What is forgiveness? Is it used to make ok the behaviours of some whom do not deserve it? Why are we taught as children to, turn the other cheek, forgive and forget, make amends at someone’s death bed? Is it doing more damage than good to the human race? Is it creating more and more monsters who over time aren’t making this existence something that makes us feel good and more one that causes so much pain and suffering for no apparent reason a lot of the time it’s not funny? Why do most actions seem to be an intentional act to cause damaging and sometimes irreversible effects on those who cross paths with us? Why if pain causes such an adverse effect in us do we find the one who will hurt us the most time and time again? Why do we stick it out and fight a little harder for our abusers? Why do we turn a blind eye to people who are not as strong as us being played with like a cat will taunt a baby bird before it kills it and walks away? Not because it was hungry and more so because it could? Are we just teaching people through forgiving them that we are weak and in fact that this is really what people want?
The human condition. What is the human condition? For the most part, it is comprised of all the things a human experiences such as birth, growth, emotion, aspiration, conflict and mortality. It’s been a way for philosophers to make sense of who and what we are and a meaning behind why we exist in this time and space. Darwin and Plato were two who explored the human condition in some capacity and if people took the time to read what they wrote, they might find it’s more relevant to us as humans now than ever before.
Within my own mind, the dialog is for the most part, conflicting and besides recognising people who also feel the same and grabbing a hold of them, I don’t really know what to do. I truly like who I am as a person. In saying that, I am not perfect. I am what I am but if I had the choice to be here from birth, knowing what I know now, I would say no. For every year now that I’ve existed, that answer for me has becomes more and more confirmed. Something tells me I might have known the entire time? I was born blue with the cord wrapped around my neck and for as long as I can remember, I have had thoughts of not existing. Whether that was a symptom of my childhood or me being a little more intuitive than most I don’t know. All I know is the thought of not being anything anymore brings a sense of relief to me and in a lot of way.
So why would we punish and humiliate those who feel the same way or take their own lives? Maybe they worked out this is not where we find content? Maybe a true sense of peace and calm actually comes when we no longer exist at all?
I was born in 1985. Since then, 12 philosophers have died, and this is how:
- 1986 – Simone de Beauvoir – Pneumonia.
- 1990 – Louis Althusser – Heart attack.
- 1994 – David Stove – Suicide.
- 1994 – Sarah Kofman – Suicide.
- 1994 – Guy Debord – Suicide.
- 1995 – Gilles Deleuze – Suicide.
- 1998 – Dimitris Liantinis – Suicide.
- 2000 – Willard Van Orman Quine – Alzheimer’s disease.
- 2001 – David Lewis – Diabetes.
- 2004 – Jacques Derrida – Pancreatic cancer.
- 2007 – André Gorz – Joint suicide with his wife.
- 2017 – Anne Dufourmantelle – Drowning.
If the total amount of suicides worldwide are 4.8% then what are they discovering about the ‘human condition’ that has meant that 50% of them have taken that very life they have spent a so long trying to understand?
I desperately want to be back with my son so do I want to push this subject in my own mind and risk working out what the human condition really means?
In the end it was said best in Alice in Wonderland I guess, “How strange it is to be anything at all.”
DIARIES FROM DOMESTIC VIOLENCE 