The Myth of Morality

This post is inspired by the last fifteen minutes of listening to Matt Drudge on his Sunday night talk show. Here's the setting:

I turn on my radio to listen, as I sometimes do on Sunday nights, to Matt Drudge. I listened for fifteen minutes and in disgust turned the radio off. What set ME off was the content of his program. Matt Drudge is fond of criticizing Hollywood for its skewed perceptions of reality. He also likes ridiculing "liberals" and other "democrats" in American politics for their skewed or "melodramatic" perceptions of reality. This evening, Matt ranted about violence in Hollywood media and played, over the air, a narrated video clip of a mob viciously attacking a prostitute: stripping her naked and beating her to the ground. He bemoaned the "ethos" of the videographer who pleaded with the mob to let him capture the scene on video. Drudge condemned the immoral and sex obsessed mentality of Hollywood media producers... but then he added that the listener might visit his website (@Matt Drudge .com) to view the "pornographic" video clip. Nice touch, Matt.

SO here's my take. Personally, I have no doubt that our American society is FUBAR, as in FUCKED UP BEYOND ALL RECOGNITION. But how dare Drudge condemn "Hollywood" for its sensationalistic posture when he supports a political body that ARBITRARILY MANUFACTURES the excuses for war, sits idly by as short-sighted political policies send thousands of American citizens to their death (not to mention the over 100,000 Iraqis that have left this earth), and maintains a xenophobic and ultimately suicidal platform that supports and promotes the existence of nuclear weapons. In short, the primates that govern our country are ignorant beyond belief, and quite frankly it pisses me off that those who would stand so proudly for "moral standards" simultaneously wallow in a shallow, dogmatic perspectives.

So here it is, folks: Morality is a MYTH: WE subjectively construct the architecture of our beliefs. If anyone doubts this, they need only open their eyes to the raw function of human civilization. "Morality" provides a framework for social integration, but this framework varies from culture to culture and person to person. "Morality" establishes a system of boundaries for cultural behavior, but during times of crisis, i.e. social confict, "morality" is EASILY inverted to accomodate the realities of war and politically driven bloodshed. The point is, ultimately, our "moralities" mean NOTHING when we can so easily distort them to conform to our biased cultural demands. Of course, saying that "morality is a myth" doesn't mean that people can't believe in morality; indeed, humanity's historical "myths" were all once conceived as "sacred" material. Humans have always believed in "myths"; myths are a cultural extension of our creative minds. People believe whatever they need to believe to survive, even if this means taking our most sacred beliefs and (figuratively) RIPPING THEM TO SHREDS for the sake of maintaining the illusions of control and survival.

So, morality is a myth, on par with economic mythology, (i.e. material wealth and capitalism), not to mention race, language, popular icons, religious icons, and even science (although, unlike most myths, science at least exists to DISPROVE its own assertions). Although morality is mythological in nature, this doesn't mean that we shouldn't establish moral boundaries; it only means that we should closely examine WHY we believe what we believe and how this perspective fits into the BIG PICTURE, that is, cosmological existence.

We humans live on ONE Earth. This Earth is a LITERAL island within the extremely hostile environment of space. Some might say that this Earth was given to us by a Creator; I'm partially obliged to accept this as truth. I maintain my own spiritual faith, but I take this faith very seriously. It sickens me when other "believers" corrupt the foundations of faith that I have grown from. It sickens me that within this miraculous journey called "LIFE ON EARTH" we humans get so wrapped up in what we think we NEED that we forget the precious value of what we actually HAVE. War and violence have always been a part of the human experience on Earth. We have within our creative spirit the power to see beyond our misconceptions and to build a world that recognizes the miracles of life itself. For me, the perfect example of how to do this is exemplified in the life of Jesus Christ. Yet, often I feel that, although "Christianity" is one of the world's largest religions, most "Christians" exercise an empty and dogmatic faith, especially when the shit hits the fan and terrible things force us to ask questions like, "Why?". When our society so easily discards compassionate faith for survival instinct, I am reminded of the raw holographic nature of cultural belief, and, well, sometimes I just want to be an atheist. Let the primates have their mythological gods.

In conclusion, I've decided to take the themes of this blog to "eleven" (in Spinal Tap terms). More on this later... in the meantime, question everything, combat ignorance with knowledge, communicate experience, and grasp the meaning of life on Earth... because although we are merely human, we are alive, and this is in and of itself a most significant miracle.