On Lightness of Being (In Memory of Milan Kundera)

 

'Life which disappears once and for all, which does not return is without weight 

and whether it was horrible, beautiful, or sublime means nothing at all.'

 

I. 

 

Milan Kundera, the Czech-French novelist who died earlier this month, aged 94, was one of those writers whom I tried (but failed) to read and to love - Umberto Eco would be another such author. 

 

And so it is that the only work of his to which I ever returned was the philosophical novel for which he is best remembered, The Unbearable Lightness of Being (1984) [1]. And it's this work about which I'd like to make some brief remarks ...

 

 

II.   

 

Set in the late 1960s and early '70s - i.e., during and just after the so-called Prague Spring period - it is the tale of a sex-obsessed surgeon, Tomáš, who eventually learns how to love and remain faithful to his wife, Tereza, an animal-loving photographer with hang-ups about her body. 

 

It is the story also of Tomáš's mistress and confidante, Sabina, an artist who has declared war on kitsch and puritanism and wishes to lead a life of extreme lightness [2].

 

Essentially, the novel challenges Nietzsche's thought of eternal recurrence; an idea which, were it true - or were we to take it seriously and act as if it were true - would lie upon our actions as the greatest weight. 

 

Kundera obliges his characters (and readers) to ask themselves how they would live were they to know for sure that they only have one life to live and that which occurs in life does so once and once only - would this lightness of being bring freedom and happiness, or become unbearable: for without weight (i.e. existential meaning), do not all our actions become trivial and worthless? [3]

 

 

III.

 

Einmal ist keinmal, as our German friends like to say - i.e., once is never enough; indeed, once is as good as never having happened at all. If a human life, for example, fails to forever return, then once it is over it is truly over and the universe can simply carry on in utter indifference.

 

Obviously, as a floraphile - that is to say, as one who loves flowers and locates their beauty precisely in the fact that they bloom and then fade with no sense of shame, or responsibility, or significance - I am not particularly troubled by such a thought, nor do I accept the logic. 

 

And whilst I don't think we can ever become soulless like the flowers - or that this would be desirable - that doesn't mean that men and women should forever live as beasts of burden, weighed down by moral seriousness.      

 

Similarly, as a lover of birds, I approve of young women like Sabina learning how to fly in defiance of the spirit of gravity - even if that means they must first hollow out their bones; it is better to live in freedom with nothing to eat, than un-free and over-stuffed, as someone once wrote [4]. 

 

However, like Nietzsche, I would also counsel taking things slowly, cautiously. 

 

For if, like Sabina, you want to learn how to fly, then you must first learn how to stand and to walk and to run and to climb. And to do that, you need to develop strong legs and that means remaining true to the earth and practicing a little weight training.     

     

 

Notes

 

[1] Written in 1982, in Czech, as Nesnesitelná lehkost bytí, it was first published in a French translation as L'insoutenable légèreté de l'être (Gallimard, 1984). That same year, it was also translated into English from Czech by Michael Henry Heim and published by Harper & Row in the US and Faber and Faber in the UK. 

 

[2] The novel also introduces us to Sabina's other lover, Franz - a kindly academic and idealist who might have been better advised to stick to his books and not get mixed up with women like Sabina - and a smiling, cancer-ridden dog belonging to Tomáš and Tereza who, for all their flaws, love this poor mutt and so pass what for Kundera is the true moral test of mankind; namely, whether one can or cannot display kindness for those creatures at one's mercy.

 

[3] Kundera is aware that this debate within philosophy between those who favour weight and those who champion lightness is as old as the Greek hills and can be traced back to the pre-Socratic thinker Parmenides (who thought the latter positive and the former negative).

 

[4] See the post entitled 'On Dance as a Method of Becoming-Bird' (10 Oct 2015): click here.  

With thanks to Thomas Bonneville for providing the insight into Kundera's animal-based ethics.

 

 

On the Traditional Beauty of Japanese Women (2): White Skin

色の白いは七難隠す

 

Whilst the emergence of mass marketed skin lightening products was an early 20th-century phenomenon, the Japanese desire for blemish-free fair skin is as old as the hills. 

 

In other words, whiteness has been an aesthetic ideal for many centuries. In the Nara period (710-794), for example, women belonging to the upper class would powder their faces with oshiri to look more beautiful. 

 

There's even a word for this: bihaku. 

 

And there's also an ancient proverb which promises that women with less than perfect features can still look good providing they're pale enough: iro no shiroi wa shichinan kakusu ('white skin covers the seven flaws'). 

It's important to note, however, that for the Japanese, whiteness signifies holiness as well as beauty. And so the Japanese woman's preference for fair skin is not the result of western imperialism; it emerges from within Japanese culture - or, if you prefer, Japanese racism - itself. 

 

That the Japanese regard their whiteness of skin as uniquely different from that of other peoples, is made clear by the writer Jun'ichirō Tanizaki in the following astonishing passages:

"From ancient times we have considered white skin more elegant, more beautiful than dark skin, and yet somehow this whiteness of ours differs from that of the white races. Taken individually, there are Japanese who are whiter than Westerners and Westerners who are darker than Japanese, but their whiteness and darkness is not the same. [...] For the Japanese complexion, no matter how white, is tinged by a slight cloudiness." [1]

 

Thus it is that Japanese women resorted to cosmetics:

 

"Every bit of exposed flesh - even their backs and arms - they covered with a thick coat of white. Still they could not efface the darkness that lay below their skin. It was as plainly visible as dirt at the bottom of a pool of pure water. Between the fingers, around the nostils, on the nape of the neck, along the spine - about these places especially dark, almost dirty, shadows gathered. But the skin of the Westerners, even those of a darker complexion, had a limpid glow. Nowhere were they tainted [...] From the tops of their heads to the tips of their fingers the whiteness was pure and unadulterated. Thus it is that when one of us goes among a group of Westerners it is like a grimy stain on a sheet of white paper. The sight offends even our own eyes and leaves none too pleasant a feeling." [2]

