Hal - Deliberately Basic

Not long ago a friend of mine told me he never questions authority. As we are both, in a manner of speaking, children of the sixties, I was somewhat shocked to hear him say this. Although it may not have been wise at the time, I started questioning my father when I was about ten years old. It turns out he was right, but that is not the point. It is especially not the point once you become an adult.

As children we are taught not to question parents, teachers and other authoritative figures such as police officers and the school principle. And rightly so, for the obvious reason we need protection from that which we don’t yet understand. At some point in life, it is imperative that we learn to think critically about all authority that governs us, i.e. for the same reason, we need to protect ourselves and those around us. To our misfortune, most of us never learn the latter half of this principle.

Psychological experiments over the last 40 plus years have proven that people are afraid to resist or object to authority, even knowing they will harm someone. The two best known procedures were conducted in an attempt to explain the Nazi prison camps during WW-II. The  Stanford prison experiment in 1971, and the Milgram experiment in 1974 both concluded that the majority of people will conform to authority regardless of the consequences.

In the Milgram experiment, a “teacher” and a “learner” were involved. The teacher was instructed to deliver an increasingly powerful shock to the learner (a confederate) for each error the learner made while answering the test subject’s (teacher) questions. The majority of participants would continue to deliver shocks up to the maximum amount despite hearing the learner’s screams of agony and even not hearing any sounds at all once a certain voltage was reached.

With the Stanford prison experiment, twenty-four undergraduates were selected to play the roles of guards and prisoners and live in a mock prison in the basement of the Stanford psychology building. One-third of the guards were judged to have exhibited “genuine” sadistic tendencies, while many prisoners were emotionally traumatized and two had to be removed from the experiment early.

To learn more about this phenomenon, similar experiments have been carried out in Europe and other parts of the world. The results vary from country to country of course, but human beings in general are afraid to defy authority, even when they know they are right. We see this in everyday life. An example is the legality of something versus the moral obligation to do no harm to a fellow human being. In other words, simply because a thing is illegal does not make it right.

Most of us would like to think we would take the high ground and do the right thing when confronted with a situation like this. The fact is, unless you have been tested you don’t really know; the best you can do is be aware of your thinking, and hope you will. I believe I will, because I have been tested, in the most demanding way I know.

I was in the US Army three years in the late sixties. In the military, obeying orders without question is imperative - otherwise an army could not function effectively. In most cases this is not a problem, given the circumstances of warfare. However, certain situations may come about, requiring you to either conform or sacrifice yourself for principle.

Early on, I decided that there were specific things I would not do, even if it meant I would die or go to prison. For example, I would refuse to be on a firing squad. I would kill someone if necessary to save my  life, I would not torture people. I would not kill anyone who was not trying to kill me. I will stick with these principles all my life. More than once I was tested under fire, and I stood by my decisions. This does not mean I am superior. It means I had a prior understanding about authority, and made conscious decisions about living with my actions.

Some questions to consider:
Are you afraid of a cop who you believe has overstepped his authority?
Have you examined your religious beliefs, or do you believe what your    parents taught you?
Is your doctor “always right?”
Would you question your supervisor?
Do you believe if you exercise and eat the right foods you can live to be 100 years old?
Should critical thinking be a part of any school curriculum?

These questions may sound rather elementary for those who question even a little.  Of course, in most circumstances you need to obey doctors, and your boss if you want to continue your life as it is. However, “follow the doctors order” is ignorance exemplified if you fail to examine what he says and ask questions. This may be one of the most “blind obedience” issues that exists.

Blind faith, a religious concept that has caused so much human misery, is another notion that I will never understand. Yet another issue I see that causes me to doubt humanity’s ability to judge right from wrong is urban legends. From the ignorant to the well-educated, this junk soars around the Internet. Even after pointing out that most “pass it to everyone” messages are nearly always wrong, they continue to be accepted without question.

Finally, even if you do think and question, it is of no value unless you can substantiate your reasoning. Rhetorical bullshit is so prevalent it is often hard to separate the chaff from the grain. Emotion gets in the way of common sense and reason.  Questioning without reason is merely annoying.

Note: I wrote this article in June, 2008. The NYT posted an article July 1, 2008 about the same experiments. This is a great follow-up to the original experiments, with additional work still in progress at Ohio State University.

“The most remarkable thing,” Dr. Burger said, “is that we’re still talking about the work, almost 50 years after it was done. You can’t say that about many experiments.”

“There is nothing either good or bad but thinking makes it so.”
Hamlet (Act II, Scene 2)

When she walks into a room she creates enough energy to light a small city. She has that certain je ne sais quoi that attracts male and female alike. Charisma, charm, class, this force of personality is magnetic, and knows no boundaries. It is such a rare thing, one would have to be remarkably insensitive not to feel it.

