This made me cry. I have seen people losing their basic humanity in my own lifetime. I grew up in one of the worst parts of Belfast during the Troubles; sectarian murders were a part of life. But the stuff that goes on now...I honestly think we are living with demons. Recently, for the first time, I have understood a friend’s decision not to have children as she ‘didn’t want to bring a child into this world’. She didn’t want the fear of what might happen to them when she is no longer there to protect them. I have a strong Christian faith and that teaches me that we must prevail, but at times it is hard when you know that things are only getting worse. God bless everyone.
One of your best yet, Morgoth. I hope this monologue gets the traction it deserves.
I think you are mistaken in assuming that empathy is lacking among the awful. Empathy is a *requirement* for cruelty. One must be able to accurately map the internal emotional landscape of another person in order to find the best place to twist the knife, otherwise all attempts to make another's life a misery would be slipshod and haphazard. As you have pointed out in a past essay on malice vs incompetence, the direction of policy and culture only goes in one direction. Empathy makes cruelty's high success rate possible.
Your terrier sees rats and rabbits as prey. No possible concord can exist between predator and prey, there will never be an emotional handshake that acknowledges the other as worthy of consideration; the predator would starve if this was so, the divide is utterly fundamental. The division of people into predator and prey is a wartime phenomenon, when hearts are hardened for slaughter. Between political factions, we can look to uniforms and flags to see where the line is drawn. In a culture war, we must look to who is praised and who is vilified. The innocent, the kind and the loving are all on the receiving end of the cruelty from the degenerate, the powerful and the wicked.
I remember the Channel 4 handover clips that showed a chaotic landscape that resolved into the coherent image of a 4 when the camera moved into a very specific location (https://youtu.be/1qB1rtXwhrA?t=11). Literally nothing in the image makes sense until you're in the right place. The process of ontological evil manifesting in society is entirely coherent if Christianity is the Truth.
This made me cry. I have seen people losing their basic humanity in my own lifetime. I grew up in one of the worst parts of Belfast during the Troubles; sectarian murders were a part of life. But the stuff that goes on now...I honestly think we are living with demons. Recently, for the first time, I have understood a friend’s decision not to have children as she ‘didn’t want to bring a child into this world’. She didn’t want the fear of what might happen to them when she is no longer there to protect them. I have a strong Christian faith and that teaches me that we must prevail, but at times it is hard when you know that things are only getting worse. God bless everyone.
One of your best yet, Morgoth. I hope this monologue gets the traction it deserves.
I think you are mistaken in assuming that empathy is lacking among the awful. Empathy is a *requirement* for cruelty. One must be able to accurately map the internal emotional landscape of another person in order to find the best place to twist the knife, otherwise all attempts to make another's life a misery would be slipshod and haphazard. As you have pointed out in a past essay on malice vs incompetence, the direction of policy and culture only goes in one direction. Empathy makes cruelty's high success rate possible.
Your terrier sees rats and rabbits as prey. No possible concord can exist between predator and prey, there will never be an emotional handshake that acknowledges the other as worthy of consideration; the predator would starve if this was so, the divide is utterly fundamental. The division of people into predator and prey is a wartime phenomenon, when hearts are hardened for slaughter. Between political factions, we can look to uniforms and flags to see where the line is drawn. In a culture war, we must look to who is praised and who is vilified. The innocent, the kind and the loving are all on the receiving end of the cruelty from the degenerate, the powerful and the wicked.
I remember the Channel 4 handover clips that showed a chaotic landscape that resolved into the coherent image of a 4 when the camera moved into a very specific location (https://youtu.be/1qB1rtXwhrA?t=11). Literally nothing in the image makes sense until you're in the right place. The process of ontological evil manifesting in society is entirely coherent if Christianity is the Truth.