The Courtrooms of Reason

It is another sleepless night. We all know the feeling. The very first time I remember being sleepless was at the age of four-years-old. My sisters slept soundly in adjacent rooms, and I sat wide-eyed and wide awake, awaiting what would come next. It seemed such an odd feeling, going to sleep. Why would we sleep when there was so much to be done? I wanted so badly to draw pictures and play soccer and ride my bike. There was purpose in the day! Why should that cease with the night?

I stared at the dark ceiling with only the dim light of the night light casting its protective glow. Above me shadows waved back and forth with a pace similar to that of waving tree-tops in the wind. As I watched the shadows morph and move, they began to be characterized by evil. They began to hiss and tease and toy with me, and all I could think to do was pull my covers over my head and hope to fall asleep. To no avail… As I unclenched my eyelids I slowly pulled the covers under my nose. And there they were, as if waiting for my emergence. What would such evil beings gain from my torment in the night? What authority do they have over me? Were they to kill me, wouldn’t they have done it by now?

With that I leapt from my bed. I stood amongst them and raised my finger toward the ceiling. “Get out of my house!” I told them. “In the name of God, I cast you out!”

Who knows how long I stood and chanted. Who knows how many sleepless nights I spent casting shadows from my ceilings.

Many ticks the clock has ticked since that night. Many shadows have crawled along my ceilings, and my tents, and my trails. It is hard now to do anything but rationalize each and everything that I see or feel. Sadness can be weakness. Anger can be shortsightedness. Happiness can be ignorance. Shadows on the walls? They are only shadows. The truth is, the character of the shadows in the night will give way to the comfort of the inanimate objects I recognize in the light.

As I look back to the many interesting metaphysical occurrences in my life, I find great ease in the rationalization of such moments. I wonder now if the idea that ghosts and demons do not exist would have been enough to deter my fears and send me deep into sleep. I wonder if it would have mattered at all. If you believe something to be true, how true it can be! As soon as we rationalize our existence and minimalize our experiences to helpless subjectivity, fear of the unknown ceases to be. How could you fear the unknown if the unknown is known? If I know what is under my bed, my fear turns to preparation and action. It is the question of “if” that leaves me to seek the 'is'. If 'it' only 'is' and 'if' always 'isn't,' 'I' only 'am' and cannot 'become.' ‘If’ leaves me to discover. ‘Is’ leaves me only to observe.

But what also must be abandoned should we depart from the unknown? Curiosity? Excitement? If I watch a video of each future wilderness journey, the bubble of my angst and elation is popped with the needle of rationality. This leaves me to wonder, where is the place for rationality? Is it always necessary?

I ponder now what other anomalies I presently rationalize that I did not as a boy. There was a time when I believed in love, in truth, in happiness, in compassion. Not because I understood it, but instead because I felt it and never questioned whether or not it was real. As I saw roadkill I felt sad, as I saw a homeless person I felt compassion. As I saw my parents and my siblings I felt a deep love. These things can be rationalized as instinctual or psychological. I could rationalize to the point where love and compassion does not truly exist, it is merely a response to a herd instinct or genetic sexual preferences. But why would I? I would therefore deprive myself of the very existential pleasures that make me an excited, thoughtful, and curious human-being. Can I not entertain beliefs outside of my realm of understanding because of their irrationality?

Here is the hard truth that we avoid intellectualizing when we make claims that we are either ‘atheist’ or ‘agnostic’ or ‘religious’: There are only two options for our existence— a) If we do not believe in a creator, we cannot then believe in right or wrong because everything we see and know happened as a result of chance. Our decisions only carry consequences equal to the harm they cause to others, and harm to others can be ‘rationalized’ as okay providing the circumstance allows the action. The only ‘rational’ possibility for existence is that everything that has happened or will happen is a domino being tipped by the preceding domino, therefore all life, technology, feeling, or action is only a consequence of what lead up to its occurrence. B) If we do believe in a creator, our rationality must be tapered by our imaginations. If there is a creator and the creator is conscious, the creator must also have intentions, feelings, and actions. Therefore, everything we do or say is the most important thing we will ever do. That means our lives are not just lottery balls bouncing at random. That means that our choices are REAL choices and not just reactions to other reactions reacting to reactions.

A claim that there is no creative force of the Universe is a claim that there is no freedom of choice.  No right and wrong, happiness, sadness, or fear. In essence, that freedom is an illusion and we are all slave to chance. A belief in a creative force of the Universe is the claim that everything has purpose. It grants us responsibility. It grants us authority over our decisions. No means no and yes means yes. There is no such room for ‘it doesn’t matter.’

