With a Capital T

Here we are in a new year. As we plod along forward with the hopes of improvement and progress, I can't help but think about the things that might help propel such well-intentioned hope. You hear a lot on the news these days from the more environmentally conscious among us about the depleted state of the earths' resources. I would like to submit, and possibly devote some time this year, to the idea that the most fleeting resource in the world these days is the Truth. I remember being asked in a philosophy class at Syracuse University, most likely by Professor Laurence Thomas whom I admire greatly, about the nature of truth and whether it exists in the absolute. Capital T truth if you will. I, ever the optimist, hastily replied that it does in fact exist, and that I believed in it. At the time, frightening as it is now to consider, I could not conceive of a world which rejected this belief absolutely. Five years from that time, I look around and wonder what allowed me to believe that a world where the truth is pervasive and absolute could ever exist.

As things are currently, I would venture that the vast majority of the people in the world give you a straightforward and honest opinion of what they are thinking less than half the time that they speak to you. This percentage rises in direct proportion to how intoxicated that person is in a ratio that I am not mathematically astute enough to accurately devine.

It would seem, that one of the strongest tools that one would ever be able to develop is one that is mentally constructed allowing for the deciphering and filtering of complete garbage from those small pieces of reality and veritas that we may encounter on a daily basis. To be honest though, such a tool would need to be honed not only to weed out faint and obscure bits of truth, but also be capable of manipulation in such a way that it could be turned on and off at will. This property would be paramount, for without it, you would be forced to endure a never-ending stream of truth which I don't think anyone would be able to survive for any enduring length of time.

It seems to me that the people who have the strongest grasp on the reality of the way things are in this world are those who are the least willing to accept it as it is. The people that I've met who were the most intent on escaping from this reality via whatever method is most readily available were typically those who had retired their rose-colored glasses and started seeing what was around them for close to what it was. To my chagrin, the glasses seem a necessary protective measure for most. The world that we live in is one that is overwhelming in the depth of its depravity, and in a large sense it is unsurprising that the people who are most in touch with that fact are the most resentful and least accepting of it.

The thing that is most intriguing about this, is that the weightiness of the horror that is this current system of things drives most into such terminal recoil that it is unlikely to ever change. When faced with such an overwhelming representation of what is accepted by the common people, it is only natural to wonder how you could possibly be the only other person that is having these thoughts. After all for most people sanity is a concept most commonly confirmed in the opinions and belief systems of others. But then much to your astonishment and upon further relfection you realize that the atrocities taking place all around us are commonly ignored or at the least overlooked. Even the most recently encountered stranger is willing to engage you in a conversation about the weather, and if times are hard enough some small-talk about the state of the economy or rising gas prices. Try and engage that same person in a conversation about the insane number of people that are dying on a daily basis from starvation, genocide, and disease in pick your favorite country and the best you could probably hope for is a blank stare. Most would not be able to point to Darfur if they were given a map of Sudan. How about child mortality rates in India? Perhaps you're more easily distraught by the continuing war in Gaza? The most I usually hope for when discussing this with people is "Yeah man, things are pretty effed these days."

If you read enough about what is happening to people in places outside of this country eventually, if you have anything that even resembles a heart or soul, you begin to wonder about the shortcomings of our Great Society. We spend most of our days in pursuit of careers that most often perpetuate the wealth of someone who has come before us, in an attempt to maintain our ability to provide for ourselves the conventions of life that we have come to take for granted. We are pacified by various methods of entertainment which are made readily available to us as a distraction from the things that most warrant our attention. We knowingly ignore the plight of millions around the world who are less fortunate, and the band plays on. I personally am guilty of this, and I find myself in very hefty company. I have helped in woefully small ways to improve the world that I live in, but I am hopeful that this like anything in this world can change.

It is important to note that the absence of truth in this world clearly stems from the absence of truth in normal human dealings. You cannot go to most stores and buy products at a fair market value. You turn on the news and are greeted by a clearly spun piece of "objective" journalism. Expectations are rapidbly becoming lower for any given level of relationship in any social network. The world that we see is one made manifest by our own misgivings. It is the highest level of self-delusion to believe that what we see all around us is not somehow related to qualities that we at best tolerate and at worst manifest ourselves. But do we want to see what's out there for what it is? Does anyone really want to see just how far the rabbit hole goes? I venture safely to say that the majority of us do not, and those that do, have volunteered themselves to a truly gruesome fate. I don't know if we will ever be able to openly share thoughts with one another without fear, but if that day comes, I hope you are all dressed in layers, for what we will be forced to accept seems shockingly frigid.