The Mechanics of Virtue by Matt Berry, aphorism 17

17
Some forms of cynicism are only an attempt to normalize the crisis of an adored authority who has just collapsed into a real human.  If one can secure the real as a vantage point then the figure escapes moral censure.  Just as it really is natural to be without clothing, one can justify his nakedness by appealing to the human in him, and thus recover from communal shame a sense of normalcy after all.  One creates a concept of realism, as a sort of conduit through which respect might continue to flow toward him, until, as is only natural, the very means of its survival in oneself undermines his self-importance — and so cleanly that he condemns one as a cynic and backs up the plumbing.    




A Human Strategy ** The Mechanics of Virtue ** Post-Atheism



Popular posts from this blog

A valuable book, A Human Strategy, aphorism 387

387 A valuable book may be torn to pieces without diminishing the human spirit, just so long as the words have already been read and understood.  To feel the loss of the book — at its material destruction, even though one had already digested its contents fully and had aligned oneself toward its overall direction — is evidence that one values the non-human being over human becoming , the static thing over the dynamic process .  In response to the fear of our unknowable future we would rather freeze ourselves into a single stage of growth at the expense of the entire metamorphosis. A Human Strategy ** The Mechanics of Virtue ** Post-Atheism
Read more
A benefactor's Moral Guide: what do you want that will not result in your ultimate dishonor?      ****    Meditation: "How do I get back to where I want to be?"
Read more

A theory of art

Interest is not in what you see. It’s in what you don’t see. It is sensed incompleteness completed reflexively by the spectator. It is a conflict in the otherwise imperceptible feeling that a sensory organ is “inadequate” … a mastery of scratching irritations, an “I” … “the” I. We love art the most when we scratch ourselves with what we view.  Art is valued at the interest that the passion from the incompletes in the work is instantly and successful satisfied by what the lover needs to sense … every time it senses the art.  A Human Strategy ** The Mechanics of Virtue ** Post-Atheism
Read more