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'Who, What Generates Serious Loving? Summary.' sLoving -
As I said yesterday, and this is a summary of the more detailed version that's up today, but hopefully this is what you should really focus on. I need in order to guide my own life, understand were Loving comes from.
In the same way that the first-order priority for photosynthesis is the availability of appropriate levels of sunlight, and the first-order priority for basic human life is water and food, the analogous substance for objectively, for all humane life, is loving, the creative orientation as opposed to the destructive orientation, the giving orientation as opposed to the selfish orientation. My life's been devoted to exploring and discussing, and living this so I will not belabor it now. But yesterday and today is my next stage at what for me is an important look at - where does Loving come from? I have no illusions that this analysis is precise, but I suspect that by orders of magnitude, I'm experiencing that by orders of magnitude it is useful for me, might be useful for you.
My starting point was individuals. I'm an individual and was and am trying to understand who are the people I can model myself after, attempt to Model myself, to create myself after; that have fundamentally increased the level of loving on planet Earth.
And quite frankly yesterday and today has been a depressing sobering and empowering view that maybe no one ever has. As you can see I've looked at individuals and then moved on to look at movements, organizations, and professions. I've looked the number of individuals, my guess, my estimate, that are saved per year. A Jesus was instrumental in saving me and yet he's been dead for 2000 years. Also, the number destroyed per year not to be laid at Jesus feet, but the abomination called c'ristianity created after him has been responsible for the death of millions like 12 million native Americans in the name of Spanish c'ristianity. So how many are destroyed? That was explicitly, how many collaterally? (see column in photo) So by virtue of Christian fundamentalism, which is about anything everything except for loving. I'm not suggesting malice of forethought here, but how much Loving is destroyed by the existence of such things? If one then subtracts as I have from saved per year - destroyed per year - collateral damage per year one comes up with, I came up with a 'net saved' and for this summary this chart is sorted by this column 'net saved.' And then the final column I looked at, and I was quite surprised when I thought of the King or a Gandhi, I thought of people that saved, that is moved from dead head and flesh, are addictive head and flesh, into the part of our nervous system Heart, tens, hundreds of thousands, millions of people. But my focus now is showing me that, well, short-term they did that, but not long-term. So let's look now, quickly, at the types of things I looked at , and I'll guess there are 50 or more. A loving rich, example rich environment - an aboriginal village maybe, maybe among the closest we have in this country is an Amish village. A natural predisposition toward loving. Who knows why one person in a family might be incredibly loving, like the story Little Women, where Beth is this incredibly loving individual, and the rest are pretty normal, but not heroes of loving. What seems to be a natural predisposition. A True need rich environment. Jesus the man as distinct Christianity. Christianity repulsed Gandhi. But Jesus was his greatest hero of loving. Saintly parents; the sociologist Pitirim Sorokin, his studies indicated that most saints, most heroes of loving come from a family with saintly parents. More broadly the Saint-rich life. Buddha. Teresa of Calcutta. Extreme emergency. A great academic who walks along like Norman Finkelstein. A Lust-poor environment, as opposed to a lust-rich environment ( a New Orleans, a part of the city rich with crack, or bars, or liquor stores is a lust-rich environment by comparison. So I looked at Gandhi, Obama's, MLK, Egyptian revolutionaries, Mandela, Albert Schweitzer, the psychologists that I considered great psychologists, teachers, men and women in uniform, philosophers sports figures, media figures, business people. Again these photos, this video, are sorted by the net number of people saved per year. So let's start there.
Loving rich example rich environment on planet Earth I'm guessing produces the most, 1000 per year, net loving people, I don't know. That's my immediate guess. The unexplained, I don't think it is biological, I think it is more largely the interpretation or choice but in any case, relatively unexplained; why is someone predisposed toward loving, why is Beth in Little Women so predisposed toward loving? So the one that we can't really explain, or hope to replicate, whereas the rich, loving environment we both can and should, if we really care about anyone. A true need rich environment. The psychologist Csikszentmihalyi, through his global studies, found a village in Italy, present-day Italy, up in the Alps, no electricity, relatively primitive, everyone was needed from time to get up in the morning till the time they went to bed in this agrarian town. Aboriginal natives maybe the same. How counter intuitive, we rush with our science to make resource rich environments which makes everyone really superfluous, everyone unnecessary.
