Yesterdays piece is apparently the one hundredth on this blog which understandably I’m reasonable pleased with. There’s a good chance you’ll struggle to find many things I’ve stuck to for three months, especially as, or maybe it’s because, it has been a daily exercise. It seems only fitting then to go with the suggestion I made yesterday and discuss the concept of good and bad with this being piece 101, fitting indeed if you ask Winston in 1984. I’ll not be discussing rats in cages fixed to your face but more so the fact that although I clearly described something as good and bad yesterday I am generally loathed to do so.
It is an easy thing to do to describe something as either good or bad. It immediately gives the recipient of this information a general understanding of what we mean. If you call someone a bad man it is pretty clear that you are suggesting in someway they are responsible for something or have a character that could be described as negative. We have been conditioned by society through our education, our parents, movies, television, religion to have a general understanding of this notion. Typically in all these examples, in particular movies, although arguable they’re just the outcome of centuries of religious influence, we see the battle of good versus evil, with good usually overcoming some odds stacked against them to be victorious. In films it can be portrayed as the action hero overcoming a larger force of bad guys, usually represented by whoever is the political enemy of the time, think communists to Islamists to probably Chinese very soon. I haven’t read the Bible but have been brought up in a Christian country and therefore am aware of the general attempt to portray this good versus evil battle throughout the whole text. The absolutist necessity to portray Jesus as a righteous saviour over all the evil in the world, but he can only save you if you join him. It all comes back to power and contemporary politics too is riddled with this. Join us, we are the good guys who are fighting those other guys. They’re bad, it’s okay to kill them…and so on.
While all that seems pretty obvious it is still remarkable how successful it can be at manipulating people. We are so triggered by this concept of good versus evil that we fall for it in such an easy way. It is why despite the fact I dislike it I still used it in yesterdays piece as it was an easy way to get my point across. The issue though lies more with what is good and what is evil. People will always use the concept to manipulate people but we seem oblivious in these moments to step back and actually question what is bad and why that is a bad thing. Not only that but clearly one person’s good can be different to another’s, who are we really to say what is right and wrong about someone when it is clearly such a subjective thing. I am aware it would be better to discuss this after spending a few hours reading some essays on morality and ethics but like each piece I just start writing, wing it and see what happens. There may be a lack of depth to my point but ultimately with the knowledge that one thing can be credibly both good and bad to different people, as well as everything in between, how can we legitimately label something so without giving it real thought. It is such a simplified take on the world and that makes it easy to manipulate of course, but for this reason we must be so careful about throwing these two words around. Really who am I to say somethings bad; I’m no god, I barely even understand ethics and like everyone am prone to bouts of hypocrisy. To know ones fallible yet proceed with authority anyway, oh to be human, oh to misunderstand balance.
Observations and Misunderstandings 