
For instance, we learn to admire the
glory of famous people. These so special persons. We learn that there are
people whose morning walk with the dog is more important than most of other
people’s lifetime achievements. Even when we are not necessarily thinking that
we are going to be a big television star, we wish for a little of this success.
We use this kind of success as a parameter. Great recognition, other people’s
admiration, a big victory.
But certain kind of success happens
only in the top of a pyramid, because obviously few can have it, and nobody
tells us that this funnel that selects people to the top is unfair, and
painful. Nobody tells us, beforehand, that in order to get there people many
times have to give up on what they really believe deep in their hearts.
We learn no wish, even to need, certain
kind of success, before we can know it’s price.
We learn that is normal to glorify
ourselves, we begin to find it normal that some people are left out, that some
people don’t have the respect of nobody. Before we have maturity to understand
certain things, we get in the ride of a world that thinks that every
competition is fair, that thinks it’s normal that there be losers.
A world that is theory tells that we
should defend the innocent, but always says that in a vague way, without naming
names, while in practice it teaches us to laugh at the naive.
We start to subtly – or not – diminish
the others, before we can measure the pain that is causes. We want to be the
winner, the one who is going to have the big last laugh. Before we can realize
it, we are inside, and without a sign out, of a world where the biggest laugh
wins.
I have nothing against humor, I like it
and I try to have sense of humor. But that is different from laughing of
everything. I am not against talking of serious matter with sense of humor, but
some seriousness have to be there, too, somehow. I mean, even if you choose
humor to talk about something, in the end the reason must go to the one who has
reason, who has the best argument, but in this world the victory goes to the
one who laughs higher.
In reality, this world of the big
laughter is a trap. We feel that laughing of everything and everyone is some
kind of freedom, but in the end we just get afraid of being the next joke. And
then we learn to fit, to adapt, fearing being ridiculed.
We are, in fact, afraid of being
abandoned, of ending up alone is a hostile world. Of course being totally alone
is not good, but nobody teaches us that someday most of the so called friends
simply will not be there, we don’t prepare for that, we have the illusion of
being on the top all the time.
It’s interesting, our entertainment
shows us people in a stage showing the whole world how they don’t give a damn
for what others say. So we wish for that, to be somehow in some kind of stage
showing the whole world that we don’t give a damn for what others think. But,
obviously, dreaming with that is totally different from really living without
care for other people’s opinions.
We fear being left aside, being the
ridicule one, so we fit. We start to focus upon what other people are focused
upon, to wish what other people wish, to enjoy what other people enjoy. To be
focused in something different, to like what others don’t like, is a little
risky. We may be called weird.
So, this world tells us not only what
we should do, but it tells us especially what we shouldn’t do. For instance,
when we go out in groups, be know there are certain subjects nobody should
approach, or it would be, at least, weird.
We start to follow a model that they
said was the way to happiness, only to be ashamed of not fitting in that model.
Ando who really fits? I think society was always done that, but nowadays it has
the help of the media and the marketing. Sometimes they divide us in group,
they sell us supposedly different models. Stereotypes, really, that in the end
leave us frustrated in the same way.
We end up absorbing these ideas. For
instance, ideas of how a romantic relationship should be, that end up leaving
us frustrated with our real relationships. Or ideas that we should impress the
others, to be respected by all. Ideas of how or social life should be. Ideas of
what it means to have fun, that end up making us feel that our lives are unhappy.
Or making us spend all of time and energy trying to show the others how happy
we are. Strange and arbitrary ideas of what it means to be “cool”.
Sometimes we think we must always get
out on top in every situation, never be the “fool”. We end up spending much
more energy and becoming much more stressed than we would if we had let the
others see us the way they want, even as the “fool”. Sometimes we defend and
idea of ourselves all the time, and we can become aggressive if someone
threatens this image, we can even become aggressive if someone near and dear
don’t confirm this image to ourselves.
Sometimes we live life as a succession
of “scenes”, and in the end of each “scene” we want this image we created in
our heads to be confirmed for us, influenced by a worldview that was sold to
us. I am learning not to do that.
On the other hand, a lot of times we
can also be prevented from seeing things in a critical way, to clearly discern
what is wrong around us, because of a false vision of what it means to love the
neighbor and wish the good. They can throw on us fictitious scenes where
everybody is friends, as if a peaceful person could never criticize things. Of
course they only use this “every friends” view when it’s convenient.
We use the parameters of an artificial
culture to judge ourselves, the others and the situations. Many times, instead
of specifically analyzing a situation, we already have a prepared “scene”
inside our head.
None of that helps us to get free.
There are many pressures wanting to limit us, many little games that people
play, many prisons in which society tries to put us. And these artificial
preconceptions of ours only reinforce those chains.
