From: Platt Holden (pholden@sc.rr.com)
Date: Thu Jan 09 2003 - 16:13:07 GMT
Hi Patrick, Kevin, Matt:
PATRICK
> I've been thinking about this, the Holocaust as an absolute evil,
> because no context can be imagined in which this would have been a 'less
> evil' or even 'good' thing.
Yes, I absolutely agree. Kevin's changing the context to what the Nazis
actually thought and did doesn't remove the absolute evil thereof. Let's
not forget that all evils perpetrated on masses of people are done in the
name of "the public good."
> So we have learned to value our freedom and lives more because we've
> seen how it can be treated in evil ways in the second world war.
Yes. Pray that the lesson sticks. Some seem to be wishy-washy on the
need to defend the value of freedom against those who would destroy it.
>One
> sometimes hear people, in discussions about hate or discrimination
> for/against some minority in our society (still in many ways an important
> issue today), draw an analogy between this hate nowadays vs. anti-semitism
> in the late thirties. This makes -I hope- some people realize that
> discriminating and hating some cultural or religious group is wrong-
> because the realize to where it can lead to. And this realization in
> people, I think is a 'good' thing.
Well, I think hate directed at a group of haters is a good thing. In the
current passion to be tolerant of everything and everybody, we risk
losing the will to combat evil.
> The second point is more personal. When I was 18 I went to russia, and a
> russian psychologist analyzed the people's personalities in our group
> (international volunteers for a project) through interpreting drawings we
> had to make. I'm not a fan of this kind of 'pscyho-analysis', nevertheless
> I was very impressed by what she said. One thing she repeatedly said to me
> was: "you're good from the inside." Since then I decided to believe (so to
> say) that ALL men are good 'from the inside', deep in their hearts. In this
> respect I often have wondered how people like Hitler or Stalin could commit
> such hideous crimes to humanity. Hitler was a human being. Stalin was a
> human being. You and I share over 99.9% of our genes with them. What does
> that say about who we are? The 'shadow' part in us (a term from Ken Wilber)
> was put to reality in high extent by Hitler, but don't we all carry this
> 'shadow' part in us? I must say that the last few months, I've started to
> doubt the premise that all men are good in principle, because of personal
> experiences and what I see in the media. Actually this shaking of my
> 'faith' so to say has quite an impact on a deeply rooted static quality in
> me. Do you believe in the 'good' of men?
I believe Pirsig to be right when he says:
"What the Metaphysics of Quality indicates is that the twentieth-century
intellectual faith in man's basic goodness as spontaneous and natural is
disastrously naive. The ideal of a harmonious society in which everyone
without coercion cooperates happily with everyone else for the mutual
good of all is a devastating fiction."(24)
I think you faith is rightly shaken. Regardless of context, there are
plenty of bad actors around. Different social contexts, used by some
intellectuals today to excuse evil behavior in our brave new multicultural
world, take place within in the broader context of universal reality, the
nature of which the MoQ purports to show--convincingly IMO-- to be
totally moral. Problems arise because what is moral in the context of
one level is immoral at another. Doctor's are evil if you're a germ.
Marxism is evil if you value intellectual freedom.
Great to hear from you. Do you see the influx of Muslims in the
Netherlands to be a growing threat to your society's values?
Platt
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