Self-Righteous

 

On Pages 90 and 91of his book, The Passionate State of Mind, Eric Hoffer has written six entries which I quote and then comment on.

 

Hoffer: “          156

 

The chief taint of self-righteousness is not its injustice but its insensitivity. The indulgence of self-forgiving is far less vicious than the blindness of self-righteousness which is naught aware of aught in the self which needs forgiving.”

 

My response: The most menacing personality disorder belongs to Progressive and true believers of any ilk in that they are so self-righteous. Not only are true believer the most cruel of thugs when the kill or maim for their holy cause, but they are sententious, actually regarding themselves as noble, superior, kind and idealistic.

 

They conclude, because they are so perfect, they could not possibly ever act in a way that renders at fault and in need of resolution. So it is that passionate fanatics, the most evil human type, are also the most self-righteous, as their most damaging lie is that they are a moral elite helping humanity. It is impossible to reach such people as to the error of their ways; they must just be defeated.  

 

 

Hoffer: "      157

 

Lack of self-awareness renders us transparent. A soul that knows itself is opaque; like Adam after he ate from the tree of knowledge it uses words as figs leaves to cover its nakedness and shame."

 

My response: Ultra-groupists are pure liars, so they possess know self-awareness, so they are thin and transparent. The soul that knows itself is indvidualistic, realistic and self-awareness, but she must fight the natural tendency to equivocate and dodge explaining who she is, warts and all, if she would will to remain virtuous, honest and ethical.        

 

Hoffer: "      158

 

We can see through others only when we can see through ourselves."

 

My response: If one is a sincere, honest, truth-embracing individualist, then one sees through oneself, and by extension, can see through others.

 If one, instead, is mendacious, dishonest, and lying to the self, then one cannot see through oneself, and then will not be able to see through others, thus lying joiners are credulous beyond belief accepting as gospel whatever narrative their groups espouses. 

Hoffer: "      159

No one is truly literate who cannot read his own heart."

My response: One is not an authentic or functioning individualist or individuator unless one embraces and seeks know what is true about the self."

 

 

Hoffer: “          160

 

The most sensitive among us cannot be as observant of themselves as the least sensitive are observant of others.”

 

My response: Hoffer, the implicit promoter of egoist morality, here is very accurate the most sensitive among us (self-actualizers and developing individualists and loners) are not as observant of themselves as are the least sensitive are among us (the least sensitive are wholly group creatures, so the self for each of them does not exist, so they know nothing about themselves), who are very observant of other group members. I would describe these true-believing ultra-groupists as socially sensitive but not individually sensitive in the way that Hoffer is talking about.

 

 

Hoffer: “          161

 

It will perhaps never possible to speak our inner life in precise scientific terms. Can one laugh at oneself or pity oneself in scientific terminology. The choice is between poetry and aphorism. The latter is probably the less vague.”

 

My response: Our consciousness or inner life cannot be captured or neat, linguistically encapsulated with scientific terms and propositions. There are metaphysical and ethical inputs here that cannot just be descriptively defined. 

 

 

 

 

Oblivious

 

On Page 89 of his book, The Passionate State of Mind, Eric Hoffer has two entries which I quote and then comment on.

 

Hoffer: “          154

 

Those who remain in the dark about their own motives are as it were strangers to themselves. Hence perhaps their exceptional power of self-delusion—their ability to talk themselves into anything. Their own impassioned words affect their souls as the words of an outside propagandist.”

 

My response:  Groupist and especially radical, pure joiners, have no self-knowledge at all, Now, Hoffer assumes that the individual, rational and emotionally honest, will know himself and how the world works, so truth is readily at hand for him. Not so for the ultra-joiners.

 

For her, she will believe anything and can be persuaded to believe anything, to justify anything, whether it is her clique that deceives her, or she passionately prevaricates to herself internally.

 

 

Hoffer: “          155

 

There are people who seem continually engaged in an effort of self-proselytizing. To whomever they may talk or write it is to themselves they are talking or writing. They are continually engaged in talking or writing themselves into a conviction, an enthusiasm or an illusion.”

