Inconspicuous! =D

Whenever I go out in public, I can feel all eyes focused on me, judging me for my strangeness.  The spotlight is on me.  The attention is too much.  @_@


Therefore, no matter the occasion, I should always go out wearing army camouflage fatigues.  The camouflage design will render me inconspicuous and unnoticed. 

Favorite Godzilla Monsters Other Than Godzilla, Pt. 1 of ?: King Ghidorah

Stuart K. Hayashi

Justin Wisniewski once suggested to me that I create a Facebook Note where I list my favorite Godzilla movies.  At that moment, it occurred to me that that would be a difficult task, as I judge each movie by more than one standard.

For example, when its comes to judging craftsmanship and film-making skills, 1963's Godzilla Against Mothra is one of the better movies.  It has better acting than most other entries.  However, the only monsters in it are Godzilla, the adult Mothra, and Mothra's larvae.  Compared to the other monsters, Mothra is pretty boring, and I dislike the ending.   Also, I find the "evil businessman" theme heavy-handed (it's even heavier-handed in this movie than in other entries). Therefore Godzilla Against Mothra has very low re-watch value for me. I have it in my collection almost solely for the sake of having my collection near-complete.

By contrast, 1972's Godzilla Vs. Gigan is considered one of the weaker entries . . . even by diehard fans of the franchise.  And judging the movie by film-making and craftsmanship, the diehard fans' criticisms are not wrong.  The storytelling tropes in this film are derivative of previous entries.  Worse, the movie makes use of stock footage from previous Godzilla movies and tries to pass off this footage as if it were new.  However, this movie introduces Gigan, who is actually one of the most interesting of the Big G's foes.  Gigan, by himself, is enough to give the movie enormous re-watch value.

The highlights of the movies are the monsters, and a particularly well-designed monster can compensate for what would otherwise be storytelling weaknesses.  For such reasons, I think it makes more sense if I provide some profiles of my favorite monsters from the Godzilla series other than Godzilla.

Note that I am not listing the monsters in the order of how much I like them.  The first one I'm listing, though among my favorites, is not necessarily my single favorite.

I was planning on listing all of my favorite monsters in one post, but, with my comments, the post would be too long.  If I feel like it, I will continue this series.


 * King Ghidorah

King Ghidorah is a golden, two-tailed, three-headed dragon who shoots yellow lightning bolts (called "gravity beams") from each mouth.  His origin story changes according to which movie you are watching.  In his original incarnation, King Ghidorah was from outer space, traveling from planet to planet and destroying each civilization there.  In one of the movies, though -- featuring my least favorite incarnation of King Ghidorah, he is actually a supernatural spirit assigned to guard the Earth against Godzilla. *Shudder* (more about this lamentable artistic choice later.)  In almost every incarnation -- the exception being the aforementioned supernatural Ghidorah -- the monster towers over Godzilla, sometimes 50 percent taller. 

Above is King Ghidorah's first appearance in 1964.  Note that each head has a mane of hair, two long horns (one on each side, as you would expect of the devil), and a crescent-shaped horn on the forehead.


King Ghidorah's appearance changed a bit for the 1991 movie Godzilla Vs. King Ghidorah.  The mane was eliminated in favor of more horns on side of each head; the crescent-shaped horn has also been eliminated from the foreheads.  King Ghidorah's roar has also been changed.  Originally, each head let loose an odd sound resembling the ringing of an electric alarm bell, emphasizing alien qualities. This movie in particular stresses Ghidorah's size advantage over Godzilla.

King Ghidorah '91 on the left, Godzilla on the right

Mecha-King Ghidorah

In most incarnations, King Ghidorah is a biped.  One version, though -- Keizer Ghidorah -- is a quadruped.  (There is also a quadruped named "Death Ghidorah," but I do not count him as a "real" Ghidorah, but as a separate monster.)


 

Even on four legs, Keizer Ghidorah is taller than Godzilla

Keizer Ghidorah's gravity beams overpower Godzilla's atomic ray

There is only one incarnation of King Ghidorah I find truly disappointing: the one from 2001's Godzilla, Mothra, King Ghidorah:  Giant Monsters All-Out Attack (this title needs more syllables in it!).  I hear that lots of fans consider it one of the stronger entries in the series.  As for myself, I don't like the changes.  This is the one movie where all of the monsters are very explicitly described as supernatural entities.  As I have written before, it makes more sense to see the monsters as pagan deities than as animals.  Indeed, both Mothra and Megalon are worshiped respectively by civilizations that consider the monster to be their protector.  But I think the theme of having the monsters portrayed as pagan gods works better as subtext.  The explicit supernaturalism of GMK went too far.

In this particular movie, Godzilla is not merely a dinosaur mutated by atomic bomb tests.  Rather, he is the amalgamation of the victims of Japanese wartime atrocities, and is a sort of avenging spirit meant meant to remind Japan of its past warmongering and hubris. This is the one time where Godzilla, rather than a force of nature, is portrayed as a conscious villain or antagonist, although the movie's director, Shusuke Kaneko, sounds sympathetic to the idea that some supernatural force punish Japan for its sins.  (This is also the one time where Godzilla represents, not the wartime villainy of Americans, but actually the wartime villainy of the Japanese.)

Anyhow, in this version King Ghidorah is not a space alien or even a genetically-engineered being.  Rather, he is an ancient spirit assigned to protect Japan.  For the first time ever, from beginning to end he is the explicit good guy, fighting on the same side as Mothra.  Since this time Godzilla is the villain and King Ghidorah is the good guy, King Ghidorah is made out, for the first time, as the underdog.  Hence, he is shorter and weaker than Godzilla.

OK, first of all, King Ghidorah fighting to protect Japan, on his own free will, is just plain wrong.  Secondly, King Ghidorah being shorter and weaker than Godzilla is  . . . perverse.   King Ghidorah should never come across as wimpy, and yet he does so in this movie! :'-(

 

Above is the "guardian spirit" King Ghidorah grappling with Godzilla.  He isn't crouching or anything; he is just smaller than Godzilla.  I have some notes on how his heads are adorned.  In keeping with the 1991 version, the mane is still replaced by the additional horns where you would normally expect ears to be.  The crescent-shaped forehead horns from the 1960s version have been restored to this version, however.


In case I do not continue this series, here are some of my other favorites:


* Gigan
* Megalon
* Kiryu (Mecha-Godzilla III)
* SpaceGodzilla
* Biollante
* Battra (I find the larva version more impressive than the adult version)
* Titanosaurus
* Fire Rodan
* Destoroyah
* Ebirah
* Mechanikong
* Anguirus
* Gezora (technically, only met Godzilla in the video game)
* Dogora (technically, only met Godzilla in the video game) 

Mao's Critical Biographers Misrepresent Him as an Apologist for Ethical Egoism(!!!)

