Hope.

I leave you tonight with maybe a little more hope than I had about people than before.

Courage.

What is it? I read a short story by Tolstoy today, that raised that question.
Per Wikipedia:
"Courage, also known as bravery, will, intrepidity, and fortitude, is the ability to confront fear, pain, risk/danger, uncertainty, or intimidation. "

It's one of those things that a lot of people have made quotes about through the years.
Churchill said: "Courage is going from failure to failure without losing enthusiasm."
Aristotle said: "Moral excellence comes about as a result of habit. We become just by doing just acts, temperate by doing temperate acts, brave by doing brave acts."

So, what is courage? Whatever it is, can I be defined as it?

Certain courage must be a good quality. Technical definitions aside, I think Churchill doesn't have it all right. I know people who really like his quotes, but to me they are soundbytes that held England together in war, and not nessesarily purely philosophical. Aristotle's point was that courage is a verb and you can only be courageous if you perform courageous acts.

Which to me is a big gray area. By thinking in contrary to popular views held by my peers, am I not courageous? Surely, in some scary time, thought itself may be courageous. So maybe thought isn't enough, for now.

When I think courageous, you normally think of you know, a man running through a hail of bullets to complete his mission. Yeah, it's defitely courageous, but I think we'd be wrong to stop courage at a purely physical level.

If I had to pick one person who I thought was the most courageous, I'd pick Martin Luther King, I think... Maybe to be continued.

pitfalls of objectivism

(So posting a body is nice. enter should take you down here. oh well)

I read part of "Anthem" by Ayn Rand the other day. She's known for her belief in objectivism, which is totally free business operation and ownership. I didn't like it and stopped a bit into it because I figured out what she was doing, which was knocking collectivism by associating it with fascism, which just isn't true, and I couldn't stand it.

Why is objectivism evil in my eyes? Well, because I'm the object being used right now. Working alone, for less money at the end of the week, to profit my bigger brother, who spits upon my best interest. Who will crush me if I dare speak. What sort of freedom, what sort of happiness is that?

And maybe absolute collectivism isn't best. Communism doesn't work. But at the same time, there's got to be a more fair way of doing things.

I'm just tired of it. The grind. The race.

Trying to scurry up the maze.

I'm just going to try to enjoy where I am.

Personal observations from playing with fire

It seems to always happen, in a way. After I swear it off forever. After I say that it's all a silly idea. All a silly mess. Very much hopeless.

(I pause, laugh at memories of the video where george bush stumbles through a "fool me once" metaphor)

But I let it happen again. I let myself hear their songs. I took those famous three words seriously.

But now it's just your disaster set to my music on some awkward morning.


And hopefully I've finally figured out how to use a fire extinguisher.

Lullabye

This blog has changed ideas a bit. So, in the interest of changing more, here's a bit of the novel "Lullabye" by Palahniuk that I enjoyed-

"What I'm talking about is free will. Do we have it, or does God dictate and script everything we do and say and want? Do we have free will, or do the mass media and our culture control us, our desires and actions, from the moment we're born? Do I have it, or is my mind under the control of Helen's spell?"