My Favorite Loaded Question: What is the Meaning of Life?

The following is an excerpt from an email conversation I was having with a dear friend concerning the meaning of life. Incoherent rambling fueled by pathological inspiration can be quite amusing...

FRIEND:
"I see what you are saying about this life purpose just being a human created mesh that one can hardly see through. Why need a purpose when enjoyment is right in front of us? This is a short-sighted view, for those of us who are content with short lived joys."

At this point we are having two different conversations. This statement makes it seem that you have not properly entertained the idea that THERE EXIST NO EXPLICIT PURPOSE TO LIFE. Sure, there are differences in taste, yet at the end of the day there is no reason that you and I are here.

To be clear- I am not saying that the purpose of life is a human created mesh that one can hardly see through. I am saying it does not exist in the explicit sense. There is no thing you have to do on this planet, in this life, that will dictate whether you are living rightly or wrongly.

That being said, my point in stating this is that humanity has a tendency to organize itself in order to function smoothly. This organization's consequences are extremely relevant to our daily lives. Subsequently, most actions are considered the "wrong path," while the few involving being productive to these falsely espoused needs of society are prized over all. But that has less to do with my idea than simply the notion that THIS LIFE HAS NOT GOTTEN IT RIGHT ANY MORE THAN JESUS' SOCIETY DID. JUST AS WE LOOK TO THE ANCIENT PEOPLE AND SEE THEIR FEEBLE ATTEMPTS AT ARRIVING AT A METAPHYSICAL DEFINITION TO GUIDE THEIR LIVES, SO TOO HAVE WE. Therefore, my intention is not to say that I don't want to play the game of society. The intention is regarding the fact that games are just that: fictional creations serving the purpose of making life go.

Also, it is the exact opposite of a short-sighted view of life. My own perspective is a profound realization that society has once again created a massive construct with the sole purpose of keeping us within boundaries in order that we may be more easily controlled. (Sound familiar?) That is a long-term perspective in the sense of looking at yourself in the grander scheme of misunderstandings that have been soooooo common to human thought processes. The Greeks had a name for the notion of certainty in the face of utter ignorance: hubris. This is the spell we find ourselves in, and my proof entails looking around and seeing how fucked the world is. The answer? Courageously reinvent yourself as needed. Capitalism, democracy, equality... these are short-sighted. Long term would be to have the balls to call out a bullshit system and actually move throughout life with conviction. Therefore, my letting go of life having a purpose actually will effect my life forever, hardly something that could be so oversimplified as by labeling it "short-sighted."

Thus, while the whole of the population of the richest third-world country in the world sits behind cubicles getting fatter and dumber by the decade, I will stand up and say FUCK THAT! The currency of this world is not worth sacrificing our human decency. People hear me say this and think I must be setting myself up for starvation- hardly the case. For, with my perspective, the only way to ease the horror known as human existence is to cultivate the good within yourself and, if able, help others from being bound by those same tired-ass chains. My own road will inevitably end with some sort of paycheck (so chill out Mom). However, I REFUSE TO HATE MY LIFE AS A FUNCTION OF MY GREED.

What could be more simple than a world that is just there because it is there? Metaphysical assumptions about our purpose and how to live a proper life are far more complex than my simple assertion that life is meaningless. Proof that the myth is so powerful is inhabited in the predictable response you must have had in reading the end of that last sentence. Don't we find it similar to the emotional blackmailing of previously (proven wrong) metaphysical world-views? On a visceral level, we know this to be similar in the sense that one cannot even happily entertain the idea that we are here for NO EXPLICIT REASON OR PURPOSE. That is the horror that humanity sucks at dealing with, for the thought of a meaningless life seems for some reason an abomination. My point is that I see the "purpose" notion as an inherently flawed, loaded question to which the answer does not exist. Just as Christians fear the notion of the universe without God (for this shatters the organization of the universe that has helped them sleep at night), our contemporaries fear the idea that they are here for no reason. That fear is what I attack. I laugh at this fear because it is based on a recurring phenomena humanity is wholly guilty of: creating massive metaphysical myths in order to make the fucked up moments of life (which we all know are numerous, and if you're not elite than likely outweigh the moments of "beauty") more bearable. That's why I speak of courage. One must be brave in "going it alone." I would rather not base my entire life's path on flawed notions rooted in human existence possessing some ambiguous "purpose."

Human imagination is not something to be feared, to be sure. But, massive lies that have redirected humanity towards false hopes are. Lets not confuse the two...