 

Tanizaki concludes that rather than become self-loathing and ashamed of their impurity, the Japanese chose to display the cloudiness of their skin to their best advantage and sink themselves into the shadows, with whom they develop a profound and complex relationship: 

 

"If whiteness was to be indispensible to supreme beauty, then for us there was no other way, nor do I find this objectionable. The white races are fair-haired, but our hair is dark; so nature taught us the laws of darkness, which we instinctively used to turn a yellow skin white." [3] 

 

And nothing makes the whiteness of a Japanese woman's face look whiter than supernatural green lips and black teeth:

 

"I know of nothing whiter than the face of a young girl in the wavering shadow of a lantern, her teeth now and then as she smiles shining a lacquered black through lips like elfin fire. It is whiter than the whitest white woman I can imagine. The whiteness of the white woman is clear, tangible, familiar, it is not this other-worldly whiteness." [4] 

 

 

Notes

 

[1] Jun'ichirō Tanizaki, In Praise of Shadows, trans. Thomas J. Harper and Edward G. Seidensticker, (Leete's Island Books, 1977), pp. 31-32. 

[2] Ibid., p. 32. Tanizaki, rather controversially, then adds a statement which might be seen to justify white racism: 

      "We can appreciate, then, the psychology that in the past caused the white races to reject the coloured races. A sensitive white person could not but be upset by the shadow that one or two coloured persons cast over a social gathering." 

      Of course, this remark appears in the context of a book written in praise of shadows.

[3] Ibid., p. 33. 

[4] Ibid., pp. 33-34. Readers interested in knowing more about the Japanese penchant for green lips and black teeth should see the first part of this post: click here. 

On the Traditional Beauty of Japanese Women (1): Green Lips, Black Teeth

Nothing fascinates more than the ghostly beauty of the geisha

 with her iridescent green lips and blackened teeth ...

 

 

There are three traditional elements which compose the beauty of the Japanese woman: white skin; black teeth; green lips. Here, I'd like to discuss the last two of these elements and then, in part two of this post, examine the significance and appeal of the first.

 

Green Lips

 

The art of painting lips is an ancient one in Japan and the traditional lip colouring was called Komachi-beni - a name derived from the red pigment extracted in minute amounts from the thistle-like safflower, known as benibana in Japanese. 

 

The use of beni grew in popularity during the 17th-century and by the end of the 19th-century it was found on every fashionable woman's dressing table, contained in a small porcelain bowl called an ochoko, where, interestingly, it would dry into a shimmering green powder (this providing proof of its authenticity).

 

Whilst beni would turn back to red when moistened with a finger tip or lip brush, something of this natural greenness continued to shine through when layered on the lips. Sometimes, women wishing to intensify this iridescent effect would first paint their lips with beni, then use a green pigment obtained from the stem of a bamboo plant.  

 

Sadly, but hardly surprisingly, during the 20th-century - particularly after 1945 - Western cosmetics (and Western ideals of beauty) rose to dominance and handy oil-based lipsticks (in more conventional shades) became the norm.  

 

 

Black Teeth

 

Prior to the Meiji era, Japanese women may have loved their red-green lips and milk-white skin, but, like women in other Southeast Asian and Oceanic cultures, so too did they have a penchant for blackening their teeth.

 

Whilst this practice, known as ohaguro, certainly had an erotic as well as an aesthetic aspect - pubescent girls would paint their teeth black in order to signal their sexual maturity - it was primarily (and somewhat ironically) done to prevent tooth decay.

Sadly, in 1870, the government banned ohaguro and the practice had died out almost entirely by the 1920s. In the contemporary era, you might sometimes see a performer at a cultural festival with blackened teeth, or an actor on stage, or perhaps - if lucky - you may encounter a geisha girl who still likes to indulge in the habit. 

 

However, whilst a small number of Westerners may show a fetishistic fascination for the blackened teeth of geisha girls, most will react with horror - particularly if combined with green lips. For whilst we may not insist on the redness of the latter, we value teeth for their pearly whiteness; a sign, for us, not only of oral hygiene, but wealth.  

 

 

She Was Only a Farmer's Daughter ... Notes on the Case of Miriam Leivers

Heather Sears as Miriam Leivers in 

Sons and Lovers (dir. Jack Cardiff, 1960)

 

I.

 

The farmer's daughter is a stock character and comic stereotype drawn from the pornographic imagination. A fresh-faced country girl, often barefoot and with straw or ribbons in her hair, she likes to wear a short sundress or a halter top and is usually portrayed as both faux-naïf and sexually curious.

 

Bawdy jokes and stories about the farmer's daughter and her willingness to be seduced by any passing stranger - much to the fury of her father [a] - can be traced back to the medieval period, if not earlier; there are, for example, numerous ballads about valiant knights falling in love with comely farm girls and even the Vikings enjoyed hearing quasi-pornographic tales of love among the haystacks [b]. 

 

 

II. 

 

Interestingly, however, the farmer's daughter is often portrayed quite differently in works of literature; take the case of Miriam, for example, in D. H. Lawrence's Sons and Lovers (1913) ...

 

Sixteen-year-old Miriam is depicted as an intelligent girl keen to escape her dreary life on the family farm. A voracious reader, she dreams of belonging to the world of culture and higher education and is resentful of the expectation that she will eventually marry and settle down, accepting her fate as a farmer's wife, tending the pigs [c]. 

 

Lawrence describes her as a romantic soul, inclined to religious mysticism, who imagines herself as a princess trapped in the body of a farm girl. Not only does Miriam consider her brothers brutes, but she doesn't hold her father in particularly high esteem for desiring a simple life in which his meals are served on time. 