Stuart K. Hayashi


Mao Tse-Tung was an evil man, and many people in the West remain ignorant of the extent of his atrocities.  I have heard both Americans and mainland Chinese recite the cliche, "Yes, in his old age Mao went too far.  But when he was young and just beginning his governance over China, he brimmed with noble intentions.  It is merely that he later lost his way."  Therefore, a few years ago I felt reassured when I heard that some new biographies were coming out that showed that Mao was power-hungry and bloodthirsty from the very beginning. 

These more recent biographies do argue that Mao already held malevolent tendencies when he was young and just starting out in politics.  Unfortunately, these Mao biographers take a rather questionable route in how they choose to "prove" that Mao was evil from the beginning.  These writers do not acknowledge that dictatorship and murder are simply the logical consequences of the collectivist ideals that Mao held in his twenties.  Rather, these biographers deny that Mao sincerely believed in any of the collectivist rhetoric that goes along with Marxist dogma.  On the contrary, these biographers assert -- Mao was, in private, a consistently egoistic individualist who merely lied about having collectivist convictions.  The biographers would have their readers think that Mao did not genuinely feel that the height of morality was for the individual to subordinate his own self-interest to the will of society-as-a-whole.


Mao Believes in the Virtue of Selfishness?
As evidence that Mao was ideologically an arch-individualist and egoist, not a collectivist, these biographers cite the man's early writings.  In particular, they refer to notes that Mao wrote in the margins of A System of Ethics by the nineteenth-century German neo-Kantian philosopher Friedrich Paulsen.  Mao scrawled these comments from 1917 to 1918, when he was twenty-four years old.

This is the estimation of Jung Chang and Jon Halliday in Chapter 2 of Mao:  The Unknown Story:

In these notes, Mao expressed the central elements in his own character, which stayed consistent for the remaining six decades of his life and defined his rule. [Emphasis added. --S.H.]

Mao's attitude to morality consisted of one core, the self, "I," above everything else:  "I do not agree with the view that to be moral, the motive of one's actions has to be benefiting others.  Morality does not have to be defined in relation to others . . . . People like me want to...satisfy our hearts to the full, and in doing so we automatically have the most valuable moral codes.  Of course there are people and objects in the world, but they are all there only for me."

Mao shunned all constraints of responsibility and duty.  "People like me only have a duty to ourselves; we have no duty to other people."  . . . "...I am responsible to no one."

Mao did not believe in anything that could not benefit him personally.

Absolute selfishness and irresponsibility lay at the heart of Mao's outlook.

The topic is treated similarly by Alexander Pantsov and Steven I. Levine in Mao:  The Real Story.  On pages 40-41, they quote the marginal notes that most strongly evince Mao's ethical egoism:

Since human beings have an ego, for which the self is the center of all things and all thought, self-interest is primary for all persons. . . . The starting point of altruism is the self, and altruism is related to the self.  It is impossible to say that any mind is purely altruistic without any idea of self-interest.  Nothing in the world takes the other as its starting point, and the self does not seek to benefit anything in the world that is totally unrelated to the self. . . . In the realm of ethics, I advocate two principles.  The first is individualism.  Every act in life is for the purpose of fulfilling the individual, and all morality serves to fulfill the individual.  Expressing sympathy for others, and seeking the happiness of others, are not for others, but for oneself.  ...we have a duty only to ourselves, and have no duty to others.

On page 41, Pantsov and Levine take particular offense at these remarks:  "Some say that we must believe that the moral law comes from the command of God, for only then can it be carried out and not be despised.  This is a slavish mentality.  Why should you obey God rather than obey yourself?  You are God.  Is there any God other than yourself?"

Pantsov and Levine agree with the other biographers that Mao's margin notes exhibit consistent egoism:  "As in Descartes's formula 'I think, therefore I am,' Mao placed his emphasis on the pronoun 'I.'"

Recall that evaluation of Jung Chang and Halliday:  "In these notes, Mao expressed the central elements in his own character, which stayed consistent for the remaining six decades of his life and defined his rule."  Given that these authors judged the margin notes to be consistent in advocating ethical egoism, the insinuation is clear.  As the insinuation goes, Mao did not agree with any of his own lofty rhetoric about subordination of the individual to the collective.  Throughout his entire reign as dictator, across each of those decades, Mao secretly thought that the individual's pursuit of happiness -- Mao's own pursuit of happiness -- is of greater moral importance than individual sacrifice to others, particularly society-as-a-whole.

Evidently, these authors presume that if one is to prove that Mao's quest for political power was evil from the start, it is necessary to convince the reader that Mao always believed that it is ethically right to hold one's own happiness as one's highest priority.

If Mao is an ethical egoist, then the wretchedness of his actions can be cited to smear a certain famous advocate of ethical egoism.  Disgustingly, a review of the Jung Chang/Halliday book in The Daily Telegraph blathers that Mao's decisions as head of state were animated by "a sort of Ayn Rand philosophy of selfishness."


Proof That These Biographies' Evaluations Are Inaccurate
However, one can read most of these margin notes on Google Books, in Mao's Road to Power -- Revolutionary Writings, 1912-1949 volume 1:  The Pre-Marxist Period, 1912-1920, edited by Stuart R. Schram, (Armonk, NY:  M. E. Sharpe, 1992), from page 175 to 314.

In this section of the volume, editor Schram divided each page into two columns.  In the right column are the passages of Paulsen's A System of Ethics to which Mao reacted.  In the left column, in boldface, are Mao's comments.  Hereon, when I refer to page number, I am referring to the pages of the Schram-edited volume; not the pages of Paulsen's book, which are naturally numbered differently.

The citation of Mao's margin notes to prove that Mao's ethical egoism motivated his actions as dictator, is facile for several reasons.  First, the margin notes that Mao made were not always necessarily his own opinions.  Rather, much of the time Mao was simply paraphrasing, for his own understanding, the point that Paulsen was trying to make. 

Secondly, a reading of the notes reveals that Mao's own opinions were quite tentatively anyway.  Some of his comments even implicitly condemn actions that Mao would later take as Chairman.  On page 282, the 24-year-old Mao remarks, "The reason why stealing is not permitted concerns primarily human character, and secondarily happiness.  Being a dark, malevolent act, a despicable method, stealing quickly destroys a person's self-respect."  Clearly Mao would come, as despot, to hold contempt for private property rights.