FRIEND:

"If you want to be an elite and critique the very structure that has enabled you all of your opportunities simply because it is ravaged with imperfections, fine. But that is like suing the brain surgeon for not saving your grandmother's life--she was going to die without the surgery, guaranteed. The surgeon was only their to help her."

Also to be clear, "society" and "human ingenuity" are hardly interchangeable terms. It was not because of the massive lies you dub the "structure of society" that we were able to achieve all that we have. On the contrary, we have been able to achieve so much IN SPITE OF these gigantic lies. To me, this does not champion the "structure of society" so much as it proves that we are capable of far more than we have been allowed to achieve. Do you consider that little thousand year period known as the "dark ages" as something that enabled many opportunities for humanity? You think those submerged in that time period had the ability to call it out for what it was? No, but a few did. That is how we know it was the "dark" ages, because there were a few special people whose humanness shined through, learning and growing despite the bullshit lie that pervaded every European life during it. It is my contention that had that lie not existed we would be in the Star Trek generation today; instead in the present day we fight over whether it is moral to advance science (can you say stem cells?). This is just a small example out of many concerning of how our flawed beliefs have held us back, then and now. How naive for this generation to believe that we have solved the issue of living blindly under massive mythological human constructs, and that it could never happen to us!

We kill our potential every day we sell our souls for a fucking buck. Necessity is a relative term, as is most of reality. Lets treat it as such...

The Ballot or the Bullet?

The ballot or the bullet? A famous Malcolm X speech possesses that title, a speech that I have spent some time listening to this morning. Let me inform you that this is an intense thing to be filling your head with this early in the day, with heavy sentiments of militant Black Nationalism. This philosophy of black self-reliance rings appealingly in the inner-lobes of the common radical, for it calls upon that aspect in all humans to not sit down and accept the injustices that are so prevalent and visible in our daily lives. Moreover, said world-view actually applies to many other groups other than blacks, and therefore has some merit in terms of application in the contemporary world.

Take the green movement, for instance. At best, all the protests in the world may have had some minor affect on those who perpetrate the biggest atrocities against our environment. However, without hitting them in their pocketbook or in their teeth they will undoubtedly continue their polluting practices as long as they can justifiably do so for profit. That is the essence of capitalism- as long as there is a profit to be made it does not matter how one goes about getting it as long as that potential wealth is inevitably cultivated for personal use. (On a side note, that major source of evil is also a major source of progress in humanity; therefore one must be careful in the criticism of the profit motive. However, for our purposes we will assume certain negative aspects of the motive outweigh the positive ones, which may reflect reality in the sense that most profit cultivation goes completely unregulated and consequently has many extremely negative consequences for society in its functionality.) So shall the Greens try to change the system from the inside, with sit-ins and protests and all the benign non-violent actions that are easily and consistently ignored by the greater profit seeking community? Or, shall something more be done to curtail the destruction of our planet? (Which, unfortunately, is probably the only one we'll ever get.)

A good starting point for the latter question is to evaluate the issue in terms of how much it really means to us; the more urgency possessed by the cause, the greater the justification for movements with bite. This piece of logic, when applied to the environmental movement, presents a wedge that can be difficult to reconcile between different factions within the movement. Team Immediate-Armageddon, led by Al Gore, looks at certain scientific data and assumes a sort of end-of-the-world scenario looming in which the world is going to rapidly undergo massive transformations that will be detrimental to human life. Supplement that theory with a time frame of 50 to 100 years and you’re looking at an equation in which young people living today will see the effects of this disaster in their own lifetimes, giving them a strong cause to see through an effective remedy. However, based on the contrary assumption that Al’s timing may be off by quite a bit, we are truly looking at a bit of a different scenario. For instance, instead of this process occurring in 50 or 100 years it hypothetically could actually take more like a thousand years. In that outlook, even for someone who perceives his or herself to be an ardent environmentalist, the case for militant action seems weak and unnecessary. Therefore, as we shall see, the case for a militant self-reliant philosophy as a reaction to some contemporary problem may very much depend on the urgency and breadth of the problem. The more urgent and pressing, the more justifiable certain extreme actions may be.

