On Moderation

(Yes, I know that sounds like something Aristotle would write. I was actually considering making the address of this thing meden-agan.blogspot.com, but it was already taken - apparently, I’m not the only weird person out there. So I made it a motto, at least. And I think starting out with an article like this is quite thematic.)

Everybody is talking about Israel these days, so it’ll look like I’m just swimming with the stream if I start this entry by talking about it, too. But it *was* this cause what inspired me to write this, even though it’s only distantly related.

It seems the whole of politically aware world is divided in two groups, pro-Israel and anti-Israel. You might say that it’s natural, on any topic, there will always be contrary opinions, and therefore groups of people who disagree with each other. But is this really a tertium non datur situation? On one hand, it would seem so. There’s Israel and there’s Palestine, and either you support one, or you support the other. On the other hand, your position can be – should be – more sophisticated than just this. Reducing it to the aforementioned principle means turning the whole thing into an ideological problem (I can perfectly understand why Israel and/or Palestine would be doing this, but I don’t quite get why supposedly unbiased onlookers should be), and making yourself a fanatic.

I see pro-Israel people claiming that there’s no humanitarian crisis in Palestine – probably believing that all the pictures are just from some sort of inversed Potemkin village – and reducing all Palestinians to crazy terrorists. I see pro-Palestine people declaring Israel to be blood-thirsty and lying bastards without any problems of their own, just bullying the weak Palestine. And I have to ask myself: is it really so difficult to see both sides of the story? Of course one might stay mostly pro-Israel or pro-Palestine (because being moderate, naturally, doesn't mean always standing exactly in the middle, or worse, having no opinion at all). But that doesn’t mean the former can’t see the mistakes they’re doing, the injustice and cruelty, does it? And the pro-Palestinian can still see the permanent danger Israel is in and the constant pressure, and understand the fear to show any kind of weakness, can’t he?

And of course, this is just one of many examples where this black-and-white mentality shows. Our recent elections were another example, and we don’t even have a two-party system – I don’t want to imagine what it must be like in the US (I’ve seen enough of it online to get the picture). People seem to think that as a rightist, one has to have the right (pun intended) opinion on everything, and vice versa. And what’s worse, that one has to consider the other opinion pure evil. But by accepting this stance, we stop being ourselves – unique, irreplaceable individuals – and reduce ourselves just to a representative of an opinion. And these are always expendables, never important.

Why even do it? Why take some of our positions – or all – and push them to the extreme? Is it because it’s simpler? To just decide between the two options – left/right, Israel/Palestine – and then act accordingly, and not to think about the nuances and particulars any more? Probably. Or we can make it even more simple and accept a whole set of opinions – I’ll be a liberal leftist, that means I’m pro-Palestine, I love Obama and I want same-sex marriage and abortion – and give up our individuality completely.

I’m talking about the death of an individual in such an approach, but there’s another problem. This attitude means reducing ourselves to fundamentalists and on principle excludes any rational discussion. Because we don’t really have an opinion on a particular situation, based on some particular rational facts, our belief just derives from “well, I’m pro-Israel, so I’ll think this way about it”. Which, of course, can hardly be disputed.

Now I know all this may sound a bit strange coming from a Catholic. You might say, but doesn’t the church mean exactly this? Accepting a set of beliefs just based on an authority, without examining them individually? Well, again, yes and no. First and foremost, my “second problem” doesn’t apply to this. It is faith we’re talking about. Of course it’s not up to rational discussion. That is not to say it goes directly against reason, but it’s not like any other opinion you hold, it’s not based on rational grounds and isn’t meant to. So in this way, it is indeed similar to the thing I’m discussing – and that’s why they talk about ideologies as pseudo-religious phenomena – but in this case, it’s not a problem. (If anyone desires to know why, let me know and I might write something about it some day, this is not the time and place.)

But what about the first problem? Doesn’t one loose one’s individuality when joining the church? Well some do, to be sure. The behavior I described can certainly be observed in the church, just as anywhere else. But one shouldn’t. Our dogmatic theology teacher likes to quote Chesterton to us (I can’t find the exact quote, but he said it like this): “Upon entering a temple, I remove my hat, but my head stays on my neck.” Each and every article of faith should be, in my opinion, carefully scrutinized by a believer to find out whether it’s acceptable for him. The role of the church as an authority is to present him with the things to scrutinize. It’s not about me wondering whether I would think of that on my own. I trust the church that much. It’s just to find out whether there isn’t any problem – in my reason or in my conscience – with the presented article of faith. Certainly, you may say that so far as we don’t look for the articles of faith ourselves, but let it be presented to us by the church, we loose our individuality. It is certainly a reasonable opinion, though I don’t agree. The way I see it, by accepting an authority – any authority – in this way, one becomes part of something bigger without loosing one’s individuality. But I’m well aware that opinions on this may differ, and I believe both are equally defensible.

But back to moderation. Or is this about moderation at all? I mean, so far I’ve been talking mostly about ideological thinking. Well, I find both things closely connected. Theoretically, it is possible to accept a moderate view in such a way, without any rational scrutiny. But somehow, it doesn’t happen, or at least very rarely. So is it really possible? The way I see it, moderate stance requires quite an amount of skepticism, constant thinking and reevaluating and never-ending rational scrutiny. As such, it’s in direct contradiction with what I’ve described above. However, I believe it is possible for someone to construct such a moderate view and then for other people to agree with him because, I don’t know, it’s cool at the moment. But these people wouldn’t continue in the intellectual effort that was put into it in the beginning, and thus what was originally moderate would soon turn extreme, too, for example by dogmatically maintaining the same opinions without considering what the opponents say. The position in itself would stay moderate (after all, that’s how most democratic parties work), but their approach to it as to something that is outside of them would be immoderate, because it wouldn’t be moderated by any rational evaluation.

And now to the other option: can someone arrive to being an extremist based on careful evaluation of the facts? Here, it is easier: I don’t believe so. Simply because the world is not black and white.

Somehow, this article, which was meant to be very moderate, seems to have turned into some sort of an ego-booster. Reading it, it feels like I’m trying to demonstrate my superiority over the dumb, ideological masses by showing how moderate and rational I am. So at the conclusion, I’d like to add two things. Firstly, that the necessity of rational scrutiny of everything doesn’t mean one can’t feel strongly about it. I even think it’s desirable – see the motto of this blog -, but in that, there *is* a conviction of the superiority of my way of doing things, so I’ll leave that out. What I want to say is that feelings are not inferior to reason. After all, it’s usually them who decide which side of the spectra we prefer (left or right, Israel or Palestine). The two just shouldn’t be mixed up. In my opinion, it’s not even like Plato’s painted it, the reason directing the feelings. I think it’s a circle, with the feeling directing the reason and the reason keeping the feelings in check. But that, too, would be a topic for an entire article.

And secondly, that I very often fail to live up to the ideal I’ve painted here. Yes, I do think I more or less manage to stick to it in the two cases I mentioned, but I’m sure I fail in many others. So, no arrogance here. Or at least, no that much.