"They say that alcoholics are always alcoholics..."

I'm listening to Ani DiFranco's song 'Fuel' -- there's a verse about alcoholics:
"And they say that alcoholics are always alcoholics
Even when they're as dry as my lips for years
Even when they're stranded on a small desert island
With no place within 2,000 miles to buy beer"

The same with being "a smoker" -- one intentional inhale and you're forever a smoker.

It's wrong to apply a permanent label, especially when it comes to addiction. A smoker who has quit (truly quit) is not a smoker, an alcoholic who has quit (truly quit) is not a drinker. They were smokers and drinkers. Were -- past tense. At best, they always have a predilection towards addictive substances. But to insist that an alcoholic is always an alcoholic is completely negating, no, outright denying, the victory over the addiction, as well as the self-discipline (necessarily) developed to achieve that victory.

Once a liar, always a liar. Once a thief, always a thief."

The same can be said for behaviors. Because a man lies as a youth makes him a liar -- in his youth. If 5 years later, the man doesn't lie, he is no longer a liar. He was a liar, but has changed his character. It is an incorrect to apply a title from years ago under the assumption that because he lied once, he'll lie again.

Such permanent titles do not allow the individual to change, to better themselves. Such permanent titles to not allow others to change their opinions based on new actions.

Such titles do not allow for the individual to develop their moral character, their virtue.

Freeganism

This is a movement that I can get behind...

"Freegans are scavengers of the developed world, living off consumer waste in an effort to minimize their support of corporations and their impact on the planet, and to distance themselves from what they see as out-of-control consumerism. They forage through supermarket trash and eat the slightly bruised produce or just-expired canned goods that are routinely thrown out, and negotiate gifts of surplus food from sympathetic stores and restaurants.

They dress in castoff clothes and furnish their homes with items found on the street; at freecycle.org, where users post unwanted items; and at so-called freemeets, flea markets where no money is exchanged. Some claim to hold themselves to rigorous standards. “If a person chooses to live an ethical lifestyle it’s not enough to be vegan, they need to absent themselves from capitalism,” said Adam Weissman, 29, who started freegan.info four years ago and is the movement’s de facto spokesman." (source)

Freecycle's main page

In the spirit of this article, know anyone who wants/needs a tv and vcr? Otherwise, it's going in the tag sale (which should happen on the 30th).

suggestions?

If I'm aware of someone doing a moral wrong, what obligation do I have to do something about it?

No names. She's my next door neighbor, he used to be a tenant. I've known them since I moved here. He beats her, and today I saw the immediate after-effects. (I did not see the event itself, and I'm fairly certain that if I did, I wouldn't be here writing this.)

I felt a rage today that I cannot recall ever having felt before. I wanted so badly to catch him off-guard and smash his front teeth in, break his legs so that he couldn't walk that f'n cocky walk...

And all I did was bite my lip, clench my fists, and call him an ass* when I got inside. I almost felt disappointed in myself that I had _not_ done something to him...

My level of respect for him is, at this point, the bare minimum. I cannot look at him anymore without some flare of anger... Every time that I think I've witnessed him do a Good act, he counter-acts it a thousand-fold. Or, I find out later that his motivations were entirely selfish...

But, I know my rage, my lashing out, won't teach him anything. In fact, it will re-enforce the problem.
My calling the cops only earns me an enemy (if not many), instead of giving him a lesson.
My pulling her aside and telling her that she's too beautiful for his s*, her kids are too precious for his s*....

All I can do is suggest the very thing she already knows, but doesn't have the strength to follow through with.

Am I to sit back and let her deal with it alone? as she has been for years? (I wanna help...)
Am I tacitly admitting to some form of guilt because I did not react, did not shame him, did not say/do something right then and there?

Am I stuck simply making f'n suggestions to her?

I know it's her life, and she can do with it as she sees fit. But I also know that sometimes we cannot do something alone, and require someone else's help. But what can I do?

