Carl Tollander wrote:
Pamela, I doubt that the commandants you describe were experiencing
this complexity (most of us are grateful to make a glimpse). Perhaps
more cargo-cult banal -- 'He consoles himself that he is cultured
because he can summon the works of Bach and Goethe from the vasty
deep'. So can I, and so can any one (given inclination and time), but
does the commandant show up for them? Big whup, he's got a
Gramophone (or its 21st century equivalent). How do you define
appreciation? Does one converse with a specific work or an art form
to cultivate ones self into manifesting a better person or because the
form or the artifact is a Linji challenge and you just have to?
I'm not sure I can agree to dismiss the implied paradox this easily.
While I believe that many people *do* engage in what superficially looks
like deep appreciation of cultural experiences (Art being one of them)
in a "cargo-cult banal" manner, I am not sure this is required. And I
am not sure those we recognize as "evil" are less capable of such than
those (ourselves most notably) who we identify as "good" are moreso.
In the deeper questions of "good vs evil" it is quite common (because it
is easy?) to align ourselves and our own highest aspirations, deepest
desires and motivations with "good" and assume/assert that anyone whose
nature or activities we define as "evil" not be capable of experiencing
the same aspirations/desires/feelings.
I strongly suspect that the commandants in question enjoyed Bach *much
more* than I do (or could)... partly because despite my Teutonic blood,
I have little Teutonic culture which they would have been steeped in.
I also suspect that those same commandants could very well be capable of
loving their spouses and children every bit as much as any of us
here. It is *very* hard for me to think about how someone could have
those feelings while being as callous (or downright disrespectful of) to
the dignity and the lives of the victims of such a sweeping genocide
(any genocide would do).
I do not think that Beauty or Grace or ... alone is an antidote/ward
for "evil" or a proof of "good"... I think it is much more subtle and
complex than that. And I think that for all the non-fiction (harping on
that topic again) such as the sum of Freud and Jung's work on the topic
of Good&Evil that works of Fiction such as that of Dostoevsky and
Tolstoy and Dickens and (most if not all of the Fiction authors listed
in our last spate of recommendations) have significant amounts of
insight to offer about the nature of Good&Evil. The fictional nature of
the details of the specific characters, settings and events is
irrelevant to whether they help to frame the fundamental questions of
character vs circumstance, of choice, of will, of human kindness.
It is *scary* to consider activities and behaviors which we identify as
*evil* in association with other activities, behaviors and attitudes
which we identify as *good*. At best there might be partial
correlations. Perhaps, the beauty of good music or painting or dance
might in some circumstances help a twisted soul transcend their own
damage and arise like a phoenix from their own ashes to shine in the
glorious sunlight of goodness! But I don't think it really works that
way, except in rhetorical arguments about the objective and transcendent
value of "Art" (worked into NEA Grant proposals?).
- Steve
============================================================
FRIAM Applied Complexity Group listserv
Meets Fridays 9a-11:30 at cafe at St. John's College
lectures, archives, unsubscribe, maps at http://www.friam.org
