I'm going to start a series of musings, put up here to keep the blog a tad more interesting and alive and draw in more viewership (heck you guys might even actually learn something from these!1!311) So hooray.
So before that, here's a disclaimer: These opinions posted are mine and mine alone and are in no way reflective of what anyone else thinks. It's also fairly obvious who I am. So yes. These also aren't meant to attack anything/anyone and if you feel offended, you're probably being too uptight.
Oh but really, I might get a tad critical. If you can't stand people having a strong opinion, don't read on or you might get hurt :(
Anyway, we begin!
Inspired by http://theunichannel.blogspot.sg/2012/12/our-so-called-selflessness.html
I'll quickly summarise the post on the UniChannel: some random person went for some random thing, blabla some random stuff happened and some lecturer asked (and I quote) ‘Are we truly helping others or helping ourselves?’ in reference to volunteering and helping people in need. So this random person who is clearly somewhat unquestioning about widely-held beliefs (See also: sheeple) to have not considered this at all in his or her life suddenly faces a dilemma! Oh no! Teen-life crisis!
So s/he goes on to feel depressed because s/he always thought that altruism (something I'll cover later) exists but gosh her beliefs have been challenged by a single statement so she (and I quote) "got really lost in life and in the things [s/he did]. Like being a Volunteer Instructor for Red Cross Youth, helping a wheelchair person to cross the road and all the things I thought I did in the past which were good".
Ignoring the strange sentence structure, this person's LIFE basically just got flipped around by a single question that's so simple and yet s/he failed to consider for AT LEAST 16 years of his/her life. Oh and it's basically saying that s/he is confused as to whether or not s/he is helping others out and doing supposedly "good" things merely for her own self-gratification (google it up if you don't understand, kids) and for her own benefit. So the person's confused, conflicted, lost, blabla, very sad stuff.
But s/he comes to a conclusion! That made absolutely no sense at all! You can go read it yourself, but I believe what s/he's saying is something like the fact that one questions whether or not his intents are truely altruistic is good enough already and the person will somehow miraculously and magically find his way back to the right path! Whatever the heck that is. Whee.
The post then ends off with some irrelevant photo of some old woman carrying a kid in a blanket. With some weird quote about having hands to help yourself (that's what she said).
So - now begins the fun part (have you ever done dissection in bio? Oh wait, no, you're still little kiddies hoho but this is where I dissect her post)
ANYWAY, ignoring the fact that this person has SOMEHOW NOT CONSIDERED SOMETHING LIKE THIS FOR SO MANY YEARS OF HIS OR HER LIFE (an amazing feat in itself), the conclusion of the post is what gets me the most. It makes so many assumptions that even the assumption song (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TywmpMQYojs) can't compare.
Basically, it's saying that it's GOOD to be altruistic, that we should WANT to STRIVE towards being selfless and helping others for the sake of it. The audacity of someone to actually say this is galling.
Altruism: Pure altruism consists of sacrificing something for someone other than the self (e.g. sacrificing time, energy or possessions) with no expectation of any compensation or benefits, either direct, or indirect (e.g., receiving recognition for the act of giving). [Taken from Wikipedia]
OR
Ethical altruism: Altruism (also called the ethic of altruism, moralistic altruism, and ethical altruism) is an ethical doctrine that holds that individuals have a moral obligation to help, serve, or benefit others, if necessary, at the sacrifice of self-interest
OR
Altruism: Bulls!@# in its purest form.
Altruism is the practice of giving/helping others without expecting ANY form of reward to oneself, be it CIP hours or money or what have you. Furthermore, it's assumed that the less one gets from doing the good deed, the better it is.
Do you have any idea what that assumptions means? What it implies?
It means that the WORSE you feel and suffer when you're helping others, the BETTER the act is. If you do a good deed but feel good about yourself while doing it then HELL NO OH NO NO NO HOW DARE YOU FEEL GOOD THAT'S SELFISH!!!111111
So compare, for example, person A who helps a lot of people but feels like "hey i'm doing a good thing" and becomes happy because he's helping people due to his empathy, and person B who helps a lot of people at the expense of himself and he ends up feeling wretched, miserable and depressed and is never recognised for his works. Person B is the one that's more morally righteous! BUT if person B at any point of time feels good about what he does or thinks like "hey I'm doing this stuff to feel morally righteous" then his acts suddenly lose their value.
IN OTHER WORDS, the more you suffer due to your helping others, the better a person you are. So your goal in life is to SUFFER AS MUCH AS YOU CAN! Hooray!
If you STILL don't see a problem with that, feel free to pass me all of your money and belongings and live on the streets and suffer (no I'm kidding, please don't...pass it to a charity or something or I might get into trouble with your parents)
Ok but really, this philosophy EXPOUNDS leading a sad life, dedicated to OTHERS and you receive no form of reward at all for what you do. Why one would even believe that suffering is the ultimate good (see the problem there?) really is beyond my understanding.
Then we have ETHICAL altruism, which is the same as what I mentioned above but goes on to state that we have an OBLIGATION to help others. An obligation that pops out of nowhere and clings to us for life (like some unwanted girlfriend)!
In relation to this, let's look at one of the NE messages that no one actually gives a crap about, shall we?
"No one owes Singapore a living.
We find our own way to survive and prosper, turning challenge into opportunity."
