Starting With Wrong View…Looks Like the Buddha Was Right About a Thing or Two
Once again, I was out and about, and a handful of folks were breaking the law and not masking indoors. I get so frustrated with folks not wearing masks. I get so angry. It’s not just because they put me in covid danger, its not just because they break the rules, a big part of my rage stems from the fact that, in my mind, these folks are just so damn inconsiderate! In my mind, they don’t care about the effects of their actions on others. They don’t care about creating a stable society. They can’t just suck it up and act in regard of others.
This ideal of consideration is actually a big core value of mine. I gravitate towards people, places, I view as considerate –like San Francisco — and I am repulsed, even physically sickened, by people and places I view as inconsiderate –like New York. Having reflected on it a bit in the past, I realize now that in my warped, funhouse mirror version of the world, I believe that if folks could just be basically considerate, the world would be a safe place. Folks who are considerate act in what Alana considers rational and predictable ways. They will modify themselves with regard to others, and be mindful of the effects of their behavior on others. Mostly then, society will self regulate. Harm will only come to those who deserve it; to people whose behaviors are so egregious, so naughty, that even the most considerate of us can no longer hold them in consideration. And whatever, who cares about those people anyway. Otherwise, outside of the freak random acts of nature and violence — -corner cases I need not worry my head on they are so unlikely to happen to me — I, a considerate and not egregious outlier, can feel like I am safe, on stable ground in a stable society.
Of course, the problem with this world view are so many…
First off, does considerate really equal safe? A while ago I read a book about an American POW captured and held in Japan: He felt lucky to have such polite and ‘humane’ captors, so much more civilized than the Germans for instance. They were the pictures of polite, considerate, right up till they vivisectioned him for scientific and medical research . In the end, the norms of polite and considerate Japanese culture doesn’t mean someone is safe in their society.
And then there is Covid: Even if everyone masks, distances, are fully considerate of their fellow citizens, does that really keep the virus from spreading? Plenty of people have caught covid in fully masked situations. The virus knows no consideration, even if the human hosts do.
Even if considerate did somehow equal safe, does everyone agree with Alana’s version of considerate? SF Alana liked to make small talk with baristas while standing in line for a coffee –I acknowledged them, their work, made a connection; that was considerate. But in NY where lines are long and everyone rushed, do the folks behind me really think a second wasted on small talk is considerate?
And then there is the deepest problem: I choose individual instances in time, details or occasions that confirm my view of the world, while willfully ignoring all the occasions and details that undermine my view of the world. I see times folks are considerate, and I build a fantasy of a considerate world. I see times consideration has outcomes I believe are desirable and I build a fantasy that considerate is innately desirable. I view consideration as driving predictable behaviors and I imagine a predictable world if folks are just considerate. And I take occasions where being able to predict what happens keeps me safe to build a fantasy that if just everything were predictable I could be safe. I ignore all the evidence to the contrary, and I come up with this paradigm of considerate society =safety, therefore considerate (by my definition) people are good. And all those other anti-masking assholes should just burn in hell, cast out from my orderly, safe and considerate society. And then, all will be happily ever after bliss…
But is this fantasy even a possibility? Does it agree with the fundamental nature of this world and the people in it? Humans are born because of desire. We want to become, to be, to build a self and get what we desire. With this at the core of our nature, why would I think people would regularly consider others and act in other people’s interests if it was in conflict with their own? When people act in the interest of others, we do it because we think it is ultimately in our best interest –it gets us something we want, or allows us to ‘be’ who we want; what we do, we do only if it aligns with our desires.
So isn’t it foolish of me to fixate on single instances of behaviors I see as considerate, and pretend they are the rules of the world, that the prove a state the world can ultimately achieve if we just toss out the asshole outliers? I take single instances of consideration, or predictability, or safety and use them to affirm my version of the world, my view of how things work. In fact they only affirm the actual rules of the world: that we all act in our interest, that sometimes we can predict, that sometimes we can avoid hard and, of course, that sometimes we can’t. That the world is impermanent and that we are slaves to craving.
In the end, my mind tricks me, I trick myself, to be distracted by details, to interpret them wildly in support of my view, when if I just look clearly they actually demonstrate that not only does this world not act in accord with my view, it never ever can/will. What needs to adjust isn’t this world, it can’t, it is already governed by a perfectly functional set of rules ( karma and the 3 common conditions) What needs to adjust is my view. Guess then this is a long, very round about way of my saying I think I may have just proven to myself why exactly we start with wrong view… looks like the Buddha may have been right about a thing or two .
