Quitter?

Someone commented the other day that they wished they read more poetry. I don't read a lot, I explained, but there are one or two pieces that I really appreciate. One is a section from Shakespeare's As You Like It, perhaps not poetry but one of the most thought-provoking pieces of writing I can think of. It begins like this:

"All the world's a stage/And all the men and women merely players/They have their exits and their entrances/And one man in his time plays many parts/"

It reminds me of a lot of things. Firstly, it reminds me of Sartes, who said that we took on the role of an actor and acted in ways which we thought fitted in with who we were supposed to be. It was a supreme act of self-deception, the ultimate lie that fooled everyone on the planet. But it also makes me think about who I am, and what the people around me are doing.

I don't think the world's a stage - more a series of games. Right now, I'm playing a really well-known and common game called the Popularity Game. But it's boring, and everyone cheats. I've got some serious reservations about the game in general and I've decided I'm not going to play their stupid game any more. Of course, this isn't the first time I've "definitely, absolutely" made this decision. But this time... this time I'm definitely going to stick to it. Oh yes.

Look, it just isn't fair. I spend ages learning the rules and how to play, and then someone comes along and changes them! Everyone cheats or gets lucky (or both) and I'm left playing by some archaic ruleset that no-one cares about any more. What kind of rubbishy game lets you score points for puking up anyway?

I watch other people play. Most don't realise they're playing, which make me smile softly - though even they seem to play it better than me - but those that do really get into it. They plan most of their moves and even though they don't always go to plan they're always there with a 'hoo-hah', a metaphorical energy drink and a primal scream before running back into the game again, head first.

The problem is, the board confuses me. I'm not really sure how to win. I suppose its because there are so many people playing, and they all want to be the one who decides who wins. And then, as I make another awful move which makes me miss a turn, I wonder why other people should decide whether I've won or not. I think that was the point. Sitting there, watching my friends rush past a few squares here or there, and wondering how they got there without going down the route I took. That was when it struck me. If I decide I've won, if I decide where I'm playing to - who cares about the rest of them?

So I folded my arms up and pouted and said I didn't want to play any more. And they're still folded now.

But...

But I feel somehow that playing is my duty. And so.... this weekend the dice is falling into my clasped hands again. I pout a little deeper, but I know I will end up rolling the dice. Who knows? Maybe this time the double six will come up and I can get the hell out of this game.

But the snake eyes are always there. I look at my money, and wonder when the next payday is. But I know the next card I take from the top of the pile will probably be a bill. The snake eyes are leering up at me from the dice in my hand. Is quitting the right way out? Or is the only way to escape the game to play through it? The joke that endures through the 'I've been there myself' lectures of those older than me is the fact that they never found the answer either. Or if they did, they don't want to tell me.

The dice are there. Snake eyes, double six, lucky seven. It's all a game. All a fucking game.

I toss the dice.

Shut Up

No, YOU shut up.

Me, Me, Me, Me, Me

One of the first real problems that I came up against since beginning to study Philosophy at school was the concept of altrusim. The idea that humans would sacrifice themselves or some part of their lives to benefit someone else - with no benefit for them - always seemed like a nice idea. Being brought up in a Protestant school had lasting effects on me - first and foremostly, that being nice to others was A Good Thing. Altruism, it seemed, was the missing link in society. I secretly vowed to myself that when I became Grown Up I would always treat everyone else how I would want to be treated in return. After all, if everyone did that, how could it fail? It's a shame, really. It's always the nice ideas that fail miserably isn't it? The unfortunate truth is that, at heart, we are animals. People need to wake up and smell the atheistic coffee - though a nice idea, we just don't have an immortal soul. There is no divine spark, rather only the will of the animal remains - the desire to survive and to do the things which seem the most obvious. Eating, for instance. Eating is good. And sleeping, of course. We do not need reason to work out that eating is beneficial, not do we need deductive method to regulate how much we eat. If we eat too little, we die. If we eat too much, we die. We are not altruistic inside. We are animals. Strip away the morals, the ethics, the sense of society and self, and you are left with an ugly-looking ape. The reason we don't like anarchy is not because we're scared of our own choices, but everyone else's! So the logical choice - the only way of containing all those other, far more scarier, people - is to band together. We might like to think that we're here to build a society. We might like to think that we will only progress as a species if we unite - and to some extent this is true. In fact, I don't want to say that progression won't come through unity. Rather, it is the only means for it. But this 'progression' - this is little more than a stab in the dark, where no-one knows who is holding the knife and everyone is shouting where to stab all at once. We build, we record, we discover - hence we 'progress'. And all in the name of unity, brotherhood - altruism. We are nearing a period of reflection and contemplation about the atrocities at Aushwitz, and rightly so. Why? Because of the conclusion I came to after breaking down and rebuilding the concept of altruism. I believe, you see, that altruism is a necessary evil. Part of the human condition. It might be such a pinnacle of deception that it deceives even those who practice it, but we must accept that it will always be here. As a result, we have to deal it and (dare I say it) even encourage it. Because in some way, in some twisted abstract way, it is a safeguard to the anarchical state that we are always on the brink of descending into. In Hideo Kojima's Metal Gear Solid 2, a genetic scientist is discussing why humans need to band together, and explains "We have a responsibility to the coming generations, to keep track of the mistakes we've made as a species." Altrusim, he suggests, is only a problem because we allow it to become one. If we all accept our responsibility - for the past as well as the future - then altruism can work, and can survive. Some of you reading this are going to spot an obvious flaw - namely that most dogmas would work if everyone accepted them. And furthermore, the universal situation rarely happens. So, what then? Like many arguments along these lines, we take a long-winded philosophical terail that leads us in a circle back to my depressing start point. Humanity is simply stuck in a halfway house of semi-altruism, where some help people blindly and others stay locked in a cage of their own devising. Does Holocaust Week inspire you to remember the atrocities of the past and ensure they never happen again? Or does it make you despair that such things can still happen, and make you want to stop bothering in the first place? While this week hangs in the air like a bad memory of a bad memory, we must take time to consider our place in The System. Like everything, it is an all-or-nothing situation. Either we are going to embrace the childhood dream of one nation under God, and throw ourselves into a future of unity and progress... or we may as well give up the political overtones and throw caution to the wind - we cannot paint a wash of altruism over evil deeds. There is no mean point between society and anarchy. We are either together, or we are apart. The Holocaust is remembered because it was a hideous mistake. Everyone acknowledges it as a mistake. That, if nothing else, affirms that the human condition does contain something of the sacrificial dream. If we recognise our mistakes, then it holds promise for the future. But if we are intent on repeating them, if we are intent on warring and fighting and killing, then we should announce our intentions now, throw away the oh-so precious society that we seem to treasure so much, and descend into the mellow, short-lived state of anarchy.

"This is our mammalian conflict: what to give to the others a nd what to keep for yourself. Treading that line, keeping the others in check and being kept in check by them, is what we call morality. Hanging a few feet above the Chilterns escarpment, our crew enacted morality's ancient, irresolvable dilemma: us, or me."

Excerpt from Ian McEwan's Enduring Love