Similarly, NO ONE OWES ANYONE A LIVING. Simple as that (unless you sign a contract or something saying that you owe some dood a living but that's pretty doubtful). We have no obligation to others, and there is in no way a necessity to SACRIFICE ourselves for the sake of OTHERS (I mean, there's no justification for where this obligation comes from, and lack of proof = doesn't exist. Like how we say there's no unicorns or dragons or women rights because there's no proof that there are and yes that's a joke don't get all uptight women rights exist women are great yay feminism!!)
Ultimately, the crux of the problem is this -- there seems to be this notion that being selfish is somehow inherently wrong. This notion that to help others in order to benefit yourself is IMMORAL and 'using' them (another idiotic phrase, everyone 'uses' each other anyway, that's the basis of any mutual relationship), while to do things that benefit yourself but not others is somehow morally acceptable. Probably stems from some random Confusian values or something (or was that Confucian) but it's just plain stupid. There is NOTHING wrong with "selfishness" - in fact some herald it as morally upright (google up ethical egoism). Humans are not born slaves to each other. We're not born into lives of servitude with the very purpose of our existence to suffer while attempting to bring joy into others' who's goals in life are also to suffer while bringing joy to others. Everything ends up being an orgy of misery and tears if we were to follow through with this ethical altruism crap and it just doesn't stand.
[a bit more philosophical part, if your brain's already been turned to mush feel free to go back to mapling or watching soccer or whatever it is]
The idea though, that to be "selfish" is to be evil is a funny one. All this, of course, leads back to purpose(s) in life, and that stems from what's objective. As far as I can tell, the only thing that's objectively good is happiness -- I mean really, that's pretty much the definition/idea of happiness. This means that anything that makes you happy is good (ethical egoism once again). Is this what people call selfishness? Perhaps. But those that would deem "selfishness" evil, those that would decry working hard for only oneself, are the true evil ones. They are the looters, the moochers, the ones that seek to live off those that have succeeded more than them. Ever seen people (P) whine about how rich people (RP) who come into their fortune rightfully "waste" their money on fancy cars and big houses and are therefore selfish and evil? True, it may not be necessary to waste money on nice cars and bungalows - but it's their money and their property and they can spend it any way they want and it's hardly "immoral" to do so. Then again somewhere in the P's narrow mind is this little thought that the money would be better spent if given to them by the RP, so yes.
Any ethical egoism does NOT mean that oh, everyone's selfish, oh everyone only cares for themselves and backstab each other and the world goes up in flames and fire!
In the words of James Rachels, "Ethical egoism [...] endorses selfishness, but it doesn't endorse foolishness." I may be an ethical egoist but still support, say, the development of schools in third world countries because that results in better education systems, improvements in those countries and eventual benefits to me. I may be an ethical egoist but still won't, for example, backstab people in order to get a promotion or something because ultimately that doesn't help me at all if I'm not capable enough for it and everything gets screwed anyway.
Anyway, this has been a long post, filled with many many different things, and you may have gotten lost somewhere along the way, but moral of the story is -- humans aren't and SHOULDN'T BE altruistic/selfless, and it's fine to be selfish and think for only oneself and his/her happiness. There's a lot more on this topic that I couldn't cover because that'd take a few thousand words more and I can't think properly at 3.40 in the morning, so I end off with a few interesting sentences from Wikipedia and google and all those fancy websites.
WIKIPEDIA: "Altruism, ultimately, denies an individual value and is therefore destructive both to society and its individual components, viewing life merely as a thing to be sacrificed. Rand is quoted as writing that, "[i]f a man accepts the ethics of altruism, his first concern is not how to live his life but how to sacrifice it."[12] Moreover, "[t]he basic principle of altruism is that man has no right to exist for his own sake, that service to others is the only justification for his existence, and that self-sacrifice is his highest moral duty, virtue or value." Rather, she writes, "[t]he purpose of morality is to teach you, not to suffer and die, but to enjoy yourself and live."
*Ayn Rand is an objectivist, the author of the books Atlas Shrugged and The Fountainhead - highly entertaining and enlightening reads, if not controversial. And yes Alfonse I know you think she's depraved or whatever
"Philosopher Friedrich Nietzsche suggested that egoistic or "life-affirming" behavior stimulates jealousy or "ressentiment" in others, and that this is the psychological motive for the altruism in Christianity. "
"All of our commonly accepted moral duties, from doing no harm unto others to speaking always the truth to keeping promises, are rooted in the one fundamental principle of self-interest."
"Other philosophers, such as Thomas Hobbes and David Gauthier, have argued that the conflicts which arise when people each pursue their own ends can be resolved for the best of each individual only if they all voluntarily forgo some of their aims - that is, one's self-interest is often best pursued by allowing others to pursue their self-interest as well so that liberty is equal among individuals. Sacrificing one's short-term self-interest to maximize one's long-term self-interest is one form of "rational self-interest" which is the idea behind most philosophers' advocacy of ethical egoism"
"Ayn Rand argued that there is a positive harmony of interests among free, rational humans, such that no moral agent can rationally coerce another person consistently with his own long-term self-interest."
Feel free to read the criticisms as well: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ethical_egoism#Criticisms
Interesting stuff really. I do hope you search up more on these and start thinking and questioning.
Oh and another moral of the long blog post is to question everything, because there are widely-held beliefs that have real basis and are just being blindly followed, and you might be one of those little sheep bleating to the beat of the masses (if you haven't already gathered, it's not good to be one of those).
Thank you for enduring through all that, and once again, if you got offended or anything, then learn to lighten up because even the original poster on the UniChannel is perfectly fine with this post.
