Principles

Today is Memorial Day in America, which is for the commemoration of those who died in combat, that is, those involved in fighting. This post is inspired by a short YouTube clip about all the people, besides the above mentioned, who should also be remembered today. Here is the video:

Though all of it is worthy of consideration, I was particularly struck by the narrator's shrewd observation that we teach children that harming and killing others is wrong, but then expect them to deal with the exception of war; indeed, this is expected of any patriotic citizen, that it is wrongful to kill your neighbor, but just to kill "your" enemy. My thoughts quickly ran to principles. The above, to me, is an unprincipled stance, for principles do not allow for exceptions; if you find yourself making exceptions, you should probably abandon the principle. It is the fashion as of long late to disavow the foundations of moral codes in favor of the convenient. And foundations they are: the word "principle" comes from the Latin word "principium" which means "the beginning," and therefore is meant to be the firmest bedrock upon which one's morals are place. There can be no compromise of this bedrock without a fundamental change of your whole system.

I realized lately that I am strongly attracted to principled people. Most of the most influential and favorite people in my life are very firm in their stances. One of my best friends throughout primary and secondary school was a Jehovah's Witness, and say what you will about them, they are some of the strongest adherents to their faith that I know, because I can't recall a single exception they make to their beliefs in favor of the expedient. This presents another admirable trait of the principled: their strength through adversity and difficulty, in dealing with naysayers. There is much fire and infamy blast upon those who will not budge from what they believe and think is right, and man could have easily gone the way of giving in, in our thousands of years we have yet to lose such strong people. Now, I would be speaking incompletely if I did not mention that this go both ways, and that there many repugnant people and groups who yet hold onto principles. I have no regard for the Westboro Baptist Church and their crusade against homosexuality, but I admit to some admiration for them and their death-grip upon a repulsive and extremely unpopular position. They also demonstrate the extremes most principles must be taken if they are to be true. Though I think the logic is a bit flawed, and they do it for the attention, by boycotting military funerals for the supposed support their employer, the US, gives to gays, the Westborons demonstrate that a moral foundation must extend beyond the roots if it is to have any life. Some might call this stubbornness or thick-headedness, and perhaps with them it is, but being stubborn is different from being principled, for the former is for it's own sake and will eventually budge, while the latter is for some other reason, and will not budge (unless given up completely, as mentioned above); also, a change brought on by giving up being stubborn is small compared to giving up principles.

There is also the accusation of seeing things in black-and-white. I have many problems with this, such as a.) for those with supposed gray vision, it seems a bit too easy and divisive to label some people as black-and-white, and others as gray, and that all people fit neatly into either/or; b.) very little thought is given to what it actually involves to see things in black-and-white, and the same is true with gray vision; c.) perhaps most intriguing to me, seeing gray is merely to see a way of the world, which goes against my Quixotic stance. I will deal with these in reverse. My Quixotic stance is summed by this quote from the novel: "...too much sanity may be the maddest and the maddest of all, to see life as it is and not as it should be." I see, upon first glance, much grayness in our lives, by which I mean that there are so many exceptions to everything it is quite easy to live in fog of contradictions: we expect the truth but accept white lies; we'll hate an item but love it when given to us as a gift, at the least to save face; and so on. In this grayness are many of the things we barely tolerate, or don't tolerate but give up to in hopelessness, such as war, famine, poverty, etc. I prefer to see beyond this mist and find the foundations as well as the extents of things, and to see what can be done with them and where they can go. I try to see the world as it should be by seeing, from what it has, what it can be. This involves dividing into what is such and such, and what is not, what works, and what doesn't. This is what an honest, decent monochromatic seeing person does. To do so involves thinking, judgment, and wisdom. Seeing gray is, fundamentally, merely an act of opening your eyes, while monochromatic vision requires one to do something with what one sees. I do not mean to disparage the gray, for it is essential to have, and I would say just as essential as the black-and-white, but too much has been given to the former that has been taken from the latter. Neither do I carelessly praise the monochromatic, for there are many who, in lacking the gray, are unthinking in their stances, usually just following what someone or something told them. This type of person is not to be emulated. Thus, a complete person must have both the gray and the black-and-white, which is perhaps the grayest and most monochromatic idea to have. To deal with the world, one must know it (gray) and then learn how to deal with it (black-and-white) and it is in this latter part that principles arise.


I return, then, to Memorial Day. I take a principled stance against aggressive warfare; I demand the truth. The truth is then that I cannot praise nor honor our soldiers. No war in recent memory has any honorable justifications, and those who fight them are misguided about their actions, or, unfortunately, are bloodthirsty (or both, I suppose). The video I posted above pretty much sums this up. "Defending our Liberties" is a pretty phrase that is also quite vacuous, for our armed forces are doing nothing along those lines. They have invaded foreign countries that have done us no harm; they have destroyed people, families, homes, towns, even the entire infrastructure of a people, in essence, destroy; they continuously assist in the perpetuation of lies. In supposedly protecting our freedom of speech, they have murdered innocents and posed with their corpses for pictures, which is a most revolting use of this freedom. In supposedly protecting our freedom of religion they have blown up the temples of religions not their own, which is a most blatant violation of most religious creeds. In supposedly protecting our freedom to bear arms and therefore protect ourselves, they have disarmed an already weak people, which is a most dishonorable violation of property rights. In supposedly protecting our freedom from unreasonable searches and seizures and the right to due process, they invade homes on mere whims and summarily execute innocents out of battlefield justice, which is most retrograde to our legal rights. And need I describe how they trample upon the freedom from cruel and unusual punishment? There are very few who earn honor upon the battlefield: the rest earn either pity or scorn, if they earn anything at all. I will not celebrate those who have died for fruitless and unjust causes, and I will not honor those currently involved in entanglements abroad who mindlessly do what they are told. It is against my principles.


How about some beauty now. Because I am American, and, in my own, I very much love my country, I'll share some American music. First, Leonard Bernstein, the first American conductor of international prominence, conducting and playing the piano in Gershwin's Rhapsody in Blue, which is just about as American as you can get.

This next selection comes from Aaron Copland's Twelve Poems of Emily Dickinson: "Going to Heaven"

Finally, perhaps the greatest American aria (in my opinion) "Batter My Heart" from John Adams' Doctor Atomic (which is one of the coolest names of any opera). The subject is the Manhattan Project, which is a very unfortunate part of our history, and the character singing this is Oppenheimer, who led the project.