The Topic of Denying Existential Realitites and the Resulting Moral Implications

[King David]

I was just giving this topic a good think and was hoping for some feedback on my logic.

 

I remembered Milan Kundera's epic sexual archetype bible The Unbearable Lightness of Being.  He points out that a denial of one's own waste is an existential denial of one's self, as he references Yakov Stalin who during his dismay on where the captive allied officers he was sharing prison facilities with complained about his sanitary practices, he accidentally on purpose runs himself into an electric fence. Tragic. 

 

This is where my amateur comes out(of course Stefan would be aware of this somewhere shortly after the T in the title),  but if that is the case, and one were to equate this metaphor, or maybe say example to the level of a community or a nation what do you think would be the moral implications.

 

First that comes to my mind is that principly a community must remove its waste, which archeologically, or philosophically, or sociologically or with any other ology that must be the case.

 

So my postulate (I believe that is the word here) is that the state or government should naturally seek out to control this service as it is central to everyone and is something everybody has in common.  In fact archeologically your waste defines your culture, and I would think existentially also. 

 

Here is where it gets creepinglly ere in my mind, is I think that the creation of governments often ran a parallel course with Mafia in the business of Trash Removal, and of course later establishing Currencies and whatever else the Romans could invent for a new field of coersion that Government and Mafia could operate tandem in.

 

So if you can agree that at least some of this were accurate history or philosophy what would that mean to us who live in the quasi-police state/intelligent mafia democroncy? is what I'm asking you.

 

I would think that a community that cannot accurately acknowledge its waste, or it's common threads would suffer in ability to make clear definitions and give licence to crooks and politicians alike to run our basic needs and weaknesses amok and ultimately hold us hostage to them. 

 

That seems sufficient enough description of governments today for me.

 

King David

[ThoseWhoStayUofM]

I'll just be the first to say, I have no idea what you're talking about.  I've never heard of Milan Kundera and certainly never read his epic sexual archetype bible, The Unbearable Lightness of Being.  That being said, I'm going to go ahead and try to address your points ignorantly regardless... because this is the internet and that's what the internet is for.The first assertion is that a denial of one's waste is a denial of one's self, existentially.  Firstly, I have no clue what it means to deny your own waste?  Secondly, I don't think it's possible to deny one's self.  The act of denying implies a self that is the thing that is doing the denying.  Therefore, it is truly baffling how or why a person would make the claim that a denial of one's waste (whatever that actually means) is a denial of one's self (a physical impossibility).  I mean, is the denying of one's waste the same thing as removing it?  This post is a convoluted mess.

[King David]

I'll just be the first to say, I have no idea what you're talking about.  I've never heard of Milan Kundera and certainly never read his epic sexual archetype bible, The Unbearable Lightness of Being.  That being said, I'm going to go ahead and try to address your points ignorantly regardless... because this is the internet and that's what the internet is for.

 

The first assertion is that a denial of one's waste is a denial of one's self, existentially.  Firstly, I have no clue what it means to deny your own waste?  Secondly, I don't think it's possible to deny one's self.  The act of denying implies a self that is the thing that is doing the denying.  Therefore, it is truly baffling how or why a person would make the claim that a denial of one's waste (whatever that actually means) is a denial of one's self (a physical impossibility).  I mean, is the denying of one's waste the same thing as removing it?  This post is a convoluted mess.

 

In the phrase denying your waste, I mean to say not acknowledge your basic functions.  If you had read the book like you say, you would understand that what I was trying to avoid saying is that Kundera explains Stalin's sons sanitation practices as somewhat lacking.  He shit all over the place, the inmates complained and when he could not believe that someone so inferior to him thought he was unsanitary he more or less committed suicide.

 

Philosophically,  his ego could not bear the disgrace, and this would be the extreme case where one could "deny oneself".  For example if your ego cannot fathom that your body is capable of producing filth and your shit does not stink, you are denying existential realities was what I meant.

 

You choose to avoid the historical substance of the post in that governments and mafia has cohorted to control trash removal throughout human history which is not unimportant to my point.

 

The point is that our inability as a society to recognize as a society that it is our filth that we create is what we all have in common, and because of this denial we cannot assume moral control over our governing bodies that in theory are created by us and meant to serve us.

 

The moral and ethical state of modern governments are a result of our compulsive desire to view the world through rose tinted glasses and to never claim responsibility for the flotsam and jetsam that is associated with living.

 

It's like saying that you are interested in your wellbeing and health but never addressing the state of your stool. 

 

So now I got to use all the words I didn't want to have to say, and I'm guessing I lost you from your first read anyways. 

 

Smell you later;)

 

[ThoseWhoStayUofM]

In the phrase denying your waste, I mean to say not acknowledge your basic functions.  If you had read the book like you say, you would understand that what I was trying to avoid saying is that Kundera explains Stalin's sons sanitation practices as somewhat lacking.  He shit all over the place, the inmates complained and when he could not believe that someone so inferior to him thought he was unsanitary he more or less committed suicide.

 

Philosophically,  his ego could not bear the disgrace, and this would be the extreme case where one could "deny oneself".  For example if your ego cannot fathom that your body is capable of producing filth and your shit does not stink, you are denying existential realities was what I meant.

 

You choose to avoid the historical substance of the post in that governments and mafia has cohorted to control trash removal throughout human history which is not unimportant to my point.

