On the thread "Why "Good Will Toward Men" Has Become More of a Challenge for Me: My Christmas Thoughts," on my own website, Philip Callas wrote:
I've been living in a fundamentalist Christian household for several months now. The several very young children in the house regularly experience levels of humiliation, of physical and emotional abuse and neglect, of external control over their biological needs, of dehumanizing treatment that are all, while still legal and sanctioned by the social, legal, and health communities, have nevertheless deeply disturbed me and reduced me to tears on more than one occasion. My feeble interventions have been ill received and seen as an intolerable challenge. Even the victims outwardly embrace the authoritarianism. It does not surprise me that Christian communities enthusiastically support Mr. Bush and his policies--such as those policies are even known or understood. The blind worship of authority here--whether legitimate or not--has its political counterpart in fascism.
In this vivid and even heart-breaking passage, Philip captures well one of the dimensions of evil that I tried to delineate in my earlier essay on "The Concept of Evil." This is indeed how certain aspects of brokenness in the human system get transmitted. One can well imagine how this pattern of abuse gets transmitted from generation to generation in the family system.
But beyond that, as Philip correctly suggests in his statement that this pattern "has its political counterpart in fascism," the pattern gets transmitted from the micro-cultural level of the family to the macro-cultural level of the polity.
And, we can readily envision how the human wreckage being created by our proto-fascist Bushite regime would feed back into the micro level. The neglect of human needs (tax cuts for the rich, declining incomes for the poor, thousands dead and maimed in war) increases the rage and frustration that get expressed covertly in the family system. The modeling of power --as something beyond question, something wrapping itself in a phony way in the trappings of the sacred, something not bound by rules of decency or by law and not accountable to anyone-- also reinforces the dynamics of a family system such as that described by Philip.
Philip's passage also captures the way that evil manifests when it expresses itself from the conservative side of the spectrum: evil there takes the form of THE ABUSE OF POWER. It is amoral power masquerading as the agents of morality.
This dimension of things is captured well also in a comment by Morley on the thread "What Religious Liberals and Conservatives Have in Common: A Sermon by Doug Muder":
Religion traditionally tries to dam up the sexual urge and divert it into a identification with Divine and earthly power. It places absurd restrictions on how, with who, and when you can engage in sex. Breaking them is immoral. But it has nothing to say about the homocidal political leaders who mass murder hundreds of thousands of people. Gay sex is immoral but mass murder isn't.
Let me quickly concede to Richard Stein that the liberal side its own ways of opening the door to the patterns of evil: whereas the right tends to the abuse of power from the top, the problem on the left typically involves THE FAILURE TO EXERT POWER TO ENFORCE MORAL RULES when they are needed for maintaining good order on the bottom of the flow chart, i.e. on the level of private lives. In other words, the problem of amoral tyranny on the right corresponds with the problem of moral anarchy on the left.
But I agree with Morley that the traditional morality of our civilization is hardly a pure source of moral wisdom on what optimal moral order would look like in terms of the private lives --especially the sexual lives-- of individuals. While I do believe that the liberal side of America has fostered a great deal of moral confusion in the sexual sphere since the cultural revolution of the 1960s, it also seems beyond question to me that there's an element of the perverse that has run through the traditional sexual morality of the Western tradition from Leviticus onward.
Just last night, for example, I read the following:
Augustine agreed that Adam and Eve had lived in paradise, in the flesh --a special kind of flesh, which was incorrupt and responded to their uncorrupt will. Adam, he argued, could even have made his penis reach erection, and have generated children with Eve, without feeling lust or committing a sin.
I myself would rather think of Adam and Eve as feeling lust for each other, and taking delight in their sexual pleasures. The idea that somehow the pleasures of the body are inherently a form of corruption is marbled through much of the tradition, and I believe it to be perverse and a rejection of the life force.
Surely, there's a greater wisdom to be had about sexual morality than that either of the "if it feels good do it" sexual libertines of the counterculture or of Augustine (that reformed libertine) and his ilk.
In any event, returning to Morley's comment, he speaks a truth important to our Bushite era in pointing out the eagerness of the right to make moral judgments of the conduct of individuals in their private lives while holding immune to judgment even the most heinous of actions by any authority to whom allegiance has been given.
Andrew Bard Schmookler's website www.nonesoblind.org is devoted to understanding the roots of America's present moral crisis and the means by which the urgent challenge of this dangerous moment can be met. Dr. Schmookler is also the author of such books as The Parable of the Tribes: The Problem of Power in Social Evolution (SUNY Press) and Debating the Good Society: A Quest to Bridge America's Moral Divide (M.I.T. Press). He also conducts regular talk-radio conversations in both red and blue states.
...when parents became elderly and incapacitated and asked for help from the children they had abused, only to find that such help was not forthcoming.
One of the many reasons for the Golden Rule is that what comes around, goes around. Those you abuse when they are weak and helpless, may someday be the ones in power when you find yourself weak and helpless. And they are likely to treat you no differently than you treated them when the situation was reversed.
This holds true on a national scale as well. By withdrawing from the Geneva Convention and the Conventions Against Torture, we expose our own troops to inhumane treatment should they be captured. And by committing war crimes, we will have few friends and allies should similar war crimes be committed against us someday. Don't think it isn't possible. Our troops are overextended, our nation is deeply in debt, the value of the dollar is falling, and an economic collapse could leave us in a position where we would be extremely vulnerable.
Patriarchal religions, nations, and families are similar to compulsive criminals who commit crimes knowing full well that they may be caught and have to pay the price, but continue to do what they're doing anyway. Maybe they will get away with it forever. Some criminals are never caught. Most abusive parents are never punished. Many fascist tyrants have lived to a ripe old age without being tried for their war crimes. And many empires have lasted longer than ours is likely to.