 

My response: It is the self that has free will, not the group or group will. Therefore, if the self would be free and maverize, the self must live authentically and communicate to the self in a mode of truth and openness.

 

On the other hand, where the self is estranged from the self, and lies to the self all the time to sustain the myth that the self is altruistic, exceptional, honest, fulfilled, and compassionate while group-living and nonindividuating. This whole web of interconnected social lies and evasions fed by the self to the self is meant to plaster over any awareness of what is actually going on.

Insensitive

 

Eric Hoffer, on Page 88 of his book, The Passionate State of Mind, has two entries which I quote and then comment on.

 

Hoffer: “          152

 

Lack of sensitivity is perhaps basically an unawareness of ourselves.”

 

My response: When one thinks of being sensitive in a negative sense, it is the concept of being touchy, overly sensitized to input of an irritating, unpleasant kind.

 

What Hoffer has in mind, I believe, is suggesting that to be sensitive is to be caring and thoughtful and considerate about the feelings, needs, and touchy sore spots carried by others so as to not ruffle their feathers needlessly, causing them unwelcome pain.

 

He, the implicit promoter of egoist morality, is suggesting that a person that lacks sensitivity about the needs of others, is likely a joiner and nonindividuator, not a loner or maverizer.

 

To self-realize is to love the self, to come to know the self, to be sensitive to what one needs, what one must avoid, what brings one pleasure, and what brings one pain, what are one’s obligations to be met if one strives to be able to continue thinking well of the self.

 

Once the self-aware self-realizer, now awake and sensitive to what he or what any other person needs, is able to feel sympathy, compassion and fellow-feeling, and will seek to act so as to maximize their healthy pleasure or enjoyment, while avoiding adding to their degrading pain and suffering, especially malevolent, senseless, uncalled-for suffering.

 

 

Hoffer: “          153

 

The inability to see into ourselves often manifests itself in a certain coarseness and clumsiness. One can be brazen, rude and even dishonest without being aware of it.”

 

My response: Egoist morality makes people self-aware, so they readily know how they are acting, and if their actions hare bringing enjoyment or pain to others, and that they have no right to bring pain to others.

 

The rudeness, dog-eat-dog competitiveness, and law of the jungle vying is best demonstrated  by how groupist nonindividuators mistreat each other every day on any American freeway.

 

This is why I urge self-realizers to always treat others with courtesy, kindness, dignity, and respect—it is their due.

To Change

 

On Page 87 of his book, The Passionate State of Mind, Eric Hoffer has one entry which I will quote and then comment on.

 

Hoffer: “          151

 

To become different from what we are, we must have some awareness of what we are. Whether this being different results in dissimulation or a real change of heart—it cannot be realized without self-awareness.”

 

My response: Hoffer, the Mavellonialist and implicit promoter of egoist-individualist ethics, informs the reader that we can desire to be different from what we are—negatively because we are fleeing from our loathed, unwanted selves; positively, because we have embraced an imperfect self as it is, but we realize that our talent, potential and moral improvements can be made possible by rigorous, persistent self-application—but we cannot change who we are unless we come to know ourselves (The self is largely not knowable, infinite and ineffable, but is increasingly knowable as we individuate.), discover our essence and live and act to make the essence real and improved and improving. We define and conceptualize the self and its telos, and then work to become our dream.

 

Hoffer: “Yet it is remarkable that the very people who are most self-dissatisfied and crave most for a new identity have the least self-awareness.”

 

My response: People without self-esteem, whose lives are irremediably ruined, who consciously hate themselves and their lives, they crave a new identity which is actually a personal conversion or the adoption of being invisible, a nonentity, a nonperson subsumed into the mass movement or group arrangement in which the self being fled from ceases to exist as a separate consciousness.

 

The initial self-awareness of these groupist nonindividuators was very minimal even when they are still somewhat conscious, semi-independent and rudimentarily individualistic. They lived in the truth a bit, but once they adopt their new identity of being a fully joined nonperson, self-awareness has disappeared, and what arises for the remnant individual consciousness is living, believing and thinking whatever the group’s group-awareness, group consciousness and group-personality dictates for the absorbed true believer to think and feel.