"She hated her position as swine-girl [...] She could not be princess by wealth or standing. So, she was mad to have learning whereon to pride herself [...] Learning was the only distinction to which she thought to aspire." [d]

Whilst not sexy in the stereotypical manner, dark-eyed Miriam nevertheless had a quiveringly sensitive kind of beauty that combined elements of shyness with wildness. The protagonist of the novel - Paul Morel - is (unsurprisingly) keen to fuck her. He watches her closely as she moves around the farmhouse kitchen in a strange, dreamy almost rhapsodic (but acutely self-conscious) manner, wearing an old blue frock.

Unfortunately, Miriam is one of those spiritual women who thinks sex as something low and beastly - more a dutiful vicar's daughter, than a farmer's daughter, alas, or like "one of the women who went with Mary when Jesus was dead" [184], as Lawrence puts it.  

 

She's happy for Paul to teach her algebra and help improve her French, and she might even exchange a few kisses, but she isn't interested in taking him as a lover: 

 

"The slightest grossness made her recoil almost in anguish [...] perhaps because of the continual business of birth and begetting which goes on upon every farm, Miriam was the more hypersensitive to the matter, and her blood was chastened almost to disgust of the faintest suggestion of such intercourse." [198] 

 

Eventually, after years of frustration and increasing bitterness, it all becomes too much for Paul and he sends Miriam a rather cruel letter on her twenty-first birthday, in which he calls her a nun; i.e., one incapable of accepting love in the physical sense (and rendering him incapable of giving such). 

 

Naturally, Paul's words wound her deeply and, perhaps, puzzle her also; after all, she was only a farmer's daughter ... [e]     

 

 

Notes

 

[a] I suppose I first became aware of the angry farmer and his daughter trope via Carry On Camping (dir. Gerald Thomas, 1969), where the latter is played by Patricia Franklin (and the former by Derek Francis). 

 

[b] See the essay entitled 'Male Bedpartners and the "Intimacies of a Wife"', by David Ashurst in Masculinities in Old Norse Literature, ed. Gareth Lloyd Evans and Jessica Clare Hancock, (D. S. Brewer, 2020), pp. 183-202. Ashurst discusses a tale involving an erotic encounter between two foster-brothers and a farmer's daughter on p. 191.

  

[c] For a discussion of female dissatisfaction with the world of the farm, see the post entitled 'Desperate Farmwives' (22 July 2023): click here. 

 

[d] D. H. Lawrence, Sons and Lovers, ed. Helen Baron and Carl Baron, (Cambridge University Press, 1992), p. 174. Future references to this edition of the novel will be given directly in the post.

[e] Readers will probably be aware that Sons and Lovers has an autobiographical aspect; that the platonic relationship beween Paul and Miriam is (to some extent) based on Lawrence's own sexless relationship with the farmer's daughter Jessie Chambers. 

      In the winter of 1909, having been romatically fixated with her for eight years, Lawrence finally made a move, informing Jessie that, because he loved her, it was inevitable they would eventualy fuck - which they did, in the spring of the following year, consummating their relationship on several occasions (usually outdoors among the flowers and dead leaves). Unfortunately, it was, writes John Worthen, "an awful experience for them both", resulting in shame and regret all round.

      For full details of the relationship between Lawrence and the farmer's daughter, see Worthen's D. H. Lawrence: The Life of an Outsider (Allen Lane / Penguin Books, 2005). The line quoted is on p. 79.  

Desperate Farmwives

The Farmer's Wife (SA/2023)

 

 

As the Little Greek poses at the gate of a nearby farm, I'm reminded that the (often sentimentalised) figure of the farmer's wife is a popular trope in art, literature, and cinema. 

 

I suppose some might even insist she's a figure with archetypal significance; an embodiment of the Earth Mother, representing ancient ideals of fertility and homestead, etc. Early rising, hardworking, resiliant and reliable, she is the kind of woman who loves her chickens and her vegetables almost as much as her husband and children.   

 

D. H. Lawrence famously provides a description of such women in whom the past (and perhaps the future) unfolds, in what many regard as his greatest novel, The Rainbow (1915). 

 

However, Lawrence subverts the conventional stereotype of 19th-century farmwives by suggesting that, in crucial contradistinction to their heavy-blooded, slow-witted menfolk, they are increasingly tempted by the life afforded by the encroaching world of modernity. 

 

Thus, whilst the men were content to put their very being into farming, the women were different:

"On them too was the drowse of blood-intimacy [...] But the women looked out from the heated, blind intercourse of farm-life, to the spoken world beyond. They were aware of the lips and the mind of the world speaking and giving utterance, they heard the sound in the distance, and they strained to listen.

      It was enough for the men, that the earth heaved and opened its furrow to them, that the wind blew to dry the wet wheat, and set the young ears of corn wheeling freshly about; it was enough that they helped the cow in labour, or ferreted the rats from under the barn, or broke the back of a rabbit with a sharp knock of the hand. So much warmth and generating and pain and death did they know in their blood, earth and sky and beast and green plants, so much exchange and interchange they had with these, that they lived full and surcharged [...]

      But the women wanted another form of life than this, something that was not blood-intimacy." [1]

  

What is it, then, that these women wanted exactly? Ultimately, it's the same thing that so beguiled Eve: knowledge. 

 

For despite occupying the supreme position in her own home - her husband deferring to her on almost all points - the Lawrentian farmer's wife is desperate to know "the far-off world of cities [...] where secrets were made known and desires fulfilled" [2]. 

 

She craved to know more and experience more; to have greater freedom and achieve a superior (more spiritual, less bestial) level of being. And if she couldn't achieve this, then she determined that at least her children would be educated and encouraged to aspire towards a different life - a bigger, better, finer life. 

