The Ugly Side Of Caring

Could it be construed as meaningless to not care? I think so. But what if only by not caring can one be at peace, at least in some situations? This then seems to suggest peace itself can be meaningless. Which further suggests that if you care as an ideal, you will be precluded from upholding peace as an ideal.*

This seems to make sense looking around the world. It is only by caring so deeply that people routinely become slaves to madness. For instance, overly convicted people willing to commit unspeakable horrors only because they care so much about upholding their absolute view of truth. Peace in this case must fall by the wayside because it is in the way of their ultimate aim: to further their view of truth.

Many will say that without “caring” the world would systematically degenerate into a cold, cruel place only because there was no caring in the world. But alas, the world is already a cold, cruel place only because people care so much. There is both good and bad in caring and not caring. Lest we forget, everything is a trade-off!


An example of this "caring/peace" conflict follows:

Many might readily admit they are more inclined to care as an ideal thereby consigning peace to a subordinate position in cases where the 2 conflict. But at this point, what basis does anybody have to claim the things he cares about are the very things everybody else must or at least should care about? What happens when somebody else cares as an ideal but has different cares? Conflict will ensue, be it through thought or action. 

There will be judgment, fighting, arguing, name calling, feelings of arrogant self-righteousness, gnashing of teeth, etc. It need not be an “in-your-face” assault. A more subtle, seemingly peaceful response to this “conflict of cares” is passive aggressiveness. Pretending not to be bothered but being immensely so internally. Claiming to respect one's opinions but “secretly” thinking this person's opinions to be “dead wrong”, perhaps even evil. This has a very insidious effect on the state of things when all such feelings are taken into account. 

In contrast, if one's ultimate aim is peace, in situations where it requires not caring, conflict is thereby avoided. But alas, human beings have a seemingly unconscious, insatiable appetite for conflict masked only by their belief that they are upholding truth and righteousness, the most sacred of all virtues! It is only through conflict that the ego becomes fully empowered.

It seems those that embrace peace as an ideal appear weak because it limits or even “castrates” their ego as it were. Or perhaps those that do not embrace peace as an ideal simply overpower those that do making peace appear inherently impotent. Does this make it inferior?

I think of how Jesus might respond to this, with a question no doubt. Are you more interested in winning the argument or the person? Sometimes winning the person requires us to put aside our “cares”. Why do so few people seem to heed this wisdom? One word: EGO! 



*It is important to point out why I used the imperative will as opposed to might. Remember, an ideal is only so if always followed. Why is this? Without it being imperative, who is to say when it must or must not be followed? In this case, I am reasoning that there are at least some instances where not caring is the only path to peace. Therefore, one can not care as an ideal without contradicting peace as an ideal. So caring and peace must be mutually exclusive, at least sometimes. You can aim for one or the other but you can not uphold both ideals. So it is not the case that one might be precluded from upholding peace but rather one will be precluded from doing so if caring is embraced as an ideal. The converse is of course true as well. One will be precluded from caring as an ideal if peace is embraced as an ideal.

A Challenging Thought Experiment For The Believer

For those who buy “hook, line and sinker” C.S. Lewis' argument about Jesus being either Lord, lunatic or liar (of course implied as the “evil” type), what is your appraisal of Christ's teachings in themselves?

As I have said before, if people are led to believe his teachings are only meaningful if he literally is the son of God and literally rose from the dead, this is problematic. For it is essentially a tacit admission that everything he taught lacks meaning in itself. Hence the reason many fervently add the caveat that we must literally believe in his claim of being God and literally believe in his resurrection for our respect toward him to be “valid” in any way.

The problem with Lewis' implication of Jesus being a lunatic if he is not literally God is that upon scrutinizing his teachings (the vast majority of them at least), it is difficult to argue they have come from the mouth of a crazed lunatic. Now if one rejects this argument, is he not making a scathing indictment of Christ's teachings by insinuating they have come from the mouth of a crazed lunatic?

I have thought up a valid reason Jesus, as merely a highly enlightened human being, may have felt led to equate himself to God without being so. I do not really “believe” this. I simply offer it as a “thought experiment” to expose a truth of profound importance. Imagine Jesus going about his days with an incredibly enlightened mind which he very much wanted to share with the world. As he goes about introducing his ideas, many people display keen interest and attraction to him. The more curious people become of his eccentric and “other worldly” ideas, the more inclined they are to ask him whether he is God. Initially, he is honest. “No, I am not.” This seems to dissuade people from listening to him anymore. But upon further questioning, he eventually responds, “yes, behold, I am God!”

Why might he do this? Because he is an “evil” liar? No, because he badly wants to share his enlightenment with others and it just so happens the most “efficient” way, perhaps only way, to get people to want to hear what he has to say is by propagating the idea that he is in fact God. Would this be “bad” lying? I hardly think so (though I fully sympathize with one that posits all lying to be bad in itself*).

In this case, he is neither Lord nor lunatic nor “evil” liar. Perhaps he is a liar of the “good” sort? “Good” not only as in cunning but morally as well. What “good”, of the moral type, would lying do in this case? Bring hope and meaning to people, including myself!

This “thought experiment”, as I alluded to previously, exposes a truth of profound importance. What truth might this be? That it does not matter whether Jesus was literally who he claimed to be! If one finds meaning in what he taught, then it is meaningful in itself rendering insignificant whether Jesus was literally who he said he was. On the other hand, to deny this is to denigrate all that he taught, implying any faith in God's “divine” precepts to be nothing but a complete mockery!


*Though if one posits all lying to be bad in itself, he must uphold this moral imperative absolutely. As such, if you are a parent or future one, do you hereby promise not to indoctrinate your kids with the "lies" of Santa Claus, the Tooth Fairy, and the Easter Bunny among many other innocuous lies? Husbands with overly large pregnant wives, if she asks you whether she resembles that of a beached whale, will you be honest? Are we probably better off being lied to by our government as to how it protects us from enemies? Perhaps you might like to recant your conviction that all lying is bad in itself?