Against

My grandmother always laughed at politically involved people. Especially those who would march in the streets on every available occasion. She vividly recalled how, in the tumultuous times shortly before WWII, folks of various political affiliations, be they shitty brown shirts, sick sickle-hammerites, or those supposed moderates somewhere in between, although all under a different flag, shouted in unison, “We are against!”

But when she asked, “Against what?” they all always replied the same, “We don’t know, but we are against!” Of course, that “we don’t know” part was almost never literal — just a mishmash of vacuous slogans and incomprehensible, twisted reasoning — but that was all she ever needed to make up her mind with regards to politics.

Sadly, politics is merely the most obvious facet of our “against” culture.

For few millennia already, contrarianism dominates everything. From art, philosophy, or discourse on metaphysics, all the way to the more “down-to-earth” aspects of our lives such as e.g. justice, health care, or the very social structures we are all entangled in. And of course, there’s always that pesky economy, which, like politics, cannot survive without conflict of opposing interests. No relationship is spared.

People throw beliefs and opinions at each other as if they were facts. And the more extreme an opinion, the more extreme the response. It all seems like a laughing matter, but only until one realizes that the monkeys are dead serious.

But responses are not answers, just antipoles. And that’s a huge difference.

If humans only knew how to be just for.