 

Sadly, we know where all this leads: today, farmers are increasingly prone to mental ill health and suicidal tendencies, and often have to resort to online dating services in order to find a woman willing to marry them [3]. To paraphrase Nietzsche, all meaning has gone out of modern farming; yet that is no objection to farming, but to modernity [4].

 

However, like Lawrence, I can't quite bring myself to condemn those desperate farmwives. For whilst I might not wish for the triumph of the mind and the machine, I'm not sure I would be happy living a rural pre-modern life on the farm, rooted in blood, soil, and agrarian bullshit.  

 

 

Notes

 

[1] D. H. Lawrence, The Rainbow, ed. Mark Kinkead-Weekes, (Cambridge University Press, 1989), pp. 10-11.

 

[2] Ibid., p. 11.

[3] Whilst the quality of data is an issue, research has suggested that farmers are at higher than average risk of mental illness and suicide and the UK Government acknowledges this is an issue of concern. 

      For example, whilst 64% of farmers recently surveyed by Farmer's Weekly were happy with their physical wellbeing, only 55% felt positive about their mental health and in 2019, there were 102 registered suicides in England and Wales by individuals working in the agricultural sector in England and Wales (this accounts for over 2% of suicides that year, whilst agricultural workers only make up around 1% of the workforce). 

      As for farmers having trouble finding wives, the magazine Country Living launched a unique dating service decades ago, based on the simple premise that if you live and work on the land it can be especially hard to find a partner. This grew into an online service and even spawned an award-winning TV series in more than twenty countries. If you are a farmer and wish to sign up, then click here. 

 

[4] I'm paraphrasing what Nietzsche writes in Twilight of the Idols of modern marriage; see 'Expeditions of an Untimely Man', §39.

 

 

For a related post to this one on the farmer's daughter, click here.   

 

Wilde About the Beautiful Game

T-shirt by philosophyfootball.com

Sporting outfitters of intellectaul distinction

 

 

Apparently, the FIFA Women's World Cup begins this week and we're all supposed to get excited by the opportunity to experience a tournament Beyond Greatness - whatever that means ...

Unfortunately, I don't share this excitement. 

 

In fact, when watching women running about kicking a football, all I can think of is an oft-quoted remark made by Oscar Wilde: that whilst it's all very well for rough girls, it's entirely unsuitable for delicate boys.

 

 

Amplifying Deviance and Danger: Notes on the Concept of Moral Panic

Tanya Brassie: Moral Panic 

dribble.com

 

I.

 

Stanley Cohen's concept of moral panic [1] remains a useful one for examining how an (often irrational) fear that a tiny minority of people threaten the values and interests of wider society can quickly become widespread (or go viral as we like to say in this digital age).

 

Of course, not all fears are irrational and whilst it probably doesn't help to panic, there are times when social anxiety is justified and expressing concern over perceived threats an understandable response, although we might question whether the manipulation and exploitation of fear by journalists and politicians - or those whom Cohen terms moral entrepreneurs - is ever a good thing.  

 

As Cohen points out, while a threat may be real, to exaggerate its seriousness is not helpful and often just results in new laws that restrict everybody's freedom. Further, if allowed to really take hold of the public imagination, there's the danger too that a social phenomenon that plays with public prejudice becomes a psychological issue and moral panic ends in mass hysteria (which is genuinely dangerous - often far more so than the perceived threat).       

 

 

II. 

 

I am reminded of all this when listening to the numerous reports and endless discussions on GB News and Talk TV about boat migrants crossing the Channel, drag queens reading stories to children, and transwomen competing in sporting events or accessing female toilets.

 

I might not want any of these things to happen: but I am also aware of the fact that whilst Piers Morgan and Dan Wootton, for example, are not consciously engaged in spreading hate speech, they do play a crucial (and questionable) role in the dissemination of moral indignation. For even when the above and their colleagues accurately report the facts, they often do so without contextual nuance and in a manner designed to generate viewer anger and trend on social media.       

 

So, what am I trying to say here? 

 

Perhaps, simply, that those with big mouths, strong opinions, and high-profile media platforms should also exercise a degree of caution when exercising their right to freedom of speech. Similarly - and this is a Nietzschean point - when demonising others it's best to take care lest this makes you monstrous in the process [2]. 

 

 

Notes

 

[1] Whilst moral panics have a long history, it was the sociologist Stanley Cohen who first named and explicitly formulated the concept in his seminal work Folk Devils and Moral Panics (MacGibbon and Kee, 1972). Although Cohen discussed the example of teenage mods and rockers, many other groups have also found themselves othered as a mortal danger to society, including satanists, communists, and homosexuals.

     It is worth noting that often it is not a group or community as such that triggers a moral panic, but a phenomenon such as drug use, football hooliganism, dangerous dogs, or internet pornography. Again, these things are often exploited by the authorities to justify a clampdown on civil liberties.     

 

[2] I'm paraphrasing Nietzsche writing in Beyond Good and Evil, 4. 146. 

 

 

D'notre amour fou n'resterait que des cendres (In Memory of Jane Birkin & Serge Gainsbourg)

Jane Birkin (Dec 1946 - July 2023)

 

 

I'm very sad to note that - 32 years after the death of Serge Gainsbourg - Jane Birkin has died. 

 

Theirs may or may not have been the greatest (or even craziest) love affair of the 20th century, but it was certainly the one that I found most intriguing (and possibly the most touching).

So what, then, remains now that they are both dead? Only ashes, as they themselves anticipated?

 

No.

Jane and Serge leave behind a huge number of beautiful images, beautiful songs - perhaps the most beautiful ever written in French - and beautiful memories. 

 

And, in Jane's case, she even leaves behind a beautiful Hermès bag to which she lent her name. 

 

You can't hope for much more than that ...  

