Tag: college

Bigger’s Trigger.

12/24/07

When we were in the midst of reading Native Son, we came upon the issue again. It became evident that in the Prof’s eyes, as in the eyes of the character of Max in the novel, Bigger is not responsible for who he is, and certainly not for the two murders he committed. In Max’s courtroom argument against the death sentence, he says that it’s not right for us to kill Bigger. We should separate him from society for life so that he is unable to do it again, yes, but we should not kill him. It would be unethical for us to murder this murderer, they say, ”for being the way we made him.”

We should understand him so as not to demonize him. We should ”hate the sin but love the sinner,” and remember that ”to understand all is to forgive all.” But we don’t want to understand Bigger. If we did, we would have to face the fact that we’re responsible for what he’s done.

Following?

See, we set up the conditions that drove Bigger (and what he symbolizes) to do this, and as such his actions, at least in his heart, are comparable to the actions of self-defense of a soldier of war. To understand Bigger would force us to admit our guilt, and we want to blot out our guilt. So we blot out Bigger. We enjoy having a villain, having someone to hate, and so Bigger as a rapist and a murderer serves a function for the people. Labeling him as evil serves a function for the people. We are now licensed in our conscience to hate him, to kill him. We must kill the killer (through the government’s monopoly on justified murder) to show that killing is wrong and will not be tolerated. We blame him for making us have to kill him, all the while trying to blot out that we drove him to his own murders.

This is not about justice, Max and the Prof say. The reality is that we get off on killing him.

Through his death sentence, we get to express our unconscious hatred and violence. The hatred and violence which is normally held in check by society but which is now temporarily suspended with respect to how we feel and deal with Bigger because he expressed the hatred and violence that we agreed (upon social contract) to suppress save for the legally-sanctioned windows. Like the legally-sanctioned window through which we vent upon him, if only vicariously.

Basically, they’re saying: we drove him to kill so we would have an excuse to kill him.

This is their fucking cultural conspiracy theory.

And I may agree with the suggestion for life sentence in such a case, but I do not agree with the logic behind it. Or the philosophical ramifications of extending that logic to its inevitable conclusions.

The Prof speaks about the concept of moral luck, where some people are born into situations that offer opportunity for ”good” choices, while others are not. Bigger’s environment hindered his emotional intelligence, they say. There was negligence from childhood on; there was no real physical contact or true love. Such trauma affects the brain. If we see Bigger as a victimizer, so be it, they say, as it seems perfectly justified. But we should also see him as a victim.

We can’t blame him for what he did, says the Prof, any more than we can blame a dog for not being able to do algebra.

True, all true, I agree. Save for the dog and algebra thing. Save for the implication that the two mentioned facts here — that he is a victim, that he is a victimizer — have the strong relation to each other that Max and the Prof suggest. They do not. In service of the ultimate purpose of their argument, they cannot.

If him being a victim excuses his victimizing, then our victimizing him would be excusable as well, as he victimized us. The logic goes both ways. It must. And so round and round and round the blaming finger goes, swirling towards event horizon.

Histories, memories. In the Prof’s eyes, this no doubt constitutes the core of our identities. But while he sees character, and I would be inclined to assume on that basis all else, as rigidly deterministic due to nature and nurture, I perceive the matter quite differently. Circumstance obviously has an effect on our choices, but all circumstance does is create paths of lesser and greater resistance. It’s probabilistic, not deterministic.

Of course, that raises the question as to what the deciding factor is. What makes the probability-wave crash upon the shores of actuality one way, as opposed to another? Is it all randomness?

I say not. I say it’s free will. I say this is the core of identity. I say this is the determining factor.

We typically overestimate the amount of free will we put forth in our lives, so we often take one of the paths of lesser resistance — perhaps the path of least resistance — and so, given enough data regarding perhaps nothing more than the ”closest” and most relevant variables, we are pretty damned predictable. This, however, is not equivalent to fate. This does not mean we are predetermined. This does not make free will some flimsy idea from a former era we are best to look back on with scorn, humor, or embarrassment.

This does not free us from personal responsibility. This is not the cosmic fucking pardon.

If that were true and you logically extended this argument of fate (even if only through the medium of nature and nurture) you would have to admit that no one was responsible. That’s this logic’s ultimate conclusion. You would have to admit the Big Bang itself was responsible, or the singularity preceding it was responsible. That or just infinite fucking regress.

People have overcome their conditions. Reprogrammed themselves. And despite being opposed by forces trying to hold and beat them down. Despite influences from every which way trying to drive them to the contrary.

We are more than the products of our pasts. Our genetics. Our environment.