At a recent function I met a woman like this. Its not that she is sexy that makes her so attractive, though considering that she was far from young, she was still physically appealing. It is a combination of things, the way she carries herself, her self-confidence, and her uncanny ability to talk at various levels with those around her. Saints or sinners, intellects or dullards, could not daunt her. She was the quintessential classy lady.

By chance we happened to be seated next to each other, and we began the chit-chat of everyday conversation. She is German, having come to the US after WWII, a teenage girl. It was interesting to hear about the culture shock, and we compared notes, I having come from the south as a child, and endured many of the same things. As we went on the conversation turned to immigration in general, the influx of illegal Mexican immigration, and why the hell we have to have two languages. We agreed on everything, and I learned much about what she and her family had to do to legally come to the US. The stipulations were strict, involved, with stringent regulations and requirements.

The stimulating conversation with this classy lady had me caught up in the moment, and I relaxed my usual reservations with people I don’t know. She began to talk about her son who lived in Boston, her recent visit, and the plight of the white male in the US. It was then our thinking parted, me with thoughts of the forgotten white male in politics. I noted that a recent poll showed that when candidates go vote hunting, white males are not considered valuable, compared to other ethic groups.

She began to talk about all the young white men she had seen in Boston with nonwhite women, particularly Asian women. It was a short step to “keeping the races pure” and “I am not a racist, but… .” Suddenly, we had made a leap back to Hitler’s Germany, and Aryan supremacy. She never said those words, but talked around the subject of “cleansing” and “…the sadness of racial mixing… .” More and more she gave me piercing looks, trying to see if I thought as she did. “Do you understand?” she said more than once.

“I am not a racist,” she said. “I see couples in our church, some of them beautiful, Indian women with their cultural garb. They look so nice together, but why dilute the races?”

She went on to tell me how nice it was that “these people” were there, how hard they worked, especially the Chinese, all the while scrutinizing me to see if I was with her or against her. I simply shook my head that I understood. Never once did I say that I agreed with her.

Our definition of what constitutes a racist was not in sync. There is only one species of man on the Earth—Homo sapiens. This species can intermarry and produce offspring. The word racist implies that one race is inferior to another, and intermarriage weakens the superior race. I believe there are superior people, not superior races.

All the time she talked about polluting the races, I had but one, unoriginal, thought. Suppose all races were mixed. What if we were all mutts, and race could no longer be an issue, because without race, no race could be dominant? Problem solved.

It was on the tip of my tongue to ask her why she believes in racial segregation. I could debate that the caucasian race is impure anyway. We are the ever-evolving product of European mixed breeding. But the most significant thing about all races, the one thing that will always integrate, never distinguish, dominate or reign supreme one race over another is ignorance.

With the coming election of a new president, one of the hot distraction topics is gay marriage, or for that matter, gay anything. American terrorists, aka fundamentalists Christians, are again outraged by “queers in church.” Neither a Christian or a queer, I don’t give a damn, except to continue to be amazed at the rationalization by the Christians to keep homosexuals out of churches, and by extension, destroy them.

Until the Reformation, about 500 years ago, Christianity was, for the most part, under the auspices of Catholic Rome. The Crusades, a 200 year endeavor to annihilate Muslims during the 12th and 13th centuries, was one of the bloodiest periods in history. During this entire time, about 1500 years, mass was given in Latin, because it was thought that common folks could not understand and interpret the word of God. Only priests had the power to do that. I’m not so sure that way of thinking has changed much, even if a sermon is preached in English.

Repudiation of papal authority began with Henry the VIII. Henry authorized The Great Bible, the first English translation of the bible. Even then, it was only read aloud in church; the common folks couldn’t read. And that brings us to The King James version of the Bible, the version I see most often used as the definitive “word of God.”

In the King James version of the Bible, there are several references to homosexuality, most similar to this:
Leviticus 18:6 “You shall not lie with a male as one lies with a female. It is an abomination.”
Well, it sure as hell is not something I would do, but not because of King Jimmy’s Bible.

But what has all this to do with the current Christian fundamentalist church, and the use of the King James Bible? James I of England was a blatant homosexual. He not only screwed most of the male court, but even one of his own relatives.

More than a few very intelligent, well-educated professional people, men and women I would call friends, have left their church because of the gay issue. Anytime I observe irrationality used to justify a false premise, it piques my interest. What is so chilling about it is, these are the conservatives who voted for George Bush. And that is where my interest is more than mere curiosity.

Thomas Hardy said, “Do not do an immoral thing for moral reasons.” And this is why I will never be a Christian as defined by the majority in America today.