We start wishing for fanciful things,
and end up afraid of losing what will never be ours, and this fear prevents us
from seeing clearly. We are afraid of seeing things differently than others. We
need to give ourselves the right not to wish the same things as the others, not
to have the same fears, the same opinions. And to see the situations of our
lives with a clear mind, not fearing to see the chains with which society tries
to tie us.
We must forget these false ideas of
happiness, of success, and not fear a little bit of sadness, that always comes
when we start to be honest with ourselves, but does not prevent us, in fact
even helps, to see the beauty of things. Maybe then we can recover our freedom,
our genuine joy.
INVISIBLE
THINGS
We know there is good and
evil. But, except for some pathological criminals who are able to look at
themselves in the mirror and say “yes, I am bad”, and corrupt politicians that
learned to simply not look at the mirror, the vast majority of people see
themselves in the mirror and thinks they are good. However, we keep making each
other suffer, and the world is still a mess. We must be missing something.
I think, to begin with,
we are too focused on the most external aspects, on the visible side of what we
call virtue. The things that show more.
Some place their faith in
their position in society, but our position in society doesn’t matter, what
matters is what we do inside this position. Some feel satisfied by being well
seen in society, but we know this world is contaminated with prejudices and
distortions, and so, society’s praise doesn’t mean virtue. In fact, most people
say good or bad things about others according to what brings more advantages to
themselves.
A lot of times we put our
focus in our habits, in our alimentation, if we drink or not, how we take care
of our health, our routines, places we frequent, even how we dress, and things
like that. The most external behavioral patterns.
To seek a healthy way of
life for yourself is good, and instructions for that exist in every culture,
but I think it is a mistake to base our moral on this external aspects. People
have different relations with things. One person may live in a cabin without
material possessions, the other may be a musician and feel that he needs a
studio in his home. One has problems with drinking and does good if he stops, another
one drinks a beer with no bigger problems.
We run the risk of
starting to judge others for matters that are superficial. Things like
drinking, or sex, can lead to evil – or not. But things like gossip, intrigue,
envy, are an evil in themselves. I think that in fact they are in the origin of
all of our evils.
If we put too much weight
on those superficial things, like our habits, our routines, we may start to
think that the simple existence of habits that are different from ours is a
threat to our “lifestyle”, and so, to defend this “lifestyle”, we see different
people as threats and stop believing that are people must be defended equally.
I think that there are
much less apparent, even invisible, things, that we should be paying much more
attention to. The most basic things. The central pillar of justice is
impartiality. It takes effort to be able to be impartial, judging things not
taking in consideration other people’s “lifestyles”, or if you don’t
simpathyize with someone for other reasons, or which “group” people belong to,
even appearance. And if you achieve this impartiality, is very unlikely,
pratically impossible, that you get famous for that. That’s not the kind of
thing people comment about the others.
If you defend the weaker
or not, if, when people start making gossip about someone, you act with decency
or go for the ride, if, when you see someone who is naive you respect and lend
a hand or you say “this fool is gonna get screwed”... All these things are not
so appearant, they are not going to shape the image that society has of you, on
the contrary, only the few people who are closer to you will now the way you
are concerning these things. That’s why in don’t put these things in the first
place.
We choose to value things
that are more appearant. For example, other thing, very visible, that we always
value a lot, are the achievements. If someone struggles and achieves something,
this is always taken in great consideration. But that can be kind of deceitful.
People talk as if “struggle” and “achievement” were values for themselves, but
you have to ask: Struggled for what? Achieved exactly what?
Maybe that person
struggled to conquer things only for herself, not caring for others. There
isn’t any guarantee that, conquering things for yourself, you will be
automaticallly doing good for others. The human being sometimes build pyramids.
Yes, imagine an Egyptian
Pharaoh that decides to build a pyramid that’s so gigantic, that demands the
work of so many people, that there ain’t nobody left to work in the fields and
produce food. It’s an example that seems a little absurd, but if you think
straight, we may be using all of ourt energy to build things that are not
necessarily make this world a better place.
That which brings more
profit in short term is not necessarily what will build a better and more just
world. The way we produce and consume things may not be compatible with the
world we would like to see for everybody. We may, as society and as
individuals, be thinking too “vertically” and too little “horizontally”. Like
our friend the Pharaoh.
If the world is full of
challenges and big changes don’t happen overnight, that’s no reason to don’t be
investigating the consciencce and trying to move towards a more just world.
Defining what is “just” may not be a mathematically exact thing, but a lot of
times all it takes is to put yourself in other people’s shoes. If we want
opportunity, shouldn’t we wish that for the others? If we want to have a second
chance for our mistakes, shouldn’t we give a second chance for others? We want
to live from our work with a reasonable amount of tranquility, so wouldn’t it
be good if everybody had opportunity, and everybody that works could live with
that tranquility?