 

 

Note: the title of this post is a line from a track entitled Quoi, found on the 1986 compilation album by Birkin. The song - one of my favourites - was written by Gainsbourg and Cesare De Natale (arr. Guido & Maurizio De Angelis). Click here to play here and watch the video on YouTube.   

 

 

Reflections on Nietzsche and the Dark Triad

 

First proposed by Delroy L. Paulhus and Kevin M. Williams in 2002, the dark triad is a psychological theory of personality that collates (sub-clinical) narcissism and psychopathy with Machiavellianism [1].

 

Whilst these three things are conceptually distinct, they clearly intersect with one another and each is associated with often callous and manipulative interpersonal conduct [2]. Narcissim, for example, is characterised by self-obsession; psychopathy by anti-social behaviour; and  Machiavellianism by moral indifference to others. 

 

An individual located within the dark triad might not be prone to committing criminal acts, but they're almost certainly a cold fish at best, or a really nasty piece of work at worst.

 

Interestingly, however, although each of these personality traits are regarded as being problematic by psychologists, Nietzsche seemed to think they are vital to human well-being: man needs what is most evil in him for what is best in him, as Zarathustra famously says [3]. 

 

Nietzsche argues that a certain level of self-love is essential, for example - certainly preferable to self-loathing and shame; that narcissism has its place as an active joyful force within an economy of desire. Indeed, Zarathustra suggests that it is from out of such that a new type of virtue may develop [4].

 

As for Machiavellianism, well, whilst Christian moralists might react with horror at the thought of any one acting in their own interest rather than loving their neighbour, or indulging in self-sacrifice, Nietzsche thought highly of the arguments set out in The Prince, Machiavelli's seminal essay, published posthumously in 1532, and acknowledged as one of the founding texts of modern political philosophy [5].    

 

Does this mean, therefore, that the Übermensch is some kind of psychopath? 

 

Hardly. 

 

It might, however, indicate that there remains something troubling in Nietzsche's political philosophy (particularly in its grand phase) and it's interesting to note how individuals with dark triad personalities - and I would number my younger self amongst them - are often attracted to extremist ideologies and prone to authoritarianism (often at odds with the radicalism they dream of) [6].      

 

However, we must note in closing, this is true for romantic idealists on the far left of the political spectrum, as well as young fascists. Indeed, today, it is often the wokest amongst us who are the most darkly triadic and who, whilst masquerading as the compassionate, leap into the black hole of fundamentalism [7].      

 

 

Notes

 

[1] I'm aware that a fourth trait - sadism (defined as the enjoyment of cruelty) - has now been added to this theory of personality, creating a so-called dark tetrad, but here I'm discussing the original concept in relation to Nietzsche's philosophy as  proposed by Paulhus and Williams in 'The Dark Triad of personality: Narcissism, Machiavellianism, and Psychopathy', Journal of Research in Personality, 36 (6): 556–563, (Dec. 2002).   

[2] In 1998, John W. McHoskey, William Worzel, and Christopher Szyarto provoked a controversy by claiming that narcissism, psychopathy, and Machiavellianism are more or less interchangeable. See their 1998 paper, 'Machiavellianism and psychopathy', in the Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, 74 (1): pp. 192–210. Readers interested in having access to this text should click here.

 

[3] See the section entitled 'The Convalescent' in Book III of Nietzsche's Thus Spoke Zarathustra. I am quoting here from Walter Kaufmann's translation in The Portable Nietzsche, ed. Walter Kaufmann, (Penguin Books, 1994), p. 331. 

[4] See also Herbert Marcuse writing in Eros and Civilization (1955) where he argues that narcissistic joy passes beyond immature autoeroticism and may possibly contain the germ of a different reality principle.

[5] Readers interested in the relationship between the two writers might like to see Don Dombowsky's 2004 work, Nietzsche's Machiavellian Politics (Palgrave Macmillan), particularly chapter 4 (pp. 131-167). In brief, Dombowsky argues that the foundation of Nietzsche's political thought is a radical aristocratic critique of democratic society, heavily influenced by his reading of The Prince:

"Nietzsche did not read Machiavelli as Spinoza or Rousseau did, as someone who revives republicanism and defends democratic freedoms [...] but adheres to what has been called the 'vulgar' conception of Machiavellianism. Rousseau would have considered Nietzsche to be a 'superficial and corrupt' reader of Machiavelli. What Nietzsche adapts from Machiavelli are his conceptions of virtù (at the operational basis of his ethics) and immoralism (at the operational basis of his political conception) based primarily on a reading of The Prince." (131-32)

[6] I discuss all this at length in Outside the Gate (Blind Cupid Press, 2010).

[7] Jordan Peterson is very alert to this and often warns about the zen fascism of those on the woke left who claim to act in the name of Love and social justice (or diversity, equity, and inclusion). So too is the writer, broadcaster, and satirist Andrew Doyle, and readers might find a recent discussion between these two figures on the political puritanism of our age interesting: click here.  

 

 

Interactive bonus: readers who wish to know if they perhaps have a dark triad personality might like to take a short online test: click here.

A Bastille Day Post (2023)

Man Ray: Portrait imaginaire de D.A.F. de Sade (1938) 

Oil on canvas with painted wood panel (61.6 × 46.7 cm) 

 

It's grey, wet and windy here in London this 14 juillet - La fête nationale française, or Bastille Day, as it is more commonly known in the English-speaking world where it is sometimes marked, but not particularly celebrated. 

For me, the storming of the Bastille on this date in 1789 - a key event of the French Revolution - primarily interests because that is the state prison where the libertine philosopher Sade wrote his most notorious work, Les 120 Journées de Sodome (1785), having being confined there the previous year for crimes of a sexual and blasphemous nature (despite never having been convicted of such crimes in a court of law).   

