One Simple Step to Saving the World

Months ago I wrote about how the cruelty of the world terrifies me—how greed wins out over kindness with alarming frequency, how people villainize one another to avoid addressing our problems ourselves, and how this in turn creates harmful rifts within society.  I still fear that all progress is superficial, and that the core problems remain unchanged.  Instead of racial rifts, we villainize the police.  Instead of taking real efforts to heal economic disparity, we villainize Walmart.  We hide under the blanket of these illusions of Big Bads, convinced that the problem is somewhere else in the world, somewhere out there, not among us, not within us, and not to be solved by us.

One of my friends recently echoed my sentiments when he told of how, when delivering food, his customer overpaid.   He returned the excess money without hesitation, but his coworkers celebrated the act as an anomalous kindness, noting that they themselves would probably not do likewise.  Although trivial when considered as an individual act, it's the compounding of the many of these acts—right or wrong—that occur throughout the day and throughout the world from which greater goods and evils arise.  Moreover, it's the failure to perceive the humanity of the person that is wronged which echoes through all evils.

Often people read or hear my words and end up asking, “what, then, should I do?”  People are looking for a simple “To do” list or Ten Commandments to check off progress in their free time and feel good about themselves.  There is a simple answer, but it’s necessarily ongoing, unceasing.  There is no one thing—or even a list of things—we can get over with and call the world saved.  Sure, there is a list of what needs done: education reform to focus on utilization of information instead of retention, economic reform to oppose the ever-growing economic disparity, social equality regardless of race, sex, orientation, or religion, environmental reform to ensure our survival, and this list is just the beginning.

Yet the simple answer that all this stems from is this: love.  Love unquestioningly.  Love unceasingly.  Love those you might not think deserve it.  Love in action, not only in word.  Keep striving to love more.  It sounds too simple, but the problems in society are easily traced to just as simple of causes.  Economic disparity arises from simple greed, but if we distributed wealth to facilitate cooperation and community instead of competitively hoarding it, we would not only see the decrease in poverty, but we would in turn facilitate technological and cultural progress.  Similarly, social inequality arises from these rifts we create by villainizing each side, combating each other instead of banding together to overcome ignorance and misunderstanding.  Yet efforts through love to create universal community would in turn create universal equality.  If it seems too simple, then reference how, as I pointed out before, just as it only takes the combined spark of a multitude of tiny ice crystals to conjure a lightning storm, change can come from something simple if there’s enough of it.

A number of years ago, prompted by my tendency to describe love as a series of neurochemical imbalances, a friend asked me to actually define love, in a broad, platonic sense, without resorting to snark.  I failed to immediately come up with an answer, but eventually I concluded that love at its purest is selflessness—putting someone else before oneself.  Although I haven’t changed my definition, I have expanded upon it.  As I’ve realized that selflessness gives rise to emergent patterns, creating communities capable of so much more than disjointed collections of individuals, love becomes more than an interaction between two people, or one person’s consideration of another.  Love finds a curious life unto itself in the same way the complexity of our consciousness rises from the interaction of neurons which seem completely unrelated yet nevertheless underlie its mechanisms.  Love becomes about not just a couple separate individuals, but something that grows beyond them while simultaneously improving them with it.

So, go forth and love.  Help others to love.  Maybe enough of us can come together to conjure a storm and make a difference.

An Open Letter to the Wu Tang Clan

Dear Wu Tang Clan:

Firstly, I would like to say that I am given to understand that you are, in fact, nothing to fuck with, and as such, fucking with you is far from my intentions here.  Neither is it my intention to oppose your release of Once Upon A Time In Shaolin in anyway, either the music itself or the method with which you have decided to release this particular double album—as a single copy to be toured itself as an artistic exhibit before being sold to a single individual.  To the contrary, I find the idea to be rather clever.  That said, though, I do wish to discuss the nature of the release.

As to whether or not this will bring attention to issues in the modern music industry, I have no doubt that it will and even has already begun to.  As to whether or not this new model will be revolutionary as you seem to hope, I refuse to speculate.  What I will wager, though, is that, as it is presented, this is not the revolution we need.