After all, we always say
that we want a better world. This brings another thing that is kind of
invisible: pretty words and promises. Individual’s and society’s speeches.
Imagine a person that
says he is your friend, he enjoys your friendship, he gain fame around as being
a good friend, a person willing to lend a hand, and he benefits in many ways of
this nice guy fame, but in the moment you really need him, and he could help
you, he says: “This is a cruel world and you have to make it on your own”. Then
he turns his back on you saying that whatever bad things that may happen to you
it’s your fault, while he keeps looking good in the picture, saying he believes
in friendship.
In the same way, society
must have responsability for it’s speeches and promises. If someone profits
making propaganda that “here is the land of opportunity” but in reality don’t
give nobody any opportunity at all, this person is in fault, because of the
words she spoken, words that benefited her.
In the propaganda around,
you see pretty words like “dreams”, “hope”, “partnership”, “opportunity”,
“equality”, “we are here to serve”, “we want to grow together”, “we are a big
family” and much more. It seems that these words make profit, and then when
people have problems, they come face to face with another kind of speech, a
speech – that is not in the propaganda – that says this world is indeed a dark
jungle and there is no chance of changing it, so it’s each one for himself and
may the stronger survive. But that’s not what’s in the speech when it comes to
engage people to work and consume.
I think there is nothing
wrong in, from time to time, peacefully trying to remind people that the words
and the promises have a weight, and that there is a moral issue when someone
benefits from a beautiful speech but has no intention of taking his own words
seriously.
We live in a world where
it is very easy to adopt any pretty speech. We can use the wisdom of people
that lived long ago, and make adaptations for it to serve our own purposes. We
can take things that were found by other people, that paid a high price for
what they said, and use these things to build an image that will bring us
profit. People can even profit talking about God’s things. But, if you talk of
all those things, of love and hope, but in practice you support the same old
jungle of always, something is very wrong.
The promises made and not
kept are sometimes hard to see, and you can benefit from speeches that don’t
match your behavior and never be charged for it, at least in this world. Just
as many times the ways we hurt each other can be invisible. Just because it’s
hard to prove that you’ve done something wrong, it doesn’t make it less wrong.
We must investigate our own consciences deeper.
Sometimes we hurt people
in subtle ways and get away unpunished. Just because we didn’t steal nobody’s money,
we didn’t commit any crime foreseen in the constitution, we didn’t perpetrate
physical violence, it doesn’t mean we are acting in the best way possible. Even
if it happens in a more or less subtle way, any form of humiliation, small or
big, any form of threatenig someone with total rejection, or of turning your
back on someone that trusted you, or to get bigger by diminishing others a
little bit here and a little bit there, or to make alliances with people that
grow this way, or to support slander and defamation, or anything like that, all
those things hurt people, and in a serious and real way. And what’s worst:
sometimes the person can’t demand justice because the evil perpetrated against
her was more or less invisible.
A lot of times I think
the brain is the most vulnerable human organ. At least, it is the only one that
can be hit by email. In order to avoid hurting others, we need to get off
automatic pilot and really focus in putting ourselves on the place of others.
This world is immmersed
in a culture that leads us to see only the surface of things, and to seek, for
ourselves, some evolution that everybody may see, so we are led to buy a
character, ready “clothes” of a “right person” or whatever. But this isn’t
enough to build a better world. This is a world of human relations and
relations are not defined by those “clothes”.
Well, those are the
things that I wanted to day in my book. I hope I gave you something to think
about. Each of us must seek to be better and live according to what we believe.
But I would just like to remind you that you shouldn’t expect that other people
recognize when you are doing what you believe is right. On the contrary, many
times they may want to put you down. And they will use moral speeches to say
that you are wrong. I’ve never seen nobody mistreat someone saying “I will
mistreat you because I am bad and you are doing the right thing”. No, whenever
it’s possible they will question your morals. There are people that are able to
twist the concepts of good and evil to attack whoever they want. But it’s up to
each of us to consult his own conscience and know of his balance, the balance
that says what you are receiving and what you are giving.
It is you who knows if
you are a person that takes part in the oppression of others, or if you are a
person who don’t give a damn, or a person who wants to respond the oppression
with violence, or someone who tries to respond it with good.
Maybe you have noticed
some things in this book, like the fact that I don’t present data. That’s not
my line of work. I have nothing against data, but I’m looking for some
reasonings that have their own sense in themselves. At least I’m trying. I
think data is useful, once you have defined what you think is right and what
you think is wrong. But you shouldn’t define the core of your beliefs based in
data. It’s not such a solid ground. And I am here thinking about my beliefs,
and sharing what I think is worthwhile.
