Ethics versus Suppression

But outside the circle an individual has drawn around self there may be something much worse than just carelessness: sometimes there is suppression. The intentions and actions of individuals may or may not have countless facets; but we can whatever classify them with regards to the purpose of the global survival: do they add to it or make it less? Remember the previously mentioned merchant of chaos, regarded as suppressive in practical way on the basis of products regardless of motives? There is a point where the amount of the damage caused and of the intention to harm behind it are such that it is time to call things with their name: no more just an insufficient ethics level, but sheer suppression.

I have previously touched upon two basics; now I want to complete them with a third basic and invite you to observe their full scope.

First: intention is cause. The basic cause in the world is the intention of the individual. All the rest simply ensues. All the other “reasons” are but tools, subservient to the intention. Philosophies, ideologies, religions, economic theories, any circumstances, whatever is on the scene, it’s going to be handled by individuals, and at the root of the individuals there is an intention.

Second: responsibility is individual. Every individual has an intention, and even when the individual aligns it with some other intention, that alignment comes from a decision of that individual. Even under duress the individual granted the duress an effect on him. The ultimate responsibility lies in the hands of the individual. Every group is an agreement of individuals. No individual is to hide behind any group.

Third: the difference between an ethical individual and a suppressive one lies in these very basics. I discussed earlier the practically useful assumption that the intentions of an individual trace back to one basic motive, and on this basis the difference is just there, at the root.

Ethics versus Suppression, 2

Both the ethical and the suppressive individuals want to survive, personally; the difference is in the intention toward one’s fellow man, toward others: the ethical individual wants that everyone else survives, too. The suppressive one wants everyone else dead. As I said, the why is that, while at the root of the ethical individual there is some love for his fellows and the awareness that life is a group effort, at the root of the suppressive there is the secret terror of others: he lives in a parallel world, where every other individual is an enemy, an enemy to destroy, overtly or covertly. And the enemy is constantly attempting to kill him, so he feels in constant danger and in need of defense in any possible way, beginning with any form of covert attack a single individual surrounded by enemies can put into effect. Sure, that parallel world is not real. Sure, the suppressive is raving mad, needless to say. But on the surface he can look pretty normal, well−balanced, respectable, authoritative, and get very influential and thus powerful, though. And the more things are influenced by him or her, the more degraded they get, the more people get despondent, the more dissembled and hard to detect he becomes. The human and material collapse caused by the influence of the suppressive is his or her best hideout.

Remember we’re here to get somewhere: it’s not a matter of descanting on this, but of “does it work?” Does this viewpoint enable us to understand and predict and handle?