Portraits of ourselves as demi-gods

I am and have in the recent past taken classes on ethics, metaphysics, and morality as a whole. This, no doubt, makes me an expert on all things of this nature. Prepare to be blinded by pseudo-science.

The less context you can give this, the better off it will be, and the cooler I will seem.

Basically, morality is a complicated animal. We can discuss a lot of things involving moral issues, and each instance seems a little different. We can talk about a lot of different facets of the moral right, and try to determine the necessity of a greater moral law. We can contrast objectivism and subjectivism. We can assign values to various levels of cognition. If you wanted, we could even talk about the differences between "want"s and "volition"s and the orders thereof. We could talk about maxims, and universal law, and egoism, and solipsism, and allegory. But I don't want to.

You see, you're reading this, which means two things; You're probably human, meaning all of these things are implied knowledge, and you know me, meaning you are a literate, intelligent being capable of navigating google in order to articulate this knowledge that I insist is requisite for living to the ripe age of say --- 20.

I would much rather talk about the way morality functions relative to relationships. This is pertinent to my interests.

(editors note: This is decidedly one-sided. I attribute this to my external genitalia. Sorry ladies.)

There are a lot of things we can discuss on the topic. It seems all of my friends have relationship troubles in some form or fashion. They are desperately lost. They are hopelessly abandoned. They are heartlessly ignored. They are suffocatingly crowded.

All my friends (for this discussion) are guys (at least most of the time).

People often make jokes about the simplicity that is the male mentality. Sleep, food, sex, and television. All things external to these four are unaddressed by our would-be prime directive and as such are unimportant. The fact of the matter is, there is an underlying network of relationship information and protocol which we have attained, a priori.

We are hard-wired for relationships, despite the fact that we cannot help but feel nature prodding us towards promiscuity once in a while. The need to pro-create and spread the seed is strong, but not so strong that we cannot quell the thoughts of straying with the thought of our wounded better half.

Dogs are qualified as "man's best friend" because man sees an unmistakable likeness between the two. Loyalty. Loyalty is the cornerstone of the male perspective in relationships. That's not to say that one must always be loyal in the definitive sense. There is forgiveness. All men and dogs may ask for is the attempt at loyalty. The illusion of remorse. The attempt at apology. A glimmer of faith. Such is enough for a man to hold his ground and weather even the worst a woman may have to bear. That having been said, a dog can only be beaten so many times before it responds with lax enthusiasm to the call of it's master. Much the same is the mentality of a man.

In my personal experience, you receive one real chance at loyalty. In relationships, I have been disregarded. Discredited. My trust has been misplaced. This, of course, only happens once. After the first offense, though I would remain, I am guarded. Absolutely, I still love, affect for, and all that jazz. But with one foot on the ground. As far as I am aware, most men are like this. Granted, I have friends who work their hardest to shed this standard and will willingly abandon their grudges for a chance at what once was, but even in their rare and beautifully trusting circumstances, I am willing to submit that there is always going to be a hint of reservation. And I am willing to argue that there will always be a final offense.

Why fight nature?

In my mind, there is a biological method to relationships. With each offense it is as if one were injecting a poison into the other. Though the body may sift through the blood and find the toxins and filter them as well as it is able, the blood will never be pure again. Toxicity rises, blood curdles, the body withers, and such things die.

We say what we mean and the rest we call love.

In moments of great distress, it is so easy for us to claim a moral high-ground. We can claim to be willing to do so much in order to gain so much more. When the time comes to own up to our claims, can we live up to them? Are we capable? Do we even care to be? Or are words such a sufficient substitute for action that we can say what we mean, but never mean what we say? Personally, when I die, nothing will be left of me but the words I have said, and it is my sincerest hope that those words echo the person I truly was and not the person I needed to be to get what I wanted. In the end, we all must evaluate the truth of our words and quantify them to measure the truth of our existence. We all are means and have means to an end, but I doubt that you can love the means while you lust for an end.

Morality is perspective.
I know, this is subjectivism, and to be ultimately true to morality, it must be unbiased and universally applicable. Even so, morality lies on interpretation of the scenario, and interpretation lies on the shoulders of perspective.

Perspective is a matter of time.

Some people are born with the capability to quantify all the possible outcomes of a scenario instantly (or at the very least, in an acceptable amount of time). These people are a step ahead of those who are a step ahead. We call them geniuses. Or sociopaths. Depending on if we like them or not. These people are the advice-givers. The manipulators. The prophets. They are the ones who know you better than you know yourself, and see your conclusions before you come to them. Some of these people appreciate their own foresight, and act wisely as a result. We consider these people "safe" (with a varying connotation). Some act without regard to their knowledge and these are the people we call "careless". And some people act without considering the consequences of their actions. We call these people "reckless". These people will never realize what will happen until after it has happened. Only then will they grasp the full impact that their actions held, and even then it is left to chance that they find they are alone responsible. This is a matter of perspective, which is a matter of time. Eventually people see the walls of the hole they have dug, even if it isn't until they are trying to determine the best way to climb out.

Morals are simply a matter of time.

Love is not a fleeting feeling. Love is not a moment of uncertainty. Love is not a distant memory. Love is not an instrument to fill your stomach, or steady your hand, or ease your breath. Love is the product of the work you are willing to give. You can love anyone you want, but never more than one person. Love is a feeling of majority.

Life is long. It is fast, but it is long. And it is by no means over for any of us. Hope, love loyalty, honesty, truth, whatever. It's there. And the way you spend your time looking, or not looking for any of these things is the truest measure of who you are as a person, or lover, or friend.

This wasn't about anyone specific, though I know people will see themselves in what I have written. If you read this far, I'm sure you won't have any trouble taking my sincerity on faith. This was a long one. But at least it was something to read --- whether you think it was worth reading or not. If it was coherent or not. If it was worth reading or not. If it was worth reading.

"no longer easy on the eyes; these wrinkles masterfully disguise the youthful boy below, who turned your way and saw something he was not looking for --- both a beginning and an end. but now he lives inside someone he does not recognize when he catches his reflection on accident."

I'm just waiting for a spring thaw. And a summer-night's thunderstorm.