What we have been presented in this model is not simply exclusivity, but the ultimate in artificial scarcity.  Typically, I oppose artificial scarcity on principle, as it inflates prices despite increased efficiency of production and therefore decreased man-hour requirement.  Yet, the increased profits from artificial scarcities are not passed along to the workers who are now have less work to perform, but instead they have less money to use on the inflated costs of the goods they need, which itself creates increased competition for jobs and deflates wages.

Although this is a matter that I believe needs to be addressed in society, in regards to the particular instance of artificial scarcity created by the exclusivity of your upcoming release, I find it difficult to imagine that much of the money is not finding its way to those making the product.  Yet the point that this new method for releasing an album is apparently in favor of artificial scarcity is nevertheless noteworthy, especially in the field of art.

As an amateur musician myself, I cannot foresee the small-time band I play with getting the necessary interest that would be required for the sustainable pursuit of privately released music.  Granted, I see no reason why a band could not continue to release music using established methods, but if things continue as they are in parallel to private music, we could barely call that a revolution.  Instead, this seems to be a model of exclusivity that also excludes fellow artists—namely, those artists who have yet to achieve the notability or influence required to obtain backing for a private release—perhaps those more skilled in music than publicity—and, as such, this model has the potential to work against the preservation of the art form on a whole by offering the illusion of progress.

Now, as I already said, I do not oppose the method of release for Once Upon A Time In Shaolin.  Questions about whether art should be concealed from the world aside, I do not believe that a single instance of this particular form of exclusivity will be detrimental to either the industry or the art.  The fact that it has, at least from my immediate perspective, achieved its goal of prompting dialogue about and consideration of current trends in art instead lends me to support the endeavor, and I certainly wish you the best of luck in more direct success with the project.

Yet, if we truly want to change the music industry, I fear that we have more to address than the nature of music distribution.  The same widespread artificial scarcity throughout other industries—the same thing that leaves so many working so much for so little pay to mass produce lowest common denominator goods while funneling money to those who already have the most—also feeds into a culture where the young artist, who devotes himself or herself to contributing to what beauty is left in the world, is more often than not seen as less valuable than those who make a living working against the well-being of others.  Instead, if we were to work to undo this artificial scarcity, allowing prices or wages to adjust to where they should naturally be, we would also free up both disposable income and free time to—hopefully—invest in the arts.  At the very least, it would be a much needed step in the right direction when the most we tend to see otherwise is slowing the steps in the wrong direction.

Thank you for lending me an opportunity to add my voice to the discussion.

—Carter Edge

A Humble Request for Help

A lot of people keep telling me to finish school, get a good job, and make lots of money, and they seem incapable of understanding why I'm not motivated to do exactly that, as if these things were driven by the fundamental mechanisms of the universe.

I keep telling people to seek cooperation, show kindness indiscriminately, and to constantly try to better the world for themselves and others, and I'm incapable of understanding why they're not motivated to do exactly that, because these things are driven by the fundamental mechanisms of the universe.

A number of people have said that I'm going to change the world, and although I appreciate the sentiment, whenever they say that, I know they're wrong.  The problem is not that I doubt myself, but a simple matter of how their phrasing reveals the imminent failure, because instead of talking about what I'm doing, they should be joining in, saying, "Let's change the world."  I can't change the world, but we can.  One man can't change everyone; that's for everyone to do.

In truth, I'm terrified of a world where we'd rather sell each other out, poisoning the other's water or letting the other drown in poverty because we can't be asked to make any simple sacrifice of wealth, when in reality we're sacrificing the wealth of art, technology, and knowledge that these people could produce if we let them.  It seems a simple idea, but really why should I believe that we're capable of understanding something so simple when we still haven't figured out how to stop shaking fists or pointing fingers at people based on how they look, what faith they follow, or who they love?

And I know I'm not the only one who feels the way I do, and neither are these ideas all that new, but it terrifies me even more that this knowledge is available and it's not being used.  Maybe we're too accustomed to nodding in agreement before going about our lives while we wait for someone else to change everything, letting the conversation fade away without accomplishing anything real.  Hell, maybe we even try to be better people.  Yet we let things keep going as they are even though "All that is necessary for the triumph of evil is that good men do nothing."  Even though we may not commit evils ourselves, if we let them persist, we cannot win.