When I now think back to those shadows on the walls, I feel as though I once saw something that I now cannot see. I saw things through the eyes of more than just a functioning and stable member of a society. I relied on more than what I was taught or how I was taught to think. There was a purity in my naivety. To survive in our world, there is very little room for anything outside our realm of understanding until someone comes to understand it and tells us it is okay to believe it. But by our belief in only rationality and what is ‘known,’ we rob ourselves of so much. Our freedom to love, to be happy, to care. With only what is known and what is rationalized, we are only left with illusions of feelings and no feelings actually exist. If this is true, then so be it. But if you, like me, find no refuge in a world where nothing carries meaning, I believe it necessary to reconsider your stance on the metaphysical. If it is freedom and purpose you seek, it cannot be found in the courtrooms of reason.

Musical Chairs: A Chair for Influence

The way we view our father shapes the entirety of our lives. It is easy enough to make a judgement on the character strengths and weaknesses of those around us should we have the mind to be at least minimally attentive to others. Despite our ability as adults and conscious individuals to make decisions on how we act and how we are perceived, the way we treat ourselves and others is often rhythmic. If we conduct personal experiments on our own mannerisms, thought patterns, and interactive patterns, we will undoubtedly find that many of them can be directly correlated to our parents. This is not some abstract and revelatory phenomena, but it is deeply weighted nevertheless. How parents treat their children, the value they place on their roles within their lives, and the degree of conscientiousness with which they approach their roles in their children’s lives not only effects themselves and their children, but also every single person they interact with throughout their life. How you act will most certainly effect how they treat their kids, and their kids after them. Generation upon generation has the potential to project aspects of your personality exponentially through time. Therefore, there are few responsibility’s greater than that of a parent. 

So, what is the role of a father? It seems these days that our ‘roles’ as individuals are under attack. It may be more modern and appealing to act as if all the ‘roles’ that were once delegated to us by our birthplace, our gender, or our living circumstances are only societal constructs, but in observance of the natural world this claim can be easily debunked. The role of every species on the planet is hyper impactful to each respective occupied ecosystem. So much so that if a single organism were to be extirpated, the identity of an entire living space can be altered.

In our ecosystem, the ‘nuclear family’ comes to mind when many of us imagine a good and functional living space. I have no interest in the variety of opinions that may arise if I were to exemplify the role of each character within the ‘nuclear family,’ but I do think each character has an important role. Even greater, I believe their role is often not a matter of choice, instead it is inherited naturally by the above stated conditions (birthplace, gender, living circumstances, etc.). Each role is integral to the functionality of the home and the eventual budding of the children within the home. A good husband and father, in my opinion, should carry the following responsibilities:

To his wife—He would be a leader, not a dictator. He would be kind, gentle, vulnerable, and honest. He would be attentive, respectful, and present. He would be strong, watchful, and protective. He would not choose friends, sports, or even work over his wife. He would always have an ear to listen and would not relinquish that responsibility to in-laws, friends, or predatory men. He would always be selfless, chivalrous, virtuous, and always at least attempt romance. He would take his role as man of the household seriously and would hold an expectation of himself and of his wife to continually push one another to be flawless, despite a guaranteed failure at such a task. There would be no woman in the world more important to he than her. Even as they grew old, less attractive, and every story had been told and heard to an infinite extent, he would be interested in all the details of who she was and who he transformed into through her. 

It is easy enough to break down how a couple should coexist by simplifying it to “loyalty and communication,” but a man can be loyal to his wife despite his lust of another. He can communicate his disgust with her and eventually they can communicate a divorce. Choosing to be a husband is a commitment for your life. If you do not value that commitment, you should save your knee, skip over the fancy diamonds, and keep hunting at the club. There are women out there who might enjoy your lack of discipline and dependability. If you are not yet a man, do not trick a woman into believing that you are.