 

Famously, Sade wrote the manuscript in a miniscule hand on a long roll of paper that he kept hidden in a cell wall. Unfortunately, he was unable to finish his magnum opus before being transferred - against his will and naked as a worm - to the insane asylum at Charenton. 

 

This was on 4 July 1789; forty-eight hours after he reportedly incited unrest outside the prison by shouting to the crowds gathered there: They are murdering the prisoners! and ten days before the Bastille was stormed by the revolutionary mob looking for stores of gunpowder [1].

 

To his despair, Sade (mistakenly) believed that his manuscript was destroyed during the events of July 14; it had actually been discovered and preserved two days earlier. 

 

After his release from Charenton in 1790, Sade served in the new revolutionary government, although this was probably more from expediency rather than conviction and he was despised by many of his more radical (and bloodthirsty) new cohorts, not merely because of his aristocratic background, but due (ironically) to his modération [2]. 

 

Anyway, may I take this opportunity to wish all French readers - and all Sadeans - Joyeux quatorze juillet!

 

Notes

 

[1] It might be noted that by this date the Bastille was nearly empty, housing only seven prisoners. It was mostly kept open - despite the high financial cost of maintaining a garrisoned medieval fortress - to serve as a symbol of royal power.

 

[2] Readers interested in Sade's role in the French Revolution and the question of his politics might like to listen to a paper by the Michigan State University history professor Ronen Steinberg entitled 'Sex and the Bastille: the Marquis de Sade and the French Revolution' (2016): click here. 

 

 

   

How Anti-Bird Spikes Became De Rigueur Nesting Material Amongst Corvids

Photo of an anti-bird spike nest by Auke-Florian Hiemstra

 

 

No sooner had I published a post on urban birds using rubbish to build their nests - click here - than I came across several news reports on a Dutch study in to how super-intelligent crows and magpies are ironically incorporating technology designed to deter them from making a home into their nest designs, something that has astonished even those who have long admired corvids for their cognitive skills.

 

Apparently, nests recovered from trees in Rotterdam and Antwerp, were found to be constructed almost entirely from strips of those long metal spikes often attached to buildings in order to prevent our feathered friends from nesting, or even finding a place to perch for a few moments. Whilst the crows seem to have simply utilised the spikes as a sturdy construction material, the magpies may have appreciated their intended purpose, as they positioned most of the spikes on the nest's roof where they could deter predators, including other birds and mammals.

 

Interestingly, rather than merely finding old strips of anti-bird spikes at rubbish dumps, a researcher claims that crows and magpies may even be removing the metal strips directly from buildings in an act of avian vandalism.

 

As Dewey Finn would say: That is so punk rock!

 

 

Note: for more on this story visit the BBC News Science & Environment page: click here. 

 

 

A Bird in the Bush is Better Than a Bird Forced to Nest in Rubbish

The bird a nest, the spider a web, man pollution

 

 

There has been increasing concern over recent years about the fact that more and more species of birds are using rubbish as nest building material [1].

 

Obviously, one of the main reasons for this is necessity; uncontrolled human population growth and the associated spread of urban landscapes results in the destruction of natural spaces and the subsequent loss of natural nest building materials [2] and so birds - like other animals - have to adapt to survive.  

 

Unfortunately, not all bird species will be able to adapt to living in limited numbers in small isolated areas surrounded by people, cars, buildings, bright lights, etc. A big city lifestyle amongst the garbage isn't for everyone.  

 

But some birds are at least giving it a go and they constitute one of the most common groups of urban animals: 

 

"Their ability to fly allows them to move quickly between places to find refuge, food, or water inside cities. Additionally, several bird species are well adapted to urban areas because of their generalized diets (in other words, they can tolerate the majority of food resources available), large brains (allowing them to solve problems and use new resources), non-specific requirements for nesting places (can nest in the majority of available places), and small sizes (allowing larger populations to survive on small amounts of resources)." [3] 

 

However, whether using a diversity of waste materials - including plastic, wood, metal and rubber - as nesting material will prove to be beneficial or harmful to their survival in the long term remains to be seen. I suspect the latter [4]. For whilst there do seem to be some advantages to a nest constructed from artificial materials - for example, the nicotine found in fag ends is a known repellent against some parasitic insects - there are several negative consequences identified by researchers:    

 

"For example, one negative effect of the use of garbage for nest building could be an increase in the nest temperature when birds use plastic bags pieces, a situation that could negatively affect an egg's embryo development. Another negative effect may be an increase in nest predation if, by being more conspicuous, artificial materials make nests more easily detectable by visual predators. It is also possible to expect a decrease in chicks' survival because plastic or nylon ropes may attach and tangle around chicks in the nest, causing mortality." [5]

 

Let's just say that it isn't yet certain what the consequences will be of this new behaviour. But, having said that, I think we can agree that it makes the heart sink to read about baby birds reared amongst garbage and eating particles of microplastic.

 

 

Notes

 

[1] Such behaviour isn't new - indeed, it has been observed since the early 19th-century - but it is rapidly increasing as the natural environment becomes ever-more shaped (and polluted) by humanity.

 

[2] As two researchers in the field of urban ecology write: "The reduction in abundance of natural materials for nest building is probably the force incentivizing species to use artificial materials, which are becoming more, not less, available as human activities increase." 

      See Josué Corrales and Luis Sandoval, 'Our Garbage, Their Homes: Artificial Material as Nesting Material' (December 2016). To read this text online, visit The Nature of Cities website: click here.

 

[3] Ibid.

 

[4] For a report by Anjit Naranjan in The Guardian (10 July 2023) on a newly published European study concerned with the safety of chicks being reared in nests constructed from rubbish, click here. 

[5] Josué Corrales and Luis Sandoval, 'Our Garbage, Their Homes: Artificial Material as Nesting Material', op. cit. 