Despite all the pain, suffering, and agony they cause others, the diagnostic characteristic of abusers is that, even if they have been abused themselves, they cannot put themselves in another's shoes. They lack empathy. They are incapable, in other words, of doing unto others as they would have others do unto them because they cannot identify with others. Others are always a label like, "the kids," "the immigrants," "the enemy," or "the terrorists." They don't see people like themselves, individuals who are entitled to human rights and worthy of respect, they see only the differences between people, like age, sex, religion, ethnicity, orientation, etc., and they believe that due to those differences, they don't have to treat others like themselves because others aren't like them at all.
We are born with empathy for others. Infants will cry in sympathy when they hear another infant cry. But patriarchy soon trains it out of us. We are immediately told which team we're on, given the proper uniform, and encouraged to compete with all other teams. And most people do, in family life and in business, in love and in war. The competitive model sees empathy was a weakness. The Golden Rule becomes bastardized into, "He who has the most gold, rules," or, "Do unto others -- first!"
The problem with the competitive model is that it entails constant conflict and has no mechanism for peace. And this year's winners may turn out to be next years losers. Death is a frequent occurrance at my nearby senior center. When somebody who was alway kind and courteous to others dies, you can feel the sadness of those who miss them. But when somebody who was always rude and arrogant dies, it is like a shadow has been lifted from us, and everyone is glad they're gone.
--Mark
by
Mark E. Smith (21 articles, 29 quicklinks, 77 diaries, 978 comments)
on Friday, December 29, 2006 at 6:39:33 PM
Very good article, on a subject, too infrequently discussed
Having been born and raised in the Deep South, Bible belt, and coming of political age in the 60s, I have seen both sides of the sexual morality coin, so to speak, as well as the morality or immorality of the exercising of political power, both micro and macro.
Please allow me to share a little of my own story as a way of contributing my 2 cents worth of opinion: Courage has never been my strong suit and I have always had to work at it. Fear has been my greatest demon, especially as an adult.
I remember being afraid a few things during my childhood, mostly of my mother, who was a bit bipolar, though never diagnosed in her lifetime, mainly because she avoided mental health professionals as if they carried the plague.
My father had no such temper and did not do outbursts, but, as with most families raising kids in the 50s, he wasn't around very much. He owned a business with his brother and they were quite successful for a couple of high school dropouts; they dropped out during the Great Depression, and went to work so that the family would not lose their modest home.
I was never afraid of my father, though I knew that once an indictment of one or the other, of my many misdeeds, was passed up to him for adjudication, there would be a sentence of some kind forthcoming and the sentence would be carried out in full; no appeal to a higher authority and no time off for good behavior. That was my father.
No, I did not fear my father. As a kid, though I would not have admitted it in a thousand years, at the time, I remember a felt sense of relief, along with teenage pissyness, of course, when Dad handed down my sentence.
I am now 58 years of age and my memory of my young years has always been excellent. It remains so at present, though, perhaps not for long.
I can say with all honesty that my father never handed down an unfair sentence and they usually taught me something, other than how it feels to be held accountable for my deeds. My father never laid a hand on me in anger, except for one time. Even then, he did not hit me, but grabbed my arm with enough force to send my school books, which I was carrying, most huffily, to my room, flying out of my hand and across the den. It was a non-injurious attitude adjustment.
Where most other things were concerned, I was fairly fearless, or so it seemed, mainly because I did not have sense enough to know that I should be afraid, I suspect. I loved speed (the kind you can experience on a bicycle), swimming, riding waves, diving and climbing, the higher the better, in a Pine Tree.
As a young child, the one thing that scared the living BeeJeebus out of me was a man named Brother Ike. He was the pastor of the local Baptist Church. Like many young families in the 50s, my parents decided, after I was of age, to attend church services, somewhere. I'm not sure I ever knew whose idea it was to attend the Baptist Church. All I know is that it was my mother who, finally, put a stop to it, probably, because of my obvious fear of Brother Ike and because she felt too much like a hypocrite to continue appearing at the Baptist Church.
Understandably enough, it was my mother, who exposed me to ideas that made me different from many of my peers and formed the foundation of my spirituality today, and tomorrow, as it, hopefully, continues to evolve.
Even though Mother could morph into a angry, out-of-control, bipolar tornado at a moments notice, she was far more wise than most of the people I knew, including Dad. She had her problems, which caused me problems, as well as quite a few other people who came into her sphere of influence, but there was an uncommon wisdom there as well, for which I will be forever grateful, because it included such topics as comparative religion and spirituality, archeology, anthropology and recent history, as well as lessons on racism, not preached, but acted upon, as best she could in 1950-70, Birmingham, Alabama.
My point, and I do have one, as Ellen would say, is this:
While we, human beings, are similar in so many ways, we are also quite different, in ways that matter very much, essential ways, not because our dis-similarities should be eradicated, but because, until we recognize we are all parts of a wonderfully Divine puzzle, we will not know and understand that which we must know and understand, first, before we know and understand anything else: Ourselves.
It is a foregone conclusion that no child should ever be physically or psychologically abused. It is is also a foregone conclusion that a majority of children have been and will be.
Abuse in childhood can have very different manifestations in the child who is abused. Scott Peck once wrote that Childhood is a nightmare. Truer words were never spoken.
If anything could bring about a real transformation of humankind, it would be the recognition and realization of our real diversity and the honoring of that diversity. It is not national, cultural, religious or, even, socio-economic, though those differences are certainly perceived by us all and are as real as anything else humankind can perceive.
The diversity of which I speak is far more profound and far more useful in working toward unity.
There is unity in diversity and vice versa.
Uniformity and conformity, at the expense of this profound diversity, are the greatest obstacles to unity and wholeness that we face.