Thirdly, a fuller reading of the young Mao's notes reveals that Mao is not making a consistent ethical defense of pursuing one's self-interest.  Rather, he expresses qualified agreement with Friedrich Paulsen's theory of ethics and politics.  Paulsen's theory on how government first emerged is similar to that of Thomas Hobbes.  Like Hobbes, Paulsen assumes that, by default, every person is a psychological egoist.  That is, by default everyone wishes to selfishly indulge in every possible whim, including the expropriation and spoliation of other people for one's own immediate gratification.  To indulge in every such whim is what Paulsen and Mao consider to be self-interest taken to its logical extreme.  As Paulsen, Mao, and Hobbes realize, if everyone indulged in every whim, violence would ensue and everyone would destroy one another.  This would be inimical to everyone's survival.  Therefore, goes the theory, out of self-interest, everyone tacitly agrees -- in a Tit-for-Tat manner -- that there ought to be a government restraining such violence.  According to these people, if you concede that there ought to be a government protecting everyone from random violence, then you acquiesce to restraining some of your self-interest.  You agree to a compromise -- a balance -- between your self-interest and the good of society-as-a-whole.  You agree to restrain some of your self-interest, and your deliberate restraint of self-interest is motivated by . . . self-interest(!!!). 

Anyhow, Paulsen advocates what he perceives as a middle ground between self-interest and collectivism, and Mao expresses qualified agreement on this issue. 


Mao Does Praise Self-Sacrifice
Jung Chang and Halliday would have their readers believe that, in his own private notes to himself, Mao revealed unbridled disdain for the concept of empathy.  That is not so.  Consider when Paulsen asserts, "It is true that there are persons in the world who are totally devoid of feelings for the interests of others, who are oblivious to the interests of their neighbors, who even take pleasure in the suffering of others."  On page 203, Mao responds, "Except for those who are sick and crazy, there definitely are no such persons. Love of wife and parents is inescapable.  Lions and tigers seem to have this; can human beings not have it?"  On page 206, Mao continues, "This, the narrowest form of egoism, does not exist in this world."

Nor does Mao reject self-sacrifice as a moral ideal, as demonstrated in other responses to Paulsen.  Paulsen writes that "...Jesus suffered greatly and gave his body in sacrifice, his way [dao --editor Schram] ultimately triumphed and his believers founded the theory of the heavenly mandate of the new kingdom of love."  On page 275, Mao responds, "This truly brings out very well the mentality of all those great men of the past and present who sacrifice themselves for benevolence."  On pages 207-08, Mao comments, "If you want to achieve a certain result, you must engage in an action that implies that result.  Thus sacrificing oneself for a good cause is also respected by teleological ethics." 

Elsewhere, Paulsen states, "Sacrificing one's life to save the lives of others, or for the public interest of one's nation, these are great and good acts."   Mao says approvingly, "This is in agreement with our Confucian theory of ethics. It also agrees with Mozi's universal love, because the mutual aid of Mozi's universal love does not ignore my own important interests for the minor interests of others, but is altruistic self-sacrifice that results in benefiting others."


The Collective Is the Greater Self?
Here we will observe the process whereby Mao follows Paulsen in attempt to reconcile self-interest with the supposed public interest. 

Paulsen writes,

All human beings regard themselves as being members of the entire society.  Every human being thinks of himself as belonging to a clan or society or nationality, and consequently human beings take the goals of their society as their own personal goals.  It is indeed clear that the interests of the individual are mutually interwoven with the interests of society, so that it is impossible to draw a line demarcating the two.  For this reason, it may be said that the goal of my will is the common shared welfare of the individual and of society, or we may say that the welfare of society includes the welfare of the individual.

On page 203, Mao replies, "Quite true, quite true!"

From page 200 to 201, we see Mao's quasi-Hobbesian attempt to reconcile self-interest and public interest:

Since human beings have an ego, for which the self is the center of all things and all thought, self-interest is primary for all persons.  That this serves the interests of others is due to the fact that those others who belong to the same category as the self share related interests.  Thus we say that the self cannot but benefit others.  The starting point of altruism is the self, and altruism is related to the self.  It is impossible to say that any mind is purely altruistic without any idea of self-interest.  Nothing in the world takes the other as the starting point, and the self does not seek to benefit anything in the world that is unrelated to the self. 

On page 273, Mao says, "Without the self, there would be no universe.  The universe is formed of the collectivity of all selves, and each self exists for itself.  Without the self, there would be no selves!  It is for this reason that within the universe, only the self can be honored, only the self can be feared, only the self can be obeyed."

As with Hobbes and Paulsen, Mao judges that pure egoism entails acting on every whim and impulse, and that this makes unfettered egoism untenable in the long run.  And as with Hobbes and Paulsen, Mao states that the most practical course is for someone to agree to live under a government that expects him to be peaceful toward others.  And like those philosophers, Mao presumes that agreement to be a self-imposed constraint on self-interest.  Between egoism and altruism, Mao writes on page 280,

it is egoism that pursues life, and altruism is simply one of the methods it employs to attain one's life objectives.  It goes without saying that there is absolutely no basis for pure altruism.  Pure egoism is also merely a theory that definitely cannot be realized in this world of multiple individual entities and diverse activities. . . . Should we choose the method of pure egoism?  In the beginning, a people, and the individual person when first born, do indeed select this method, but after a while run into a great many obstacles, so they discard this pure egoism and choose instead the method of combining egoism and altruism, and thus all people pursue life.

I Am You; You Are Me
Mao does end up favoring collectivism, and says that this should not be seen as pure renunciation of the self.  Rather, he prefers to think of it this way:  as a person matures, he increasingly comes to expand his self-concept to include a wider collective around him.  As a child, one thinks of one's self merely as one's individual self.  Then, growing up, one thinks of one's self as one's family; one comes to make no distinction between the interest of oneself and the interests of family members.  Hence, any threat to another family member is a threat to the self, and any benefit to a family member is a benefit to the self.  Then one's self-concept expands to include one's society.  Now one refuses to distinguish one's own life from the collective welfare of the society.  The society, not the single person, is the unit that is considered important and considered the self.  Hence, if one person is killed for the ostensive benefit of the society, no individual is sacrificed.  Rather, a small, unimportant part of society was shed for the benefit of the real individual:  society-as-a-whole. 