 

 

For a follow up post to this one on crows and magpies ingeniously using human technology (anti-bird spikes) to protect their nests, click here.  

A Brief Note on the Psychology of Philosophy

I think, therefore I'm ill

 

I. 

 

After a recent 6/20 presentation [1], someone in the audience surprised me by saying that she didn't really wish to address the philosophical aspects of the subject (mourning), as whenever she started to think about such ideas they made her feel unwell. 

 

This raises a question that the London-based writer Sam Woolfe discussed in an interesting blog post a couple of years back: Can Philosophy Harm Your Mental Health? [2]

 

Obviously, the answer is yes - what would be the point of it otherwise? However, I'd like here to briefly pick up on Woolfe's work on the relationship between psychological traits (if they exist) and philosophical beliefs (if that isn't an oxymoron). 

 

 

II.  

 

Although I'm wary of turning philosophy into just another all too human discipline rooted in the personality and biography of the practitioner, I have to acknowledge that Nietzsche would often do this in an attempt to expose the prejudices of philosophers and demonstrate how rationality is a peculiar abberation that has grown out of unreason (i.e., the unconscious forces, flows, fears, and desires of the body) [3].  

 

However, to conclude that philosophy is simply the attempt to turn the universe into a home for man by ascribing moral logic to it via an exploration of one's own temperament - as the neo-Platonic philosopher and novelist Iris Murdoch concludes - is, ironically, too depressing a thought. 

 

Ultimately, I think Ray Brassier is right to argue that philosophy should do more than simply further human conceit and that its nihilistic destiny is to acknowledge the fact that thinking has interests that do not coincide with the feelings of the philosopher (nor, indeed, with his life and wellbeing) [4]. Whilst it might be fun, therefore, to look for correlations between psychological traits and philosophical beliefs, there's more important work to be done by those courageous (or perhaps crazy) enough to do it. 

 

 

III.

 

Having said that, like Woolfe, I found it interesting to discover from the work of David Yaden and Derek Anderson [5] that those who, like me, subscribe to a model of hard determinism tend to rank higher on the depression/anxiety index [6]

 

I've certainly been feeling fed up lately and perhaps that is due (in part at least) to my philosophical pessimism. However, I'd rather be down in the dumps but intellectually honest, than happy and full of false hope as a result of only reading optimistic authors who pangloss over the tragic character of existence. 

 

And, who knows, just as one can eventually transform suffering into a form of passion via which one discovers bliss, perhaps we might also transform the darkest depression and profoundest pessimism into a form of fröhliche Wissenschaft. As Woolfe notes, "it is certainly possible and consistent to live a happy, joyful, and meaningful life while taking philosophical pessimism seriously".

 

So, my advice is keep reading Schopenhauer and Cioran, invent new reasons to live each day and, when stuck in a hole, just keep digging and discover for yourself whether there's any truth in the China syndrome. 

 

For even if Woolfe is right to conclude that some philosophical ideas - such as antinatalism, solipsism, or existential absurdism - may contribute to or worsen poor mental health [7], so what? I sometimes think better madness (or at least a few sleepless nights) than the bourgeois model of sanity (or common sense) we are expected to preserve. 

 

 

Notes

 

[1] See the TTA Events page for an abstract to the talk 'In Praise of Mourning' (presented at Christian Michel's 6/20 Club, on 6 July 2023): click here.  

 

[2] Sam Woolfe, 'Can Philosophy Harm Your Mental Health?' on samwoolfe.com

      Whilst I'm not sure we'd agree on all that much, I admire the fact that Woolfe has maintained a blog since 2012 (the same year that Torpedo the Ark began) and that he describes himself as a writer with "a penchant for complex and challenging subjects that involve a multitude of perspectives".  

 

[3] See Nietzsche, Beyond Good and Evil (1886). In §6 of the first chapter of this work - 'On the Prejudices of Philosophers' - he famously writes: 

      

"It has gradually become clear to me what every great philosophy has hitherto been: a confession on the part of its author and a kind of involuntary and unconscious memoir [...]" 

      

I am using R. J. Hollingdale's translation of this work (Penguin Books, 1990).  

 

[4] Ray Brassier, Nihil Unbound: Enlightenment and Extinction, (Palgrave Macmillan, 2007), xi. 

 

[5] See David B. Yaden and Derek E. Anderson, 'The psychology of philosophy: Associating philosophical views with psychological traits in professional philosophers', Philosophical Psychology, Vol. 34, Issue 5 (Taylor & Francis, 2021), pp. 721-755. DOI: 10.1080/09515089.2021.1915972

[6] As Woolfe points out, for those who wish to posit a link between determinism and mental illness, it makes sense that a lack of belief in free will can be associated with depression, given that the latter is often characterised by feelings of hopelessness and helplessness.

 

[7] What Woolfe actually says is this: 

 

"I would not go so far as to say that reading or studying philosophy is likely to be the major defining cause of a mental disorder. But I am open to the possibility that some philosophical ideas - and philosophising itself - may contribute to, worsen, or vindicate poor mental health." 

 

The fact that he adds the idea of vindication is certainly striking and something readers might like to consider for themselves.

Well There's Nothing More Revolutionary Than Calling for Communism Then Diddling the Maid

Helene Demuth (1820-1890)

 

 

This morning, whilst reading on the subject of famous last words, I discovered that Karl Marx had little time for such death bed theatrics.

 

'Go on, get out!' he apparently barked to his housekeeper, who was pottering about his room in the hope of recording some memorable final statement: 'Last words are for fools trying to compensate for having said nothing of any significance in life!'

 

I have to say, I was shocked - not by Marx's attitude, but by the fact that he - a revolutionary socialist and author of a work calling for the establishment of a classless society - should employ a domestic servant.