It is important to note what a good husband is before attempting to explain what a good father must also be, because they go hand-in-hand. The way a man treats the mother of his children will eventually be mimicked by his son’s and daughters. It is also important because if the husband plays his role adequately, one of the two stabilizing pillars of the household is in place. To commit to marriage, sex, and parenthood is a demanding commitment that requires both parents carrying their load. If both pillars are in place, there is still no guarantee that a child will excel in society. Since this is the case, it takes both parents to consistently evaluate their strengths and weaknesses while working together to uphold the home. Only this will give your child the best possibility of success. No amount of love, coddling, spoiling, punishment, or freedom will compensate for attentiveness, discipline, and leadership in your child’s life. Likewise, a good husband provides everything necessary for a wife to be equally good. If she is not, then at least he will have held his end of the bargain. If she carries the necessary traits of a good wife and he does not match her commitment, the imbalance is a product of his error.

To his children— He would be attentive and present. He would be knowledgeable and therefore wise. He would not rely on aggressiveness and fear to earn respect, but instead on patience, integrity, and truth. He would do as he says and direct his children to do the same. He would direct his sons to treat women with respect and stand up for them. He would direct his daughters to not rely on men for happiness or confidence. He would never outsource his protective responsibilities and would always be engaged in the development of his children’s intellect and talent. He would always encourage his kids to fulfill their potential but never encourage their affliction. He would be forthright about his mistakes, ask for forgiveness when needed, and most importantly learn from them. 

While it may be easy to say a father should ‘be there’ for his children, it is important to know the difference between watching them spiral out of control and being there to wipe their tears, and being there to recognize their missteps and find the best way to help them navigate challenging terrains. While it may seem obvious that he must ‘protect’ his children, its invaluable to recognize that protecting them from the reality of the world is not actually protecting them. In reality, what they don’t know will hurt them. He must be honest and he must not be silent in their turmoil.

I do not spend time attempting to describe how he will achieve each of these traits, because every man is different, and every child is different. How a father might react to one child over another may differ depending on the child’s personality and the father’s capability of having an impact on the child’s behavior. While it may not be easy to understand how to react to your children’s inevitable struggles, it is far easier when he carries the traits detailed above.

It is not to say women and mothers are incapable of offering these traits. We often find that people with particularly strong characteristics may fill the role of the opposite sex better than the average. A mother may very well carry many or all of these traits to an extent, but biologically speaking she may be more well-versed in nurturing and attending to her children’s personalities and feelings more effectively than that of a father. A mother has carried her children in her womb for nine months. Her connection with them and understanding of their individuality has the capability of being much deeper than that of the father, who’s duty in the pregnancy is along the lines of stability for the mother. 

I am not a father. I am not a husband. I am not a lot of things at this point in my life, but some day, god willing, I will be. With that said, when I see things like men mistreating women, children not thinking critically, teenagers feeling unimportant and disassociated with those around them, I see a manifestation of poor parenting. I recognize this because I have mistreated women (including my mother), I have been misled, and I have felt unimportant and disassociated. It is not to say that my father is responsible for my shortcomings, but rather that I recognize what roles could have been played in my life as a child that could potentially have deterred those faults. Additionally, I see these faults in young men surrounding me and know that many of them could be corrected by having a sufficient and consistent leader in their life. 

This is a pivotal time for mankind. Valuable truths have blossomed within modern Western culture, and equally many valuable truths have been disavowed and are at risk of extirpation. For the health and prosperity of the human ecosystem, the ‘role’ of the father and the man must not be underestimated, devalued, or destroyed. It is too important. It is too prevalent. From Kim Kardashian to mass shootings, voids in leadership, attentiveness, authenticity, and virtue are quickly filled with the opposite. Like a game of characteristic musical chairs, the exemplifications of how to act, how to be, and who to be are floating around, waiting for a chance to land in the minds of our future generations. The characteristics you value now may grow to have an impact long after your death. When your children look to you, who and what will they emulate? When the music stops, what character roles will you fill?

A Ransom for Truth

It is an odd and uncomfortable time to be alive. As a species we are either in a period of ethical transformation or ethical evolution and it is unclear which of these is actually the case. It is indeed unlikely to have the acute awareness to be both conscious of the current state of mankind’s relations with ethics while simultaneously cognizant of its direction, but one thing to me seems clear: it is a slow and painful process to endure, it seems to move laterally, and we die before we are given the chance to witness a pinnacle. While I tend to live a moderately optimistic life, I find myself concerned that society as a whole understands the “what I feel about this” portion of consciousness, but not the “why this is.” It is a fear that we get caught in the crosshairs of a battle between objective truth and subjective truth; as a repercussion, truth is held hostage by our volatile emotions.