****

I just talked with her, and my heart hurts again. She said that he's all she's got -- I said that he ain't worth that much. Then she corrected herself and said, "You're the only friend I've got. Everyone else has walked away from me because of him."

My urge to act is so great...
But I know that it's not my place to act for her.
All I can do is offer support... give advice that she's heard a million times over, and pray that she can find the strength to do what, I think, she should do.

She's the one that bled.
I'm the one still crying.

I don't want to be blissfully ignorant of all the wrongs happening. But I don't want to see this s*.
I don't want my heart to grow hard or cold in order to stomach these wrongs. But I won't let myself turn away.

I don't have to deal with the bruises, but I do have to figure out how to deal with the situation... if only for myself. And I'm not sure how to do that...

(I watch blood, guts and gore in movies, and cheer when someone's head gets lopped off, then critique the arc and force of the blood spray. I see the effects of a back-hand, and I'm sniffling and shaking, my mood completely shattered. *sigh* My only comfort is the knowledge that I haven't been completely de-sensitized by television and movies...)

((Speaking of -- If you get a chance to watch "Children of Men", please do. The movie itself is good, but there's a scene right near the end that sent shivers through my very soul.))

I expect to be confused

Okay, so I'm doing some packing of random things (in theory, I'm still moving to the midwest) and I find this poem:

I do my thing,
and you do your thing.

I am not in this world
to live up to your
expectations

And you are not in this
world to live up to mine.

You are you and I am I,

And if by chance we find
each other,

It's beautiful.

-Fredrick S. Perls



Immediately after reading it, my brain was swamped -- 'I do my thing, and you do your thing'... but what's meant by 'thing' and to what extent does this 'thing' go? 'I am not in this world to live up to your expectations...' Well, that's right... to an extent...

This last part catches my attention (and this is the main point of the post). 'Expectation'. Boy that's a heavy word... I can reasonably expect that my neighbor won't try to kill me (stupid people are somehow free to attack, however), and vice versa. And when I walk into a store, I expect a reasonable environment, full of people and their expected, albeit unpredictable, variations in personality -- which might change the reasonable-ness of the environment. But, what of the mother who refuses to restrain her tantrum-throwing child? Setting aside what I think I would have done, what can I reasonably be expected to do? Bite my tongue, close my ears, and suffer the headache in the name of good-will and tolerance? Am I expected to admonish the mother, or suggest a different approach? But, isn't that a form of infringement?

It relates back to 'suggesting' changes in moral behavior. I'm learning that you can suggest all you want, but at some point you have to walk away -- if only to save the situation from becoming more frustrated, if not yourself.

But all we can do is suggest... in the right way, in the right place, at the right time, with the right person... and hope that some change occurs... eventually...

Oy! - How friggin' daunting... (lots of things are feeling daunting right now... it's the word of the month!)

unanswered response

From Teddy's blog: "Hunting, Service, Necessity -- I was thinking about Silliman's idea of the moral imperative to educate ourselves on the plight of others and help when we can in connection to the neccessity defense some hunters evoke. Obviously, in country like ours, it is not neccesary for the vast majority of people to hunt to survive. This is true of developed countries all around the world. If we can agree that eating animals is morally wrong, do we have some sort of obligation to help those who eat meat to survive to find alternatives?"

DKJ responded: "I think we do. Principled opposition to morally suspect practices (meat-eating, hunting, FGM, etc.) obliges us to educate and assist others who might not be fully aware of or have access to other options."

I responded: " But isn't such a move 'interrupting' their moral development? If their culture is not to the point that it's developed a language for morality, then our words will have no meaning. Providing food, period, would mean more than shifting their culture so dramatically."


One of the discussions that we had in Moral Relativism was about the language of morality -- if one society does not have a language about morality, then to tell them that this or that action is morally wrong will, in effect, fall on deaf ears. So wouldn't it behoove those of us who have this language to let the other societies develop one on their own? (If we push the point of morality, and the language thereof, at what point does it stop being a moral act and become an tyrannical one?)