 

Worse: it's alleged that his German housekeeper, Helene, [1] was impregnated by Marx and gave birth to an illegitimate son, in 1851, who was discreetly placed with a working-class foster family in London shortly afterwards [2]. 

 

If anything exposes the bourgeois hypocrisy (and the sexism) implicit within Marxism, it's this. As Elaine Benes might sarcastically note: There's nothing more revolutionary than calling for communism, then diddling the maid. [3]   

 

 

Notes

 

[1] The daughter of parents belonging to the peasant class, Helene Demuth began her life as a maid in 1840, aged 20, entering into the Marx household five years later, where she stayed until Karl's death in 1883. Helene died in London in 1890, and was buried in the Marx family grave (and later re-interred in the tomb of Karl Marx at Highgate Cemetery).

 

[2] Some scholars accept that Marx was the father of the child; a view based upon surviving correspondence from the Marx family and their wider circle, as well as the fact that Marx's wife had been on a trip abroad nine months prior to the birth. The child's paternity, however, remains a subject of controversy, and there is no conclusive documentary evidence as such to prove that Marx had been diddling the maid. 

 

[3] In the season 9 episode of Seinfeld entitled 'The Maid' - dir. Andy Ackerman (1998) - Jerry forms a sexual relationship with his maid, Cindy (played by Angela Featherstone). Although he tries to convince Elaine that the arrangement is somewhat sophisticated, the latter is not convinced. Click here to watch the scene on YouTube.  

    

To read an earlier post on the erotic fascination with maids in the pornographic imagination, click here. 

 

 

Rioting: The Unbeatable High (With Reference to Current Events in France)

For a note on these images see [1] below

 

 

Probably there are quite a few songs about rioting and I suppose they might be classified as a sub-genre of what are known as protest songs (i.e., songs that in some way call for social change). 

 

Here, however, I wish to discuss only two: White Riot by the Clash [2] and Riot by the Dead Kennedys [3] ...   

 

 

A Riot of My Own

 

'White Riot' was released as the English punk band's first single in March 1977 (an earlier demo version was also included on their self-titled debut album released the following month). The song was written after singer Joe Strummer and bass player Paul Simonon were caught up in rioting at the Notting Hill Carnival in 1976. 

 

Ironically, some people misinterpreted the title as advocating race war, whereas, actually, the band were suggesting that white working class kids ignore what they were being taught in school and learn from black youth about the necessity of political violence (i.e., throwing a few bricks).     

 

According to Strummer, the oppressed, the alienated, and the disadvantaged had a right (and a duty) to oppose the System and its heavy-handed policing; to demand a riot of their own and seize some of the power held in the hands of "the people rich enough to buy it". It would be cowardly, suggested the bourgeois punk rebel in his Brigatte Rosse T-shirt, to passively accept one's position and refuse to rise up and fight back.  

 

There is no denying that 'White Riot' is a great single and call to arms; one which, as Strummer rightly says, knocks spots off all the other stuff on the radio at that time. However, it's also, of course, laughably naive in its political posturing and massively irresponsible in its advocacy of mindless violence [4]. To his credit, guitarist Mick Jones would later refuse to perform the song, considering it crude.     

 

 

Playing Right Into Their Hands

 

Whilst he's undoubtedly a bit of a jerk himself, Jello Biafra is a lot smarter and politically astute than Joe Strummer. He's also a superior lyricist. So, no surprise that the Dead Kennedys track 'Riot' is a far more sophisticated take on the subject.

 

Acknowledging the visceral excitement involved in smashing windows, torching cars, looting stores, throwing bricks at the police, etc., Biafra is nevertheless quick to point out that rioters inevitably play into the hands of the authorities and end by burning their own neighbourhoods to the ground. 

 

The song closes with the repeated refrain: "Tomorrow you're homeless / Tonight it's a blast", the latter speaker sounding increasingly distraught as they slowly realise the consequences of their actions.    

 

Perhaps those rioting in France at the moment [5] might like to consider this ... 

 

 

Notes

 

[1] The picture of charging police officers, by Rocco Macauly, was taken during a riot at the Notting Hill Carnival in 1976. It featured on the back cover of the eponymous debut album by The Clash (CBS 1977). 

      As for the grainy black-and-white image of a row of burning police cars, this was taken in San Francisco in May 1979 during the so-called White Night Riots; a series of violent events sparked by the lenient sentencing of (former policeman) Dan White for the assassinations of George Moscone and Harvey Milk. It featured on the front cover of the Dead Kennedys' debut album Fresh Fruit for Rotting Vegetables (Cherry Red Records, 1980).

 

[2] The Clash, 'White Riot', single released March 1977 (CBS): click here. Or, alternatively, click here to listen to the album version and watch the official video (with footage filmed by Don Letts).  

 

[3] Dead Kennedys, 'Riot', from the album Plastic Surgery Disasters, (Alternative Tentacles, 1982): click here.  For a live performance of the song from 1983, click here.

 

[4] Strummer's terroristic fascination with political violence is also displayed in the B-side of 'White Riot' on a track called '1977'. In this charming punk ditty in which he announces the death of the rock 'n' roll establishment - "No Elvis, Beatles or the Rolling Stones, in 1977" - he also fantasises how it won't be so lucky to be rich when there's "Sten guns in Knightsbridge".

 

[5] On 27 June 2023, Nahel Merzouk, a 17-year-old French youth of Maghrebi Algerian descent, who was driving without licence, was shot and killed by a police officer following a car chase in Nanterre, a suburb of Paris. Despite the officer who shot Merzouk being arrested and charged on suspicion of 'voluntary homicide by a person in authority', the incident led to widespread protests and riots in which symbols of the state such as town halls, schools, and police stations - as well as retail outlets - were attacked and over a 1000 vehicles set on fire.