In Mao's own words on pages 201-02: 

To act in self-interest may be small-minded, but is at least true.  To pretend to be benefiting others when really acting in self-interest is a great falsehood.  To extend self-interest to the greater self of benefiting all mankind, to the greater self of benefiting all living things, and to the greater self of benefiting the universe, this is to go from a small truth to a great truth. The progress of human wisdom can achieve this.  When the self and other are equal, their order is not clear and it is easy to pretend to be acting for others when actually acting in self-interest, in which case it is impossible to achieve the highest self-interest.  I think that the theories of our Confucian scholars are based on egoism, as in saying, "The way of heaven and earth has its origin in the relation of man and wife," and can be seen in, "He who first cultivates himself may afterward bring peace to the world,' and "He is first affectionate to his parents, and then benevolent to the people and kind to creatures."

The theory of universal love is not altruism, for universal love includes the self, is to extend the love of self to loving all men.

By basing the theory on self, it has a starting point, a criterion.  If self and other are treated as having equal weight, there is no starting point, and the criterion is lost.

On pages 200-01, Mao says, " If I open my eyes wide and say that mankind is the greater self, and say that all living things are the greater self, and then say that the universe is the greater self, does this negate self-interest?"  His answer is no -- collectivism, whereby one person can be sacrificed at the demand of everyone else, is simply an elevated manifestation of self-interest (even for the one man being sacrificed). 

On page 209 he again says there is no divide between the self and the wider collective:  "Furthermore, a group is an individual, a greater individual.  The human body is constructed of the aggregation of a number of individual parts, and society is constructed of the aggregation of a number of individual persons, and the nation is constructed of the aggregation of a number of societies.  Separated they are many, together they form a single whole.  Thus the individual, society, and the state are individuals.  The universe is also an individual."  On page 273, he muses, "In the past, I emphasized altruism, believing that there was only the universe, without self.  Today I realize that this is not so, that the self implies the universe."  On page 289, he concludes, "The path that benefits both oneself and others is mutual aid."

Because Mao already supports collectivism, he knows whom he wants killed:  "the capitalists" are among the "evil demons of the world" (page 208).

Thus, contrary to these biographers, it is not the case that Mao's communist rhetoric, whereby he demanded that individuals be sacrificed for the greater good of the State (himself), contradicted some egoist philosophy he held in secret.  In his own private notes, he stated that psychological egoism must graduate to a morally superior level:  collectivism.  What he preached as dictator logically developed from that line of thought. 

Oscar Night

 Do you know who I don't see enough of on television?

The Obamas!!!!!  :-D 

Godzilla Is Not a Large Animal But a Pagan Deity: Recognition of This Part of the Myth Is Necessary for U.S. Adaptation

When I learned that the British filmmaker Gareth Edwards was going to make another Western adaptation of Godzilla, I felt excited but cautious in my optimism.  I remember how my heart had been broken in 1998.  When I had first heard in 1994 that TriStar was going to make an American adaptation of Godzilla with a planned budget of $40 million, I was thrilled.  Finally the excellent cultural sensibilities of the Japanese series would be done justice by having a high-tech, high-budget makeover by Americans.  But the more I read interviews of the cast and crew of the TriStar project, the more worried I became.  Actor Hank Azaria (most famous for his voices on The Simpsons) and especially the special effects technician Volker Engel were repeatedly quoted denigrating the original series.  They even looked down on the first movie.  Then, when I saw the final product, it was horrifyingly disappointing.


More Than Just a Big Lizard in a City
The creature in the film did not even behave like Godzilla.  To most people unacquainted with the series, that sounds like an odd assessment to make.  The assumption is that if there is a giant reptilian creature let loose in the city, that automatically makes it Godzilla.  Actually, Godzilla is very distinct from the reptilian creatures that have been loose in cities in Western films (think Gorgo or The Beast from 20,000 Fathoms).

First, Godzilla is very much like a dragon.  (Interestingly, he looks more like a traditional European dragon than an Asian one.)  He shoots a radioactive blast of "fire" from his mouth -- "fire" so hot that it's blue.  The 1998 TriStar 'Zilla didn't do that.

Secondly, the whole appeal of Godzilla is that he indestructible.  No conventional weapon of man's can destroy him.  I mean, really, that is the entire source of suspense in the first movie -- that the humans try everything, and it seems they cannot stop him.  By the end of the first movie, the only invention of man's that could work against him was a weapon of mass destruction that, just like Godzilla himself, symbolized atomic bombs.  The 1998 TriStar 'Zilla -- spoilers! -- got tied up in the wiring of the Brooklyn Bridge and was brought down by a measly six missiles from a single fighter jet.  Missiles from fighter jets have never even so much as annoyed the real Godzilla.   Making an adaption in which "Godzilla" is killed so easily is like making an adaptation of Superman in which Superman, with all of his powers, can be brought down by a single prick of a pin (a normal pin, not a Kryptonite one).

Thirdly, the real Godzilla never backs down from a fight.  Over the past fifty years of his career, I cannot think of a single time when he retreated from a battle.  The reason he doesn't retreat is that he doesn't have to.  He's invincible, remember?  In the 1998 TriStar version, the creature's immediate response, upon seeing a fighter jet, was running away and hiding.  That, right there, is forfeiting the entire essence of Godzilla.

To assume that you have Godzilla just because you have a giant reptile in a city, is wrong.  He is an individual with distinctive behavioral traits -- even a distinctive personality.  And that is what I hope that Gareth Edwards understands as he makes his new Godzilla adaptation.

Is there evidence that Mr. Edwards does understand this?  There are some good signs.  In contrast to the makers of the 1998 TriStar version, Mr. Edwards identifies himself as a genuine fan of the film series.  He says he is aware of the weaknesses of the TriStar version and that that wasn't the real Godzilla that fans have come to know.  He has stated that his Godzilla will shoot flame and will even fight another creature of equal size.  All of that sounds promising.

That sounds substantially better than what the 1998 TriStar team offered.   Even here, though, there is a chance that Gareth Edwards's film might lack the quality that I most appreciate about Godzilla.  To me, for Edwards to get Godzilla right would mean that he understand that Godzilla is emphatically not just some large animal.  Rather, Godzilla is more like a pagan deity, and his having anthropomorphic qualities is actually part of his charm.


No, He Doesn't Have the Traits of a Real Animal: Is That So Bad?
Ever since I was a little boy, I appreciated Godzilla.  And I have gotten a lot of flack for this, even in elementary school, middle school, and high school.  I would hang out in the art room, populated by "fan boys" obsessed with anime and X-Men.  You would think that they would be sympathetic to my own personal fandom, right?  Exactly the opposite.  Because I had my own personal tastes, and did not conform to what they liked, they denigrated me and my interests.  They told me that all of the movies were cheap and fake and dumb, and that I deserved their ridicule.  Evidently, my having my own interests indicated that I didn't deserve to live.

