A World of Grey-Why Order is Crucial

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Some of what this man says contain truth. However, most of what he does say is representative of someone who has never taken an accurate look at Christianity and is blind to his own narcissism, the same he seeks to bring to light.

Recognizing the capacity of human beings to exact pure evil-slavery, genocide, fascism, white supremacy, murder, is in fact terror. We must be strong enough to look at atrocities such that we would also recognize our own capacity for evil. We are far closer than we would like to accept. The Bible addresses this with the same recognition of inherent evil. (“All have sinned, Dont love the world, The wickedness of man was great of the earth, No one is good.”) Yet, he then claims that racism and fascism are the result of a Judeo Christian world view. The twisting and inaccurate representation of a true Judeo Christian worldview may lead to atrocity, yet these are not the fault of the worldview but the twisting and marring of said belief system. As he recognizes, this is a result of our fallen state. However the true understanding of the Judeo Christian worldview as found in the Bible doesnt lend itself to any of the above. The opposite is found.

He also states that the world if the world is good and evil, and we are good, then someone must be evil. Here he most likely is attempting to dismantle Christianity by asserting that a christian might find himself as good and pure and thus separate himself and look down on the world- by recognizing all others as evil. This is not the truth found in Christianity. No one who has looked inward hard enough or had worked to understand true Christianity would claim he himself is good while condemning others. While we have the capacity for good, we recognize our evil nature. In the Bible, those who made such a claim as to be good or at least better than others around him were rebuked by Jesus. The point of recognizing an objective morality isn’t as a tool to lift oneself above the test but an act of submission and reverence to something far greater than ourself -something in which we can hope-something transcending our fallen, evil state.

While this guy spends his time attempting to conclude the world is grey, and absent of any objective good and evil, he uses words like light and darkness. He spends time on the importance of recognizing evil and atrocity in ourselves and others. Does this not contradict? Darkness and light cannot coexist. By labeling darkness and light, good and bad, isn’t this a recognition of a universally understood definition? If it is subjective, the result of your own invention, how could anyone know what you mean? When you say to recognize our capacity for evil, is this merely subjective definitions of evil? How do we know where to look? How can you call the world grey while recognizing these as existing?

He then addresses the idea of saying what you mean and believe, and being brave in it’s articulation. This is crucial in one’s ability to navigate the complexities of being and in particular when it relates to answering the questions of morality and what one should do. As human beings we have looked yo know where we are going, what are we aiming at, what are we doing and why? We must engage in this brave dialogue and exchange of idea-even at the risk of being wrong. (Modern college campuses are at a deficit in this regard; the creation of echo chambers doesnt lead to the discovery of truth especially in this regard). However the point of doing so is to subject your beliefs to criticism and question. You must be willing to place them into the forge of discourse and allow it to burn away the impurities; in the hopes that what is left might lend to your understanding of these important questions. Does what you believe have substance? Does it hold against scrutiny? The idea of saying what you believe at the risk and probability you will be wrong is encapsulated in the archetype of the fool. Not foolish in the derogatory and negative sense, but in a genuine, truthful and ardent sense. The utility of being a fool is such that you are then willing to constantly examine your beliefs, your idea of subjective morality, and recognize what is ill founded or wrong. However, this man claims that he is unwilling to move forward or away from what he believes. He is unwilling to change his beliefs in result to scrutiny or ”offense”. I cant imagine anything more narcissistic than the rejection of all phenomenology, the unwillingness to accept you may not have it all figured out, and the assertion ”I have done all the work, and my internal boundaries are the best source of my own moral truth”. This is at the source of all narcissism as the hidden hand of history! Colonialism is narcissism, and guess what, it arises from the same idea that ”what I personally find to be true is truth, and I dont need to subject my ideas to change under scrutiny.”

He then ends by saying we must recognize how both light and dark the world can be. Aren’t these categories of light and dark the same as those of good and evil? Can you not call light dark or darkness light? Or would that be indicative of a transcendent moral code… One that can be defined. One with edges and shape-a world where were are able to call the dark darkness, and the light, light?

The idea of subjectivity when it comes to ideas of morality may sound utopic and may be free of division. It is the easy answer. However a world without order, subject to the grey-a world in which nothing is everything and everything is nothing lends itself to madness. Envision the world and human experience as a field. We must figure out how to walk through the field. We cannot look at the field and derive a plan of how we are