 

Only when the new identity sought and gainable is an organic evolution arising voluntarily, out of a loved and esteemed self with wholesome, sane self-regard, and some sophistication assumed already in self-awareness, is the adopted, new identity of a fairly self-satisfied but still ambitious self-seeking self-growth of the individuating young person.

 

Hoffer: “They have turned away from an unwanted self and hence never have a good look at it. The result is that the most dissatisfied can neither dissimulate nor attain a real change of heart. They are transparent, and their unwanted qualities persist through all attempts at self-dramatization and self-transformation.”

 

My response: Hofer warns that the un-self-aware cannot adopt a genuine self, and they can even simulate a fake, artificial self in a credible fashion.

 

One can only change, really change, if one is self-aware, having loved the self enough to enjoy getting to know it and appreciate, despite its flaws and limitations: that the self has not given up on working to make that battered self better or less unsavory. Once one comes to know the esteemed self to a fair degree, then self-awareness is awakened: the self-appraisal is fairly accurate and realistic, and the self is ready to take on a new identity, especially linked naturally to the emerging self if one self-realizes.

 

The maverizer is self-aware, has made his peace with the self, and so takes on a new identity growing out of his fulfilling his life quest.

 

The nonindividuator, self-avoiding and not self-aware, cannot take on a new identity because he really does not want a new identity: he wants to move from being a weak, stunted, displeasing identity as self towards becoming a reduced status for the self: life as a pure follower, a group non-entity, buried deep within the gang or the pack.

 

 

Soul-Saving

 

On Page 86 of his book, The Passionate State of Mind, Eric Hoffer has one entry which I quote and then comment on.

 

Hoffer: ‘           150

 

In this godless age, as much as in preceding religious age, man is still preoccupied with the saving of his soul.”

 

My response: Hoffer is cautious about reform plans. Most reformers are collectivist and idealist, with zero appreciation for what makes people tick: the world would be better off if these willful zealots did nothing. We usually cannot make things much better, but our ill-conceived, mandated, clumsy public regulations enforced on the masses usually make things much worse, often intolerably so.

 

We should not be so morally ambitious and filled with sententious, self-congratulatory idealism: our altruist-collectivist activists claim that federal mandates will uplift and save the souls of millions, when, in fact, they have the opposite effect—soul-raping and soul genocide.

 

Our idealistic goals necessarily, self-consciously must be much more modest and limited: reform must be generally a private, voluntary effort by each person independently undertaken (if she so elects), left up to each individual who, as a child, can be taught a little about self-realizing and self-control, and then he is left alone, as we idealists reluctantly must agree to leave it up to him on his own to decide how to live.

 

Hoffer: “The discrediting of established religions by enlightenment did not result in the weakening of the religious impulse. A traditional religion canalizes and routinizes the quest for salvation. When such a religion is discredited, the individual must do his own soul-saving and he is at it twenty-four hours a day. There is an eruption of fanaticism in all departments of life—in business, politics, literature, art, science and even in lovemaking and sport. The elimination of the sacerdotal outlet thus results in a general infection and inflammation of the social body.”

 

My response: People are not born good, and they are born passionate and irrational more than reasonable and temperate, though they can learn to be more sensible and practical.

 

People do not like themselves and run in packs where they hide anonymously from themselves and their nagging moral sense, so they can avoid being free, independent, and forced by reality to confront the self and build a life of competence, hard work, and reward on self-correction.

 

They gain a desperately sought-after, substitute sense of worth and vicarious sense of soul-saving comfort from a quasi-collectivist organized religion, and they find some relief from guilty and self-nausea; They find home and hope for salvation in some group church of modest value, to which they belong. Their quiet lives of inner despair and discontent are manageable, unless secular idealists, as they did in the Enlightenment--and as the Progressive postmodernists are committing today—undercutting and gaslighting the standing social order, its metanarrative and its cultural story and faiths, pushing the masses into frustration, mandated, unwanted awareness of the self, violently jerked into awakeness, in full naked public exposure.