One might criticize Godzilla movies for their unrealism.  Let us put aside that, due to physical laws like gravitation, a creature of Godzilla's size would not be able to have body parts in the same proportions that he does.  Godzilla is not actually shown to have a life cycle.  With the exception of just one movie (1991's Godzilla vs. King Ghidorah), it is presented as if Godzilla always looked the way he did and was always that size.  Only the series of movies from the 1990s makes it explicit that Godzilla would not have been so gigantic if he were not mutated by radioactivity.

You never see Godzilla's parents or any siblings, and thus his age is actually not clear.  If he actually survived since the time of the dinosaurs, that implies that he was already immortal long before being mutated by nuclear weapons.  By contrast, if it is assumed that Godzilla's life began in the twentieth century (which is what is implied in Godzilla vs. King Ghidorah), then it stands to reason that in the 1950s there must have been an entire family of Godzillasaurs like himself.  But they are never shown; Godzilla is always alone.

It can be stated that Godzilla has had two children -- Minilla/Minya in the 1960s and Baby/Little/Junior Godzilla in the mid-1990s.  Even in their cases, though, there is not direct proof of Godzilla being their genetic parent.  Minilla does not even look like he is of the same species.  Baby/Little/Junior Godzilla does appear to be of the same species, but there is no proof of Godzilla being the parent. It may simply be the case that Godzilla adopted Minilla and Baby Godzilla.

Also unlike a real animal, Godzilla does not eat.  From 1984 onward, the film series goes as far as making it explicit that he does not eat.  Rather, he absorbs radioactive energy through his skin and stores it in his dorsal plates.  Moreover, it is never explained how he is able to spend years underwater without resurfacing.  He isn't any more like a large animal than Superman is like a real human.

TriStar's Fraudzilla from 1998 certainly behaved much more like a real animal with a life cycle.  It was the known parent of an entire brood of offspring.  The makers of that movie considered it an "improvement," thus displaying a poverty of understanding of why the Godzilla legend thrives.


Too Anthropomorphic?
Godzilla even has attributes that are very human and decidedly unlike that of a reptile or even a dinosaur.   The Tyrannosaurus Rex, as well as all other carnosaurus, walked hunch-backed with their tails never touching the ground.  Not only does Godzilla drag his tail, but he walks upright like a man.  Unlike any dinosaur (even unlike any non-human primate), he possesses opposable thumbs, which he uses to grab objects and other monsters in battle.  And he sometimes conveys human emotions.  In Godzilla: Final Wars of 2004, it looks like he practices a form of forgiveness.  In Ghidrah: The Three-Headed Monster and Godzilla vs. Gigant/Godzilla on Monster Island respectively, he is depicted having conversations in Monster-ese.

Many critics can cite Godzilla's dissimilarities from a real animal as being glaring scientific inaccuracies.  They can consider Godzilla's non-animalistic attributes to be a flaw of the franchise.  I disagree.  It never bothered me that Godzilla behaves very differently from a real animal, nor did it bother me that he has humanlike traits.  It doesn't bother me that, in many respects, he seems to act like a supernatural, immortal creature -- hence the God in Godzilla.  The reason is that, except for when Tomoyuki Tanaka first got his idea for the movie, Godzilla was not really intended to be seen as just a large animal.  Though only one movie states this explicitly -- and that movie is not even considered "canonical" to the storylines of the others -- the implication has always been that Godzilla is a pagan deity.  And when you see hm in that light, many aspects of the movie series, that previously seemed inexplicable, actually make perfect sense.

Pagan Deity for the Nuclear Age
There are certain pagan deities that have animalistic physical traits, but also behave in a manner markedly different from an animal.  And often these pagan deities have personality traits more comparable to that of humans.  Consider the Aztec god Quetzalcoatl.  This mythical entity actually holds various commonalities with Godzilla.  Quetzalcoatl is large and reptilian, but has traits that go beyond those seen in normal reptiles.  Quetzalcoatl has a humanlike wisdom.  He is also capable of wreaking great devastation on mankind, however, and that is why, in fear, Aztecs made sacrifices to him.

When you think of Godzilla, not as a large animal, but as a pagan deity, then it's not such a big deal that the rules that normally apply to animals do not apply to him any more than they do to Quetzalcoatl (or Superman, for that matter).  Being an animal would preclude Godzilla from having so many anthropomorphic traits, such as his having a type of sapience in the 1960s and '70s.  But his being a pagan deity would not preclude it.

Also consider that pagan deities would battle one another.  Aries had fights against Athene (and he consistently lost to her).  Thor battled Loki.  Likewise, Godzilla battles Mothra and King Ghidorah.  Mothra has always been worshiped as a pagan deity.  And one movie -- Godzilla, Mothra, King Ghidorah: Giant Monsters All-Out Attack -- even states explicitly that each of the titular monsters has supernatural powers.  I do think that the movie went too far, though, in doing so; I never had a problem when it was just subtext that the monsters were pagan deities.

People always ridicule Godzilla movies for the monsters looking rubbery and for the cities obviously being collections of miniatures (from the 1950s to 1960s, the miniatures were actually very detailed, and this craftsmanship deserves far more respect than it is given).  To me, what matters much more than that is the symbolism of the story.  Godzilla and the other monsters are pagan deities that reemerge in modern times.  They should not be merely large animals, because they are epic and grand -- larger than life.  They have that godly quality to them.  To me, this means that even as human technology has advanced, many people are still, psychologically, stuck in the same mindsets as they were in pre-civilized times.  Godzilla brings out the same fear in men that Quetzalcoatl did the Aztecs.  Getting that part of the story right trumps the other considerations for me.


Godzilla the Rebellious Individualist
What always appealed to me is that, if you see Godzilla in an anthropomorphic light, his relationship with human civilization is comparable to a rebellious iconoclast's friction with his own society.  I should explain this.  The explicit philosophy of the movies is markedly different from my own.  When Tomoyuki Tanaka got his idea for the first movie, he really did intend for the monster to just be a big faceless organism without an individual personality, similar to the Blob.  As originally conceived, the first movie is a typical Frankenstein story about how arrogant man -- specifically, American man -- fills himself with hubris as he uses his technology to seek mastery over the non-human wilderness.  As the Frankenstein story always goes, man's hubristic use of technology creates a monster that punishes him.  In the case of this particular monster, Godzilla is nature's revenge against arrogant humanity for the sins of the American-allied scientists who sired the atomic bomb.   Environmentalist, anti-capitalist propaganda repeatedly imposes itself throughout the entire series.

