Friday, November 26, 2010

"Ah Hopes Mah Die They Do"



For some, it seems, living life the way I do might be cruel, if they did what they think I do for their reasons. It's not easy to explain that I don't do what I do for their reasons. Any more than they do what they do for mine. In my world view it's not possible for either one or the other.

My youngest brother subscribes to one of those "word-a-day" dealios where the guy running the gig sends out a new word with the etymology and examples, and his opinion of the word of the day to boot. Infrequently he forwards a copy to me if he thinks I'll be interested in it.

A couple of days ago he forwarded the post in which the word-of-the-day was an expression rather than a single word. Maybe it's French or Latin or some other language. I don't care. It was "tu quoque". It means the subject/person is using another person as a sort of straw man to cause an attack on them for behavior they practice themselves.

Until my brother brought the tu quoque fallacy to my attention I have used the psychological descriptor "projection" to point out that a person is accusing some other person of acting or reacting to stimuli in the exact same way they would. Whether that behavior is treated by the observer as sinful or saintly is determined by how they would expect to be treated if they were "caught" performing the same act.

Observing that homo sapiens, as a species, have a tendency to ideate the notion that their fellow animals do what they do for the same reasons they would act that way, has been the ground of being for my irrefutable denial that the other people on Earth are who or what they are for my reasons. They can't do that because they are not me. I am is. I am is not them. They are them. I am is me. "Thou shalt have no other..."

That is not to say that they can't be me. How could they not be? There ain't but one me, so if their I-am-is be-co-me-s, where else can they turn except to the One me I am is too.

It never fails. I-am-is becomes a curiosity seeker in order to approach an other to chit chat and eventually ask, "Who are you?" Most usually, in amenable conditions where strangers with odd questions are tolerated, they will respond with the "I am's". Its a system very similar to the "begets".

"I am a native of this area. I am the son of my parents. I am my siblings brother. I am a student of life. I am a Christian or Jew or Muslim or Mormon, etal."

"I am a man. I am married. I am a husband. I am a father. I am a respectable, law abiding citizen. I am a suburbanite. I am a commuter. I am a licensed driver. I am a considerate person. I am fervent about the ethics and morals I practice. I am is your nemesis. I am an agent of a ancient secret cabal who has decided you must die immediately because you have ignorantly decided to allow I am to be yo' God. This belief is abject blasphemy, and your betters have decided that you are too stupid to procreate." Bang!

You may have discerned, dear reader, that this writer is not too fond of those who worship any other God than the One me each of us attempt to be with. Everybody wanna be with me. They unknowingly seek union with their I-am-is when they gotta abandon that crap and be-co-me.

The portal to the One universal me is the individual me. It's the entity each of us call ourselves in the first person singular. Me. As in, "That's me alright, I am is just like that." or "I simply wouldn't do what she's doing, that's not me. I am a different kind of person."

Untrue, in my less than sparkling opinion, every homo sapiens is the One me, and the only difference is what they declare I am is every other woid that comes outta they mouth. They're worshiping their subjective "idea" of what the One me is, and that's blasphemy of the spirit.

They worship a false god because they are of the One universal me, and pretend to be different to be-co-me as an individual "star" on Earth.

"This little light of mine,
I'm a'gonna let it shine.
This little light of mine,
I am is gwine let it shine,
Let it shine,
Let it shine,
Let... it... shiiiiiiiiine!

~ Old Protestant Spiritual

The two entities "me" and "I-am-is" appear to be that wot must be united to be-co-me One. In my stoically unceasing, but highly questionable opinion, most holy books somehow bring this subjective, eternal battle of the gods into play.

But, even if elements of duality are brought to atonement occasionally, for their own sake, their real work is apart from each other. Homo sapiens can't have One without the Other. They need each other something terrible. As my old Coharie Indian friend Billy Jacobs might say, "Ah hopes mah die they do." '-)