            To set a parameter from which this essay can be carved, it must first be concluded that truth does exist and is not subject to perspective. Before there were telephones, airplanes, social media, and virtual reality (oh boy…), the thought of these being within the realm of scientific probability was likely laughable. Despite their laughability, their capability to exist and the truth of that very capability never wavered, it was only yet to be discovered. Despite our current outward social musings of ‘what is true?’, truth still exists without our interpretations. While the self-helping tendencies of our society may state that each of us need to “find our truth” or “recognize we are enough,” the fact-of-the matter is that “our” truth is watered down by “our” feelings. We are not enough. If we were, there would be no need to achieve anything greater than birth. Science is incomplete, we are incomplete, and our understanding of truth is incomplete. Truth still exists.

            While awareness of self and feeling is a gift to be cherished, it could also be regarded as a burden. If it were not for moments of joy and excitement, life would be a continuous momentum of discomfort, stringing together a path of suffering and confusion, climaxing with our death. The continual event of individual discontent shared by all humans drives us to both innovation and dehumanization alike. Our awareness of ourselves within our kingdom walls can either propel us to build them greater or compel us to undermine them at the core. To achieve this, we sacrifice virtuous constructs in order to appease a never-ending flow of discontent.

            If consciousness is awareness of self and feeling on a moment-to-moment basis, then it could be argued that most humans only flirt with consciousness and never adequately develop means for consistently valuing the importance of themselves or their actions. In many ways, an objective perspective on human consciousness could determine that only a measure of us truly achieve awareness of the “why” in our actions while a greater portion of us only act in accordance to the fleeting comfort of our emotions. To put that in perspective, an ant may carry sticks and pebbles to its colony because it is wired to do so, not because it has chosen to or not to; a human may choose to work at a factory to afford a vacation or a new car, never truly knowing why it wanted the car or questioning the impact they are to have while working at the factory; another human may recognize the impact of their actions and feel empathy or anger towards one another or an entity, but never look at the big-picture with appropriate objectivity so as to act responsibly; or a human may look at things or events, evaluate their importance or lack of, determine how they feel about them after considerable evaluation, then choose to act in an effective and calculated manner. To simplify even further, levels of consciousness could be boiled to four distinct states: instinctual (driven by instinct), apathetic (driven by reward), cognizant (contemplative but potentially blinded by subjectivity), and disciplined (contemplative and virtuous).

This manifests itself in how we handle ourselves (or don’t) within our society to a great extent. It takes no courage for an ant to act on its instinctual reasoning, if an ant has any capacity to reason. It takes very little courage to work an uninteresting career and have a minimal positive impact in your existence, but instead to do exactly as you’re told and never question why. It takes a bit of courage and a good bit of intellect to challenge the pillars of civilization and the moral structures which guide our laws and authority. However, in my view the greatest measure of intellectual courage is to recognize what you’re doing, ask yourself why you’re doing what you’re doing, question authority and challenge the boundaries of right and wrong, and still do what is right, no matter what the consequences are to your subjective reasoning. It is the difference between an open mind with an open mouth, and a disciplined mind with a disciplined tongue. It means that we recognize our feelings as fleeting and often misleading, and act within virtuous parameters at all cost, no matter the consequence. It means we reinforce the staples of virtue that fulfill the greatest version of ourselves, and do not live by the lie of our intuitions. No matter what the continually fluctuating moral trends dictate or how much social reward is granted through activism or rebellion, your state of virtue remains steadfast. Furthermore, our personal virtues are not a point to be made and an opinion to be heard, but a highly refined description of who we are and how we conduct ourselves.

We find ourselves in a peculiar moment in time. Everything is in front of us; from economics, God, gender, liberty, and ultimately truth, all the intricacies of ethics are under the contemplative microscope of the liberal West. Every imaginable moral conflict is cooking within the ovens of our educational, governmental, scientific, and religious institutions—and the table is set. It’s easy to recognize genocide, enslavement, and blatant oppression. But there remains a subtle and invaluable measure of courage in our seeking and standing for what is true. Moral issues as basic as how we treat someone we disagree with, how we handle failure, or even greater; how we combat our own patterns of emotional bias as they obstruct us from what is right. Moral decisions are rarely as recognizable as confronting malevolent dictatorships. Instead, they are day-to-day, moment-to-moment decisions. Decisions that impact more than just your social standing. Decisions that cannot be summarized by YouTube “gotcha” moments or silly lopsided memes. There is no cost too great that should drive us to cease in our defending of virtue. There is no virtue too small to be brushed under the colorful rug of subjectivity.