As Godzilla was born of technology created in the United States, Godzilla has also been something of an implicit symbol of the country.  When Japan still held a grudge against the USA in the aftermath of World War Two, Godzilla was a threat to Japan.  But, throughout the 1960s, Japan's opinion of the United States warmed as it traded with the country and came to see it as Japan's protector against far more dangerous threats like Russia.  Likewise, in this same decade, Godzilla eventually became Japan's unofficial protector against far more sinister monsters, like King Ghidorah and Ebirah.  To Japan, both Godzilla and the USA could be thought of as having mythic qualities -- of being superheroes.

As the 1980s went on, though, Japan became ambivalent about the United States.  Certainly the USA was no longer considered militarily an enemy to Japan, but the Japanese were frightened of a nuclear showdown between the USA and the Soviet Union.  As Japan's economy grew and as it traded with the USA, there were still emotional tensions between Americans and the Japanese. Increasingly, the Japanese thought that although the USA did not mean Japan any harm, the USA was going to do whatever it wanted to do, whether Japan liked it or not, and Japan might bear negative consequences from this.  Likewise, from the 1980s onward, Godzilla similarly became that neutralist force:  he did not hate Japan or consciously want to destroy people, but he was going to do whatever it was he was going to do, whether anyone liked it or not.  This is how Japan came to perceive U.S. foreign policy.

When I was a boy and could not verbalize my reasons, I initially became attracted to Godzilla because of his 1970s superhero incarnation.  Many science-fiction critics -- even most of Godzilla's biggest fans -- consider Godzilla's superhero years to be the nadir of the film series.  But everything I like about Godzilla's behavior is still in the 1970s movies.  Even though he often saves Japan from threats at this point, he remains supremely selfish.  He saves the world from King Ghidorah because it is in his own interest to do so -- King Ghidorah represents a danger to him as well.

As a little boy, I could relate to Godzilla.  I liked to spend time alone on my artwork; my artwork was what I considered my superpowers.  Godzilla's superpowers included his atomic breath; mine included my ability to tell stories.  This did not actually win me many friends, however.  That I spent time alone on my art, and my dressing and looking as I chose, caused many classmates to see me as some sort of existential threat.  For that reason, they ridiculed me and laughed at me.  Many people would interpret this as an example of the bullies picking on me for being weaker than they.  I saw it as the opposite -- I felt that I was being persecuted for my strength.  It made me think of how petty little humans perceived Godzilla as an existential threat, and thus came after him with their petty little tanks, which which they would shoot at his feet.  Neither Godzilla nor I fit into conventional human society.  But that was OK, because we each had ourselves.  Classmates wanted me to conform to be as they were, but I refused.  I was an individualist who would peaceably live by his own rules.  Godzilla, too, was an individualist who lived by his own rules . . . but not so peaceably.

The monster outcast figure is often a symbol of an individualist who does not conform to society's rules, and is actually an outcast, not because he is looked down upon as weak, but because he is feared for his great abilities.  And among outcast monsters, Godzilla is the king.  I was not familiar with the term at the time, but I saw him as a perfect Nietzschean ubermensch.

Japan, of course, is not known for individualism.  If a young Japanese man says that the rules of society hold hardly any meaning for him, and that he prides himself on being a loner who peaceably lives by his own rules, a lot of Japanese people would consider that perverse.  But as Godzilla is not a human but a pagan deity, he gets a free pass -- "He's a giant monster, not a man, so what can you do about it? Nothing."

Of course, when I was a little boy, I did not know that one could still live in a relatively-free society and still peaceably do so by one's own rules.  Reading The Fountainhead showed me what a more rational, cultivated individualism looked like; one did not have to put on physical combat against conventional society in the manner that a Frankenstein monster, Phantom of the Opera, or Godzilla did.

I suspect that a lot of Godzilla's young fans feel something similar -- they admire that he, unlike they, doesn't have to surrender his will to adult authority figures.  He does what he wants.  When someone behaves that way literally, the results are not so pleasant.  But Godzilla makes for a compelling symbol of individualistic strength -- one who does not retreat in the face of adversity.

For all of the philosophic flaws of the men who made his movies, Godzilla will always hold a place in my heart.  The legend works for me not because Godzilla is some large animal, but because he is a pagan deity -- and an individualistic one at that.  If that part of the legend survives in Gareth Edwards's telling of the story, I will think he has done right by the Big G.  :-)

Perfection

Every single candidate I voted for, LOST.


Once again I have a perfect score!!!!

HAPPY BIRTHDAY, GODZILLA!!!! :-D

^_^


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About Teens, Ayn Rand Answers President Obama from Beyond the Grave

As early as 2008, President Obama had already been making passive-aggressive swipes at Ayn Rand. We remember his complaint that "we’ve made a virtue out of selfishness. There's no virtue in that! We made a virtue of irresponsibility, and need to usher in a new spirit of service and sacrifice and responsibility."

This year, President Obama has finally made that antipathy explicit. To Rolling Stone, he proclaims:

Ayn Rand is one of those things that a lot of us, when we were 17 or 18 and feeling misunderstood, we'd pick up. Then, as we get older, we realize that a world in which we're only thinking about ourselves and not thinking about anybody else, in which we're considering the entire project of developing ourselves as more important than our relationships to other people and making sure that everybody else has opportunity –- that that's a pretty narrow vision.

In short, he's repeating the old cliche that Rand is only appreciated by teenagers -- that growing up means growing out of having appreciation for her.

How ironic that the President so reputed to have inspired the idealistic youth of America to vote for him, is now dismissing this very same demographic as being somehow inherently prone to shallowness.

Fortunately, throughout her life Rand always remained appreciative of the idealism of youth. Concerning teenagers and other young people, Rand has a message from beyond the grave for our President:

There is a fundamental conviction which some people never acquire, some hold only in their youth, and a few hold to the end of their days -- the conviction that ideas matter. In one's youth that conviction is experienced as a self-evident absolute, and one is unable fully to believe that there are people who do not share it. That ideas matter means that knowledge matters, that truth matters, that one's mind matters. And the radiance of that certainty, in the process of growing up, is the best aspect of youth. . . .

It is not the particular content of a young person's ideas that is of primary importance in this issue but his attitude toward ideas as such. The best way to describe it would be to say that he takes ideas seriously -- except that "serious" is too unserious a word in this context: he takes ideas with the most profound, solemn and passionate earnestness. (Granted this attitude, his mind is always open to correct his ideas, if they are wrong or false; but nothing on earth can take precedence for him over the truth of an idea.) . . .

