Blame

I am starting to write at 22.45pm and in order to maintain my status as an Inkhaven resident I must have 500 words by 12.00am. This is annoying. This is annoying in particular because this has happened many times this week, and during each of these instances I resolved that this would not happen again. Resolved in a semi-conscious manner.

A similar flavour of thing can happen when I play computer games. Play computer game → resolve to not play computer game in future → play computer game in future → rinse and repeat.

This is annoying. But it is also quite hinteresting.

Often the resolution happens before the naughty action eg. resolve to not play computer game tomorrow → play computer game now (which is not yet tomorrow, and so allowed by the terms and conditions specified).

And also, often the resolution comes with some sort of blame or judgement seasoning. Like, yes, that was, or even will be, a bad/ naughty action.

I spoke to a guru about this once and he said something like, ‘the judgement is part of the pattern’. How very hinteresting. Here’s how I make sense of this:

Blame or judgement is a form of rejection. It’s kind of like saying ‘Yes, well this thing is aberrant’. It’s not what is supposed to happen.

If I have a plan for some sort of thing, let’s say I want to get a post posted by a certain date. However, I also need to have someone else, Judy, give some comments before I post it. Which they do not do, and thus my plan does not come to fruition. It does not bear the fruit. Sad.

One thing I can do now is blame or judge Judy. The plan would have worked, but Judy did a bad. And one useful feature of doing such judgy blaming is that I don’t need to change my overall strategy for the future. After all, this was aberrant. I am not to blame, Judy is to blame.

Likewise, when I resolve to not play computer games, it seems like the blamey judging seasoning is a necessary ingredient for the resolution dish. The blamey judging means the naughty action, eg. playing computer game, can be separated from me, or at least the part of me that is doing the resolving. And this separation means that I can believe in the resolution, whilst also having just done the naughty action or being about to do the naughty action, and ultimately both have my cake and eat it. Twice as delicious!

Without the separation, one is left with the glaring contradiction between resolving to not play computer game whilst being about to play computer game. Things do not like having contradictions within them, and this will lead to a ‘neither can live whilst the other survives’ type scenario. And at most one cake.

I think this is a solution to the problem of evil. Or at least vaguely related. My understanding of the problem of evil:

God, as traditionally conceived, is both a nice bloke and has a magic wand which means he can do basically anything he wants. But, bad things happen. Which means either God isn’t a nice bloke or doesn’t have a magic wand. In either case, God cannot exist as traditionally conceived.

For the heathens among us, this is all well and good. Though I think there’s also a psychological problem of evil. Basically, it seems to me that the way people’s psychology works is that they need to believe, roughly, that they are good, and that things broadly will turn out good.

But, bad things tend to happen, which is annoying, and in particular annoying for the belief that things will broadly turn out good. This circle can be squared by judgement and blame. Ah yes, bad things happen, but they happen over there! Where over there is in another person, or a past self which one no longer identifies with, or a part of oneself which one rejects.

Brene Brown says that people are doing the best that they can. I think there’s a sense in which this is true. And if it’s true it means people are in some fundamental sort of way, not blameworthy. Which also seems true to me.

I think this is a beautiful way to view the world, and is also hard to bear. It seems to me that blame allows one to live in a fantasy world where things happen as they should, and without blame one is not shielded from the reality of badness.