And so, every day I struggle to figure out how to convince others to see what seems to me simply fundamental information about the world, like trying to explain colors to the blind.  I try to figure out how to effect change, where so many others have done the same to little avail.  And I'm forced to wonder, am I really the person we should let try to change the world?  My desk is covered with an army of Lego figures, there's a good probability I won't put on pants for the next couple days, and I recently threw myself down some stairs during a Nerf battle.  I'm probably not the man for the job.  I'm only trying to do what I can because I believe it's how things should be, and, moreover, I don't see enough others doing what needs to be done.

Perhaps, most importantly, don't let the conversation die.  No matter how good of a person you are, it won't matter if you're the only one.  Spread the word.  This needs to be a dialogue, not a lecture.  I obviously don't have all the answers, and I don't expect anyone else to.  If you like what I have to say, share it, respond to it, or do anything to further it.

And, please, don't tell me I'm going to change the world.  Help me change it.  I obviously need the help.

Considering the Little Things

I'm haunted by the fact that kindness and cooperation aren't the status quo.  I'm haunted by the fact that truth and reason don't invariably win against ignorance and irrationality.  Although I understand the mechanisms and motivations underlying the way things are, my understanding stops short of why we haven't made things better.  I know that there are people who agree with me on most of these things, and yet every day I feel like I'm a lone madman shouting at the sky.

Some people describe me as a nice guy as if it were some sort of anomaly or as if I've done something amazing just because I like to help in little ways.  They see me go out of my way to hold a door or help a stranger pick up something they've dropped, and maybe these acts of kindness don't happen enough, but in truth they take almost no time, effort, or other expense to undertake.  It's not as though I've rescued someone out of the way of a bus or donated my kidney to a dying stranger.  I like to think I would rise to the occasion should such extreme measures be necessary, but until such situation arises as they are, I'm hesitant to say for sure.

It requires so little to help people in little ways, yet it benefits everyone involved--perhaps not a lot, but more than a little--and so I don't understand why being friendly and helpful aren't the default states for people.  Yet I do understand that the problem is self-perpetuating--cruelty and conflict breeds mistrust and withdrawal from unnecessary interaction with strangers, leading only to more cruelty and conflict.  As such, if we focus on the evil in the world and in others, we'll end up adding to it, but if we look for the good, we'll not only find it, but we'll spread more.

Moreover, because of the nature of the feedback involved, we can't expect things to sort themselves out.  We have to continuously seek to be something better.  It seems that a lot of people try to decide who deserves help or who deserves kindness, believing that they shouldn't have to be kind to someone acting cruel, but this just limits kindness to persist where it already exists.  If it's spread, we have to take initiative, especially when so often I've found that kindness can diffuse cruelty better than conflict.  And often even good people slip--after a long day of cumulative troubles, or stressed by responsibilities, we all are jerks occasionally.  And, when we slip, we would want people to be sympathetic, offering us kindness, and so, too, is it important that we offer kindness to others even when they're acting like jerks.

Another problem is that many people confuse kindness for weakness, and they confuse strength for aggression.  It should be obvious, though, that showing kindness to someone being cruel does not involve siding with them.  I'm not expecting anyone to see cruelty and offer to help be cruel; I'm simply asking that we not be cruel to those who themselves are.  Returning cruelty for cruelty just makes people defensive, polarizing those involved and strengthening resolve on both sides.  However, kindness can often change minds.

I think, in the end, what terrifies me most, though, is that when it's so rare that someone's a good person in the little things, I don't know how we'll ever fix the bigger problems.  Every day we plunge deeper into economic disparities, government corruption, environmental pillaging, and a society of blame that--in addition to keeping us from being more helpful--diffuses responsibility so that no one's at fault and nothing is getting done.  Yet we can't even figure out how to do the little things.  We can't manage to be kind indiscriminately, especially in the little things, so how are we to change the world where it needs it most?  Because, certainly, it needs it.