If the level of action is to be justified by urgency, we are now placed with a situation in which the facts matter. Hmmm, lets see... what is our environmental situation? Are we destroying natural habitats at an alarming rate? Are we reducing the number of species that exist on Earth every day? Are we creating an environment near our major urban cities in which children cannot play sports outside without threat of contracting asthma? Are we creating a gigantic swirl of photo-degradable plastic in the North Pacific Gyro that could eventually poison the ocean in an unimaginably harmful way? Unfortunately the answer to all of these questions, and many more like them, is si senorita. Moreover gosh-darn it, if the facts matter than the fact finders should be listened to. Scientists do not deserve the treatment given to them under the years of 2000-2008 in which they have practically been viewed as witch doctors participating in hedonistic rituals (so-called laboratory experiments) that result in theories which inconveniently go completely against the literal interpretations of the bible that are constantly being espoused by those scoundrels who occupy the bully pulpits of the world. (I'm amused and encouraged to think of many scientists as modern-day Heretic Heroes).

Therefore, if the facts matter, and the facts are that shit is going south fast, what’s next? This is where we get to Malcolm and his notion of the ballot or the bullet. Can we expect that our politicians are actually going to do anything that will favor the environment when it almost certainly will be a blow to the capitalists (their most ardent supporters) who look to exploit it? The cynic in me knows the answer to that question, and if a pragmatist is reading this than you also know the answer. There hardly exists the precedent of politicians choosing to side with the environment (whom has no vote or even political sway for that matter) over the very real interests of the capitalists who use their profits to help prop up these puppets in Congress and the Presidency. It just will not happen this way, and those who protest so loudly need to understand this fact. Malcolm knew that when it came to black nationalism, and we should know that when it comes to protection of the environment. As the political scientist Amartya Sen stated, people get what they demand, and more crucially, do not get what they do not demand. If we think going to the polls and voting for party one or party two is demanding something, we are fucking kidding ourselves.

Therefore, we should not shy away from a form of militancy that gets results.   By that, I mean that the first thing we should do is huff and puff and try giving a shit; it begins by getting pissed off about the situation.  We should always attempt to emphatically exhaust any political or diplomatic options when dealing with any sort of contentious issue such as the preservation of the environment. However, if taking a plastic red cup and painting it green is their idea of participating in saving the world, I refuse to buy that load of horseshit. The facts matter, and THE FACT IS THAT PAINTING OR CALLING SOMETHING GREEN DOES NOT MAKE IT SO. Thus, until we have some sort of system that holds accountability for the claim of “greenness,” we should be vigilant in our actions and skeptical with our ears and eyes, hearts and minds. Brothers and Sisters I have seen the mountaintop, and it is inhabited by plants and animals- not buildings and factories and money and suffering. Long live the spirit of Militant Environmentalism X...

The Day I Lost My Job

The day I lost my job there was a pumping swell.
The day I lost my job my heart was an empty well.
The day I lost my job a little girl drowned at Sands.
The day I lost my job I mourned my hardworking hands.
The day I lost my job the world came crashing down.
The day I lost my job there was no one else around.
The day I lost my job my bank account went dry.
The day I lost my job the tears evacuated my eyes.
The day I lost my job I thought myself a failure.
The day I lost my job I felt the urge to email her.
The day I lost my job it all stopped making sense.
The day I lost my job life seemed much too intense.
The day I lost my job I sought some empathy.
The day I lost my job society laughed at me.
The day I lost my job I listened to the news.
The day I lost my job I drank a couple brews.
The day I lost my job I screamed aloud “FUCK IT.”
The day I lost my job I picked up an empty bucket.
The day I lost my job I made a magic potion.
The day I lost my job poisoned my devotion.
The day I lost my job that silly question arose.
The day I lost my job my soul necessitated repose.

The day I lost my job the world all came together.
The day I lost my job I started noticing the weather.
The day I lost my job I had plenty of time to read.
The day I lost my job I contributed a good deed.
The day I lost my job I learned a bit about myself.
The day I lost my job I realized my exquisite health.
The day I lost my job the sun came out to play.
The day I lost my job all the pain floated away.
The day I lost my job somehow I felt empowered.
The day I lost my job I no longer required showers.
The day I lost my job something in my head went “click.”
The day I lost my job I stopped feeling like a capitalist prick.
The day I lost my job I cracked a humongous smile.
The day I lost my job I hadn’t felt that way in a while.
The day I lost my job the universe was there without a worry.
The day I lost my job the constant questioning slowed its fury.
The day I lost my job exposed money for what it is.
The day I lost my job it became clear "what's mine is his."
The day I lost my job I was a steely-eyed-realist.
The day I lost my job I became a hippy-pinko-socialist.
The day I lost my job I finally came to know.
The day I lost my job I decided to let go.
The day I lost my job was the best day of my life.
The day I lost my job I was liberated from strife.