So many say of people who drop bombs and shoot others during war, ”They’re just following orders. They’re just doing their job.”

True. And yet.

We don’t create murderers. Killers. We don’t create anyone, we can only influence. We only create the gun, make the bullets, load the weapon and put it within arm’s reach. And that indicates somethings fucked up about our society. No argument there. But don’t make the mistake of glossing over the fact that the murderer made a choice he didn’t have to make.

After all, he chose to pick up the damned gun and pull the fucking trigger.

If we’re all just products of fate, of course, than he’s not responsible for his actions, but neither are we — and so we’re not responsible for him. It’s personal responsibility or no responsibility. There is no gray area.

Of Couldabeens, Maybes & So-and-So’s.

The last few years — perhaps longer, as my sense of time becomes increasingly skewed as I continue to age — I made a deliberate effort to stop dwelling on and mulling over the past, and I met with surprising success.

I just stopped writing about the past, stopped reading and editing old things I wrote about the past, and tried to focus more on the present — weaving in past experiences into my writing when they’re relevant to current experiences, yes, but that is different in my view. I also do look back on my incredibly strange experiences over the years, though again, I find this different, as I typically do this when I’m exploring hypotheses, doing research, doing my damnedest to build a context through which those unusual experiences might make sense.

Lately, though, I’ve found my mind drifting back to past times, to old friends and aquaintences, as well as old relationships — the few I’ve had, but mostly Anne in this area. In any case, what I try not to dwell on is regret: what could have been, might have been, perhaps should have been had I been wiser. What if I had committed myself to Anne? What if I had finished college? Even earlier than that, and more to the point here, what if I had did what my art teacher suggested, put together a diverse portfolio, and tried to get myself into art school?

When I entered college in my thirties, I did so as I had decided what I wanted to do: become an English teacher. I’ve wrote every day since as far back as I can remember, and to be a teacher in that area had become profoundly appealing to me. Not only could I make an impact on young minds and hopefully do my little part in trying to make the world a better place, but as my creative writing and literary analysis courses in high school and college revealed to me, I could incorporate damn near anything into my teaching. I could talk about social issues, philosophical issues, religion and spirituality, politics and the paranormal. I could both stimulate minds, give them a space where they could engage in self expression, and guide them towards more effective means of translating what they held within to those who were receptive. On the way to earning this role and once I managed to embody it, I, too, would learn about such things and be able to share my knowledge. It was not only a meaningful vocation in the sense that I would be helping others, thought I, but a path that would help me evolve myself as well. In addition, I would have a day job involved with what I really wanted to do, which was write for a living.

I did great in college, too — until my last semester, when I had my first public speaking course and it all went to shit. The first (and last) day of that class that all-too-familiar anxiety attack reared its ugly head.

In college, I had focus and structure; a meaningful goal and a step-ladder approach to achieving it. And then I fell off that ladder, flat on my ass, and that dream was crushed. It was a horrid ordeal. I dropped out and tried to accept my pathetic lot in life.

I’m still working on that.

Maybe it wasn’t the right path, though, or at least the right process. I should have gone to art school, disciplined myself in the visual arts, and established myself as an artist. Once established, once making money by means of my art, I could have then branched out — writing articles, books, blending my passion for writing and the visual arts through producing a comic, children’s books, and onward from there.

I just needed some foundation. I feel it should have been art, but it could have been writing as well — in any case, upon that foundation I could have then had the necessary discipline and opportunities to pursue and incorporate the other passion. Multiple passions.

Insights from this lifetime that I hope carries over into the next incarnation and has a considerable impact on my decision-making.

Yeah, yeah, its not too late, even as I’m bound in my present flesh. I’m only 42 and could live for another half a century or more. Or I could die tomorrow. In any case, its never too late, so they say — and though I would argue it certainly could be, at this exact moment, at the very least, I confess there is no certainty that it is.

After all, So-and-So didn’t publish their first book or become a respected artist until they were fifty-something, you constantly hear. Still, there is no certainty that I am among the So-and-So’s.

“Why not try?” Asks an internal voice. “You have nothing to lose, so much to gain here in the mere attempt. So what, then: are you a pussy?”

I mean, I am warm right now, moderately moist, and wound tight inside, so the comparison might have some merit.

“You’re deflecting.”

Well, you’re attempting to manipulate me.

“I’m trying to inspire you. And if that constitutes manipulation, I’m only trying to manipulate you into veering down what you would experience as a more satisfying and productive path. And anyway, I’m you, dude. Can’t you trust yourself?”

Not entirely. I mean, I am sort of dwelling on the past again.