Young persons who hold this conviction, do not have to "throw off the leading conformity of the only society they have known." They do not conform in the first place: they judge and evaluate; if they accept any part of the prevalent social trends, it is through intellectual agreement (which may be mistaken), not through conformity. They do not need to know the different types of society in order to discover the evils, falsehoods or contradictions of the one in which they live: intellectual honesty is the only tool required.

--"The 'Inexplicable Personal Alchemy' "

Patients With BPD Can Get Better ='-)

A study in Denmark shows that patients with Borderline Personality Disorder can indeed get better with additional treatment.  :'-)

About Stuart K. Hayashi, The Writer

At the behest of editors and publishers, I have written a new "About the Author" essay for myself.  This is what I have so far.


____




Stuart K. Hayashi is a freelance journalist residing in Mililani Town, Hawaii.  His original research played a part in publicly revealing that the documentary film Fahrenheit 9/11 cited what turned out to be a doctored newspaper page.  National news outlets eventually reported on this revelation.  Mr. Hayashi’s role in the investigation is acknowledged by name in the 2005 revised paperback edition of the New York Times bestseller Michael Moore Is a Big Fat Stupid White Man (New York, NY:  HarperCollins) by David T. Hardy and Jason Clarke, pp. 139-140. 

Hayashi’s own writings have appeared in the Honolulu Advertiser and on the news analysis website Ideas in Action (formerly Tech Central Station). 

He also contributed these chapters to nonfiction anthologies:

* "Human Cloning Is Ethical,"  Genetic Engineering:  Opposing Viewpoints, ed. Louise I. Gerdes (San Diego, CA:  Greenhaven Press, 2004).

 * "Atlas Shrugging Throughout History and Modern Life," Ayn Rand’s “Atlas Shrugged”:  A Philosophical and Literary Companion, ed. Edward W. Younkins, (Hampshire, England:  Ashgate, 2007).


Most recently, his essay on the philosophy of fiction has been published in Scout & Engineer, Issue No. 2.

'Scout & Engineer': The Exciting Second Issue!

The excellent literary magazine Scout & Engineer came out with its second issue over here, here, and here. It contains an article written by me, in which I explain why high-quality fiction, far from being a form of dishonesty, should be considered a highly symbolic method of conveying deep psychological truth.

There is so much more to this issue than me, however. The main attractions are the collection of short fiction by various writers, as well as the reviews and interviews by editor-publisher Hannah Eason.

You can see my enthusiastic review of the first issue (which doesn't include anything by me) over here. :-)

This magazine also published a great anthology of short stories by Christopher Blonde, entitled Wendy Never Married.

August 11, 2012

Loving Someone Versus 'Possession'

"Individuals with self-respect and self-esteem do not want to possess you."

--Michael J. Hurd (source)


Someone being "possessive" of you should not be confused with love.

I Will Always Care

Wishing a happy birthday to someone I care about.  Whether this is understood or not, for you to have lasting happiness is of paramount importance.  I meant -- and mean -- everything that I have said.  :'-)

If You Know Someone Who Exhibits Suicidal Gestures, Are You a Real Friend to That Person . . . or a Sycophant?

As I've blogged before, someone having suicidal ideation does not always lead to that person attempting suicide, but it remains very dangerous.  It is dangerous both for that person who has the suicidal ideation, and those who care about him or her. That is why I have absolutely no tolerance for it. None. When I say that, I don't mean that I cast moral disapproval on those who experience suicidal ideation. What it does mean is that if someone I care about happens to display very prominent suicidal ideation, the ethical course is to intervene.

Michael Jackson Syndrome?
There is a common story about many self-sabotaging celebrities that goes something like this. The celebrity is on a very self-destructive path, which causes visible harm to him or her, as well as trauma for those who care about the celebrity's well-being. The self-destructiveness can be manifested in substance abuse, eating disorders, self-cutting, criminal behavior (or falsely accusing others of criminal behavior), or symptoms of morbid mental illness.

Even though such self-destructive behaviors do not necessarily mean that the celebrity consciously desires to commit suicide, in this particular post I will place all such self-destructive behaviors under the category of "suicidal ideation," "suicidal gestures," and "suicidal imagery." (A psychologist might dispute that as being too broad on my part.)

Because of the celebrity's socially prominent status and because the celebrity acts outwardly confident in public, most people around him or her are reluctant to address this issue. Often, these people keep silent and pretend not to notice the disturbing suicidal gestures. Such a person who refrains from confronting the celebrity is not a real friend but a sycophant. By playing along with the celebrity's self-imposed illusion that the celebrity's suicidal gestures are safe and acceptable, the suicidal gestures are normalized and tacitly encouraged. Far from being conducive to the celebrity's long-term happiness and well-being, this "accepting friend" amounts to a passive "enabler." Think of Hans Christian Andersen's famous story "The Emperor's New Clothes."

Once in a while, someone close (or who was once close) to the celebrity does try to confront the celebrity about such dangers, or urges other people in the celebrity's circle to address the issue compassionately. When this happens, the whistleblower is often marginalized, ridiculed, and devalued. That's terribly tragic, because the whistleblower has shown himself to be a real friend -- exactly what those hangers-on, who have failed to address the issue, have not been. Those real friends -- the concerned whistleblowers -- are sidelined, and the self-defeating celebrity surrounds him- or herself with "yes" men and sycophants who play along with the illusion that everything is fine and normal.They then ostracize the whistleblower as the maladjusted troublemaker.  (Again, it's like "The Emperor's New Clothes.")


A Problem for Non-Celebrities as Well
As I do not know the celebrities personally, I cannot claim omniscience about them; my interpretation of them can be mistaken. However, from what I've read of their biographies, I think the scenario I just verbalized can be largely attributed to Michael Jackson, Charlie Sheen, and Lindsay Lohan. But it doesn't just apply to famous entertainers.

For more than a year, I corresponded online with a very intelligent person whom I will call "Lucy." Lucy expressed interest in looking beautiful, and, of course, in the beginning that sounded perfectly safe. Increasingly, though, Lucy would post pictures of bony anorexic women (this is not humorous hyperbole; they were literally anorexic-looking) and labeling them as the sort of people she wanted to emulate. She posted disturbing photos of herself looking ever-thinner and frailer. She then wrote status updates complaining about really odd physical ailments, like temporary blindness. Such physical ailments are rare in someone of such a young age . . . but common among people who experience starvation and malnutrition. Frighteningly, a large number of "loyal friends" (translation: sycophants) clicked "like" on the disturbing pictures and announcements and encouraged it.

