Moral Musical Chairs

The person who uses the perceived disadvantage of others as a means of advertising the excellence of their own disposition towards that disadvantage has a curious order of priorities. They have noticed that public goodness (for there is no such thing as private, intrinsic goodness any more) is a limited commodity and they have set out, with sharp elbows if necessary, to corner that particular market. 

In terms of private, intrinsic goodness this might suggest that the person in question is, in fact, calculating, cynical, predatory, selfish and voracious in contrast with the public image they have secured. They have simply set out to be top dog in what they wrongly consider a dog eat dog world.

The God who used to see into men’s hearts and know their private, intrinsic goodness or wickedness, thus guaranteeing it and giving an ontological grounding to its reality, has been subtracted leaving only public appearance having any validity or currency.

Hence also the unseemly and often vicious scrabble to delegate scapegoat identity to others. There is a finite quantity of this commodity too. In this case it is not acquisition that is at issue but delegation to others in order that it is not allotted to oneself. This resembles a game of musical chairs.

Beneath all of this there is a lack of faith that there is any real morality at all. However, the fact that the appearance of goodness and wickedness is still vital seems to give the lie to this fear.  Morality matters to us whether we like it or not. Few of us can truly live, Raskolnikoff-like, under the illusion that it doesn’t matter.

And putting the cynical predators aside, what is real goodness like? It derives spontaneously or not at all (if your heart does not respond like this there is no simulating it; you’d better mend your heart which must be in the wrong relation to your fellows) in real sympathy where the action of kindness is lost in the contemplation of the other’s plight. It creates a human bond that acknowledges that the sufferer and the contemplator of it are part of the same thing (as in Donne’s ‘No man is an island). It is forgotten the moment it is over. In one sense it is a completely unremarkable expression of our nature.