 

The point is that our inability as a society to recognize as a society that it is our filth that we create is what we all have in common, and because of this denial we cannot assume moral control over our governing bodies that in theory are created by us and meant to serve us.

 

The moral and ethical state of modern governments are a result of our compulsive desire to view the world through rose tinted glasses and to never claim responsibility for the flotsam and jetsam that is associated with living.

 

It's like saying that you are interested in your wellbeing and health but never addressing the state of your stool. 

 

So now I got to use all the words I didn't want to have to say, and I'm guessing I lost you from your first read anyways. 

 

Smell you later;)

 

Firstly, I said I didn't read the book.  Secondly, if you are going to introduce a new topic on a public forum, it's intuitively obvious that you should define your terms and not make the assumption that everybody has read some obscure book with an exceptionally long title.Jiddu Krishnamurti has said, "The ability to observe without evaluating is the highest form of intelligence."  If what you say is true, Stalin's son threw fecal matter everywhere, was told that others disapproved of this behavior, and then he killed himself.  You have evaluated these observations to imply causation between them.  His lack of sanitation CAUSED people to complain which CAUSED him to commit suicide.  Alternatively, he could just be crazy.  Crazy people throw feces everywhere.  Crazy people kill themselves.Jiddu Krishnamurti has also said, "Is the ending of the self, death?  Death in the ordinary sense of the word... it's not obviously.  The self is non-existence.  There is no identification of any kind, with experience, with belief, with country, with wife, husband, with Allah.  Is that death?  People who say, 'If I don't identify myself with my something-or-other, then I'm nothing."  So, they are afraid of being nothing, and then identify.  But nothingness, which is not a thing, is quite a different state of mind."So any definition that you can give "the self", which is why defining terms is so important and why, if you do that, you will see no coherent argument can be made, gives the same logical conclusion.  The self is nothing more than an identification one makes in fear of being nothing at all.Now let's talk about human waste.  The smell is unpleasant to the vast majority of rational individuals on this planet.  Therefore, these individuals that make up societies have concluded that if will be in everybody's best interest to separate ourselves from our waste.  By this I mean, life becomes more pleasant for everybody by separating ourselves from our waste.  The question then arises about who will be the one to remove our waste from our societies.  A social institution exists that can handle this public service called, "government".  To assume that there is anything deeper, philosophically or psychologically, void of reason and evidence, is to deny rational thought.

[King David]

My apologies, here is the piece in question that should have been the focal point of my original post, I was reaching out to see if someone else had encountered the work and could relate to the philosophy. "Captured by the Germans during the Second World War, he was placed in a camp together with a group of British officers. They shared a latrine. Stalin’s son habitually left a foul mess. The British officers resented having their latrine smeared with shit, even if it was the shit of the son of the most powerful man in the world. They brought the matter to his attention. He took offence. They brought it to his attention again and again, and tried to make him clean the latrine. He raged, argued and fought. Finally, he demanded a hearing with the camp commander. He wanted the commander to act as arbiter. But the arrogant German refused to talk about shit. Stalin’s son could not stand the humiliation. Crying out to heaven in the most terrifying of Russian curses, he took a running jump into the electrified barbed-wire fence that surrounded the camp. He hit the target, His body, which would never again make a mess of the Britishers’ latrine, was pinned to the wire."(Milan Kundera – The Unbearable Lightness of Being (1984) I was thinking that the philosophy transcends the piece and this phenomenon relates to the perceived necessity of mafia, and governments (in that order). You talk about the removal of waste like it is a rational conscious decision, it is not. You also think that it should be the concern of society and government provide this service, why? If I created waste and hired my neighbor to dispose of it with a shovel, I would suspect that he should charge me dearly for the service, because like you say "The smell is unpleasant to the vast majority of rational individuals on this planet." Now if some organization, say the mafia approaches me and offers me the service at reduced rate, simply because they don't think that my waste smells that bad, then what does that say about that organization? Firstly, I applaud the reduced fee's, secondly, I psychologically relate to the organization as they are now pumping my tires to make it seem less of a burden to take care of my shit. Fast forward a couple thousand years, throw in a couple modern conveniences and what are you looking at?  Modern government is nothing more than a glorified Mafioso turd gobbler, with fringe benefits of military industrial complex, and fiat currency.  

 

"It would seem that nature, which has so wisely ordered the organs of our body for our happiness, has also given us pride to spare us the mortifications of knowing our imperfections"

-Fancois VI Duc De La Rochefoucauld King David

[fridolutin]

About waste and natural economy

 

one of the major unsustainable habits of the urban man, the fact he doesn’t give back as other wild living creatures his loan from the earth at  birth, neither  pays interest on it during his lifetime. 

 

If he would give back at death his loan he wouldn’t burry or burn his body, he would give it back to the soil so that nature could use it trough the digestive creatures to reinvest in generating life.  The interest on the loan man should pay during his lifetime are the dejections, from the digestion of the food and water he consumes, and like for his corpse they should go back to the soil, unpolluted from artificial contaminants. 

 

As you maybe know this sane retribution is not done, the deceased are often embalmed with toxic chemicals, buried to deep and in coffins or burned. The food is treated with synthetic concentrated chemicals and the urban treatment plants won’t filter heavy metals and pharmaceutic molecules. 

 

In that sense wastes have an existential corrolaire. 

[Josh F]

it begs the question, does the state shit?  Anarcho-existentialism. 

[King David]

it begs the question, does the state shit?  Anarcho-existentialism.

 

They shit all over everyone