The man Jesus created Gandhi, and along with my biological father created me, created Teresa of Calcutta, created King as near as I can see - it wasn't Paul, it wasn't John, it wasn't the apostles, tho they may have played a role, and it wasn't any 'Divine' Jesus, it was the man Jesus, who also inspired Tolstoy, the creator of Gandhi and maybe King. Saintly parents - Sorokin's studies indicated produce the most saints. More broadly a saint rich life. Maybe the lucky child that properly interprets the more healthy religious upbringing. I'm impressed by the self immolating of the monks, not self immolation itself, but it strikes me as heroic humanity. Seems to me it may be the most benign, most loving-creating of the religions.
Teresa of Calcutta - her nonpolitical, damn, let's go love the neediest. My respect is, to my surprise, has been high for her, but it's growing. Extreme emergencies can bring out the best in us, and some of that can be sustained. A great academic like the heroic Jew, standing up for Palestinians, Norman Finkelstein, a heroic academic life and the courage to walk the walk. Lust-poor environments, like parts of the city that aren't filled with crack, and bars and brothels. Temptation poor environments like the Amish Farm.
Let's see if there are any surprises. The Tunisian self immolator that created the Arab spring. My point is not to denigrate him but it won't be a long-term impact in terms of creating loving people. It will move some people out of physical poverty, is that bad? No, but it is not enough. Great intellectuals like Chomsky and Zinn who for much of their life haven't walked the walk in any heroic way - no significant difference. These are people that I've admired, they've helped me, but no massive difference there.
The men and women in uniform. There's a surprise to most people, although not to me or to Gandhi. They don't take the job to kill; they take the job to put their bodies between those potential victims and people and harm.
The religions are an abomination. When we look at the collateral damage, the 12 million native Americans killed, the Palestinians being tortured by so-called Jews, the suicide bombers and other terrorists, the brutalization of women by Muslims. And here's the great Killers, the business people. Is business bad per se? It's potentially the most altruizing of environments. But by and large we use it as our religion and it destroys loving.
I'll try and put this spreadsheet up online with a link in the description of this video so you can explore this explore this further.
Something else that I found interesting, which I think I suspected, but I've not looked at nearly as clearly as I am now - the people that I've revered - Gandhi, Martin Luther King Jr., what I wasn't seeing was how incredibly short-lived their altruizing effect was. This is not to diminished them, but it is to separate that when the goal is fundamentally material, political, liberating Libya, or bringing civil rights, when that is the explicit goal, as opposed to bringing love itself which was Jesus' goal, it may have, and it has had at times, a tremendous altruizing effect, moving people from head and flesh, to Loving, but that's not good enough. Whereas the man Jesus, who is understood by some, to simply have been a champion of loving, which can't be done in a cave; Teresa's definition remains the best I've seen. To paraphrase and take a little bit of liberty she said - love is that which cannot remain passive in the face of suffering. Love is that which runs toward suffering, to eliminate it. But her goal, and Jesus goal, was to create more loving. And an that seems to be what is the most persistent. The other heroes, the Tunisian self immolator, Francis of Assisi, whose heroic humanity has otherwise been diminished by association with a corrupt church; the people I've so admired - short-term loving they've created, but not long-term.
Something I've been very concerned with, we all should be, is destruction in the in eco-war, Earth liberation front ELF, deep green resistance, DGR, Derrick Jensen's thrust. These aren't to be denigrated; what Gandhi most reviled was not physical violence; it was cowardice, but I can't think of a time when such destruction hasn't moved people away from loving. I just don't see it as other than a self-defeating, suicidal strategy.
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