Roles

As I've said, I don't think I'll be blogging Thus Spake Zarathustra, which I finally finished this week. To do so would trivialize it. But let me point to some giant steps (Coltrane) I made with his help.

So we all know the social-psychological power of Roles. That is, in certain situations we find ourselves defending a position because that's what someone does in that position, not out of personal beliefs. In particular, imagine an American in Paris (Gerschwin).

Now here's what he's showed me-- to be placed, forced even, into a role is exactly the populace bringing you down to their level. They make you make your philosophies categorical. They make you defend America. And you know, America is based on choice. New Jersey isn't very pretty, but you don't have the right to say that other people fucked it up. You are absolutely free (Frank Zappa) not to live there, you have the right to try to improve it, and you can realize the beauty that actually is there. But not to say that "they ruined my land".

This isn't my point. My point is that in most of the debates about America or politics in general I've gotten into of late, my opponents main strategy is make arguments ad hominem. Consider "your government has done this, and that!" Well, immediately there's a problem. Now I don't even consider this to be a very subtle point. Everyone should realize it at a young age. But most people are more concerned about winning an argument or at least perturbing their opponents.

So I suppose as a "policy" in future arguments of this type I will be immediately offended by said ad hominem attacks, rather than the content of the argument. Should they drop the strategy, we'll continue with a real debate, should they not, the conversation will be dead and lovely (Tom Waits).