 

People will seek any replacement mass movement—which the gaslighters and revolutionaries know and planned upon--any holy cause to worship, something to believe in, something to tell them they have some worth, something whose guru absolutely promises their souls will be saved. People want their souls saved by vicarious means, by collectivist religions rather than doing the hard work and answering the call from God to maverize personally, the only way that a soul can be saved by the self willingly living as God lives, as an individuating individuators.

 

People must have faith, must believe in something, must strive to save their souls, and must find self-worth somehow, however ludicrously crafted. Holy causes will spring up where legitimate religions are cast down.

The Danger

 

There is always a danger that the suppression of a clearly defined evil will result in its replacement with an evil that is widely diffused—one that infects the whole fabric of life.”

 

My response: For example, the Prohibition Movement in US: no one drank less after the anti-booze crowd outlawed drinking: it just gave organized crime a chance to become a permanent fixture in our culture, and criminalized the behavior of millions of ordinary, functioning citizens.

 

When Marxist decry the injustices of capitalism, and then introduce the greater evil of totalitarian Leninism into a conquered society, limited evil is not eliminated, but has morphed into something far more pervasive, cruel, and dangerous on many levels. These are the destructive, ineffective techniques employed by these destroyers: fanaticism, extremism, arrogance, incompetence, absolutism, the collectivized, universal application of their “solutions”, their violent, brutal, cruel enforcement methods—all these strengthened means of growing evil in authoritarian society gravitate towards making a smaller evil into a greater evil inflicted involuntarily upon unwilling society.

 

Hoffer: “Thus the suppression of religious fanaticism usually gives rise to a secular fanaticism that invades every department of life. The banning of conventional warmaking may result in an endless undeclared war. The elimination of the conventional employer gives rise to a general monstrosity that bosses not only our working hours but invades our homes and dictates our thoughts and dreams.”

 

My response: Hoffer is warning society at idealists, true believers, and fanatics, are authoritarian and intolerant, and they always seek to take over the government and all the social institutions, running them with the heavy hand, the iron fist. Their nationalizing moral solutions makes their terrible solutions universal and now enforced by the secret police, through out every corner of society. None are left unscathed. Evil has not been eliminated but has been give several shots of steroids. These murderous reformers seek to wipe out all vestiges of personal liberty in society in the name of bring justice to society; they are the cruelest enemies of humankind, and their damage is deep and wide.

 

We must not give up on humanity. I know I assert all the time that people are born sinners, postlapsarian, morally defective creatures. Yet, paradoxically, I know that there is not any moral reform possible if it is not shouldered by each agent voluntarily and consciously, without external pressure, deception, empty promises, threats or flattery or bribes.

 

Reform must be a personal choice and is best achieved—by individuals on an individual basis--not by seeking to be perfect, but instead to love the self and others, to seek to be at peace, while simultaneously struggling each day upward and forward by self-actualizing. One works with all that what has as one’s disposal, both one’s defects and morally questionable properties.

 

A society of such reformed and self-reforming individuating supercitizens could then unite to come up with answers to mitigate socially and collectively and democratically, what linger social ills as need addressing still.

 

Evil is with us always, even after Jesus comes back to earth and brings heaven to earth. Evil is embedded in all of us, all the time, ineradicably so. Total, permanent, unending moral victory is not achievable or desirable because uncompromising absolutists and idealists with the purest motives, are haters and killers and poison all wells that they drink from. They collectively cannot make things better, but will make things much worse.

 

By contrast, willing individualists and individuators can make themselves and the world a little bit better, if they try real hard, and that is as good as it will get.

Doable

 

On Page 84 of his book, The Passionate State of Mind, Eric Hoffer has one entry which I will quote and then comment on.

 

Hoffer: “It is doubtful whether we can reform human beings by eliminating their undesirable traits. In most cases elimination comes to nothing more than substitution: we substitute a close relative for the bad trait we have eliminated, and the dynasty continues. Envy takes the place of greed, self-righteousness that of selfishness, intellectual dishonesty that of plain dishonesty. And there is always the chance that the new bad trait will be more vigorous than the one it supplants.”

 

My response: Undesirable traits is much of human nature is, so it would be wise and more prudent to worry less about eliminating undesirable traits and emphasize sublimating such traits, redirecting them.