You Are Not Alone

My father sent me a link to a page called Eject! Eject! Eject! that has an article (or two, I suppose) called "You Are Not Alone". This article is largely about the precarious balance between cooperation as a society and self-advancement, about the need for just action in the face of exploitation, and the role of incontrovertible character and duty in a society rife with criminal personalities and self-destructive short-mindedness. It excited me enough that I had to start this post before I was finished with the second half of the article, so forgive me for failing to mention a strong point. Only an hour til I must go to work, and I thought it possible that I'd talk on it so much just posting the link that I wouldn't get it posted until after work, when I could possibly lose the necessary luster to expand my thoughts on it.

Anyways, there is more concentrated common sense and sound, educated logic in the first segment alone than I've read in anything since Atlas Shrugged. It's written very intuitively, the author addressing next exactly what you probably conclude from reading it. It's therapeutic, both encouraging against the feeling of isolation we all have and reinvigorating the sense of logic in our most dear creeds.

A few things came to mind as I was reading it. One was: How much do you suppose the math of the game theory figures into it? I wonder if it makes much difference that it's six months versus two years imprisonment, if the results and their ethical implications would change if those seemingly arbitrary numbers came to a different ratio. As I was reading it, I thought it could be possible that a lower sentence, say a year, for non-betrayal might change the results drastically, but now, thinking on it more, I doubt it.

I just came to the part in the second segment about how isolating yourself from society is no way to show courage, or to improve anything. This is something I've wrestled with for years. Often as a kid I thought life would be much better if I could go live as a hermit in the mountains somewhere, that in that way I could show the world that my ideals could result in success, because I was so often jaded by the cruelties, the illogic, the cowardice of the perceived masses that I never wanted to participate. As time went on, though, I began to see the benefits to immersing yourself in your enemies; that thinking largely encouraged me to go to Augustana, where I knew plenty of loud-mouthed anti-patriots and liberal elitists would challenge my assumptions and give me something to challenge, to conquer, in return. As a result, I further developed my ideals, expounded upon them and learned what logic specifically guided my character, but at the expense of feeling too often beaten down by what appeared to be the norm. I still waver back and forth between those two viewpoints, mostly because it is very unsettling to try and stand strong in the face of fierce opposition and see your beloved ideals attacked and belittled. But I know now that strength is one of my highest goals, and that my beliefs, my character cannot be strong without tempering both in the fires of ordeal. Ha! I wish to stand high atop the piled bodies of my defeated foes!

ANYWAYS, it's not a perfect article but it's damn close. I encourage you all to read it and consider it. Perhaps I'll expound upon it more when I get back from work...but I always say that, and it seldom happens. Let me know what you think about the article.