Eventually, a minority of Lucy's online friends -- people much wiser and ballsier than myself -- wrote to Lucy that they were concerned about her health. Not once did they morally criticize her or express full-blown rejection of her as a person . . . though she reacted as if she interpreted it that way. Lucy pointedly told these people that her self-starvation was none of their business.


If Your Suicidal Gestures Are Nobody Else's Business, Why Do You Post Them on Facebook, LinkedIn, or Wordpress?
The whistleblower friends thought that Lucy's response was rather inexplicable. Their thought was, "If you think that your suicidal imagery is none of my business, then why are you putting it on display in front of me and other people?"

Of course I can be wrong, but I think I know the reason. I suspect that on some level the suicidal gestures did disturb Lucy, and that is exactly why she shared images of it on Facebook. She did not want other people, however, to confirm her fear that she was placing herself in a dangerous situation. Insofar as a "cry for help" refers to the crier wanting other people to acknowledge the problem, this was not a traditional "cry for help." Rather, it was like some kind of game of "chicken" in which Lucy implicitly dared other people to comment on the dramatic and alarming change in appearance.

Insofar as people refrained from negative comment, or even complimented the disturbing images, Lucy felt vindicated that her suicidal gestures were actually safe and acceptable, and that her painful health problems were completely unrelated to her self-imposed starvation. The sycophants granted Lucy this short-term gratification, giving her "social proof" that the starvation wasn't a form of self-harm. As for the whistleblower friends who raised the issue, the sycophants reprimanded them and piously told them that they were the assholes.

I blocked Lucy on Facebook because I did not want to lend tacit support to that self-destructive tendency. I envy those who wrote to her about the issue, though, as they were the ones most helpful toward her, even though such positive effects are not obvious in the present. I have known someone who is similarly self-destructive and who similarly exhibits "hints" of the inner pain. This person has informed me that this person has a long history of self-injury and of contemplating suicide. Almost two years ago, this person started posting a lot of suicidal imagery on Facebook, LinkedIn, and Wordpress. In this case, I did confront the person.  


How to Address a Self-Destructive Person Compassionately Without Forcing an Argument
If you are in a similar situation, and you strongly care about that person -- the "Lucy" in your own life -- I urge you to address the issue. If you notice something is going on, and you say nothing, that helps normalize the suicidal ideation and self-defeating behavior. It implies that the self-destructiveness is normal and acceptable. If someone has routinely displayed suicidal gestures to you in person or online (like on LinkedIn or Facebook), then it doesn't really fly for that person to say, "This is none of your business!" When someone has, on more than one occasion, shoved his or her suicidal imagery in your face, he or she has made it your business. If he or she fully believed that the suicidal imagery was not your business, he or she would not have made it visible to you.

Often people are reluctant to confront their "Lucy" because they have this rationale: "My friend can be very scary and temperamental sometimes; even my friend's great height is physically intimidating. If I mention that I notice the suicidal imagery, it will just start a big argument. She will hold a grudge and not seek help, and nothing good will result from the confrontation. It will only make our relationship awkward."

In the past two years, I have become very familiar with that feeling -- that fear from intimidation. Quite frankly, though, if someone is exhibiting suicidal ideation and expects you not to address that, then the relationship is already awkward. More importantly, I think there is a way to address the issue compassionately without forcing an argument. I suggest that to your own "Lucy," you say something like this:

I strongly value your friendship; you mean a lot to me. When I see the [here, make a brief list of the disturbing gestures you've witnessed, such as the dead-body imagery or the defensive insistence on wearing the exact same clothes every day --S.H.], I can't help but think that you must have a lot going on. You don't have to talk about it if you don't want to. But I want to let you know that if you ever do want to talk about it, I am here for you. :'-)

I think that gesture is even more powerful when it comes from a close relative, like an uncle or aunt. If the person you care about -- your "Lucy" -- happens to respond to you in an abusive/bossy/devaluing fashion, I recommend that you ignore it and reaffirm, "I know what I know.  If you ever want to talk about it, I am here for you.  :'-) "  And if that person provides no response, or responds dismissively, that's OK; at least you showed where you stand.

Note that that approach does not force an argument, demand that the person change, or cast moral disapproval. It does, however, let the person know that you are aware of the suicidal gestures and that that is not something you condone. It conveys, through action, that you reject the suicidal gestures but still value the person qua person. Hence, it shows the person that you accept him or her while you refuse to play along with the charade of normalcy -- that you refuse to help normalize the pathology.  I concede that the person who needs help might resent it as patronizing if you take this approach.  But all in all, it's the best available alternative.

I think that everyone has a right to his or her own harmless eccentricity. That is not the same as being an idle bystander when noticing a friend's suicidal gestures. This cannot be emphasized enough:  Suicidal gestures are not a lifestyle choice.

Why I Don't Have Winston Smith's Job, and Why I Don't Delete Historical Fact

Nothing exists but the truth.  And to sacrifice the truth is to sacrifice everything.

Anne Hathaway on Doing What You Love Never Being a Sacrifice

Stuart K. Hayashi

Perhaps I'm reading too much into it.  But, as Amy Peikoff pointed out, a recent interview with Anne Hathaway seems to suggest that the actress understands an important truth about sacrifice.

In conventional language, people often speak of giving up anything as a "sacrifice."   If parents give up some leisure time they wanted for themselves in favor of spending quality time with their kids, lots of people call that a parental "sacrifice."  But, as Ayn Rand pointed out in Atlas Shrugged, it isn't.  It is not a true sacrifice in the circumstance that the parents value their children more than they value that "alone time."  They give up the "alone time," a lesser value, for their greater value, which is the well-being of their children.  Far from being a net loss to your life, this is actually a net profit in terms of long-range happiness.  When an entrepreneur gives up a unit of merchandise he values less, to gain the revenue he wants more, the net gain in value is a profit.  The same logic applies to this emotional tradeoff.

That is an important distinction, because to call that rational tradeoff a sacrifice is to conflate it with the very serious sacrifices that the collectivist leaders of our culture often demand of you.  When the advocates of collectivism call for sacrifice, they invoke some arbitrary duty of yours to abdicate your greatest values to appease some "higher good" that you actually value less.  When they demand that you give up your precious time to take care an adult relative that has shown you nothing but cruelty since childhood, for example, that is a sacrifice. You relinquish what you value more (your time) for something you value less (a cruel person with whom your sole connection is blood).

When you are expected to give up your time and possessions to that which you value less -- such as strangers or an endangered subspecies of bog critter of which you care nothing -- that is a sacrifice.    It's bad enough when people try to extract such sacrifices through social pressure.  But it's particularly grueling when the government imposes such sacrifices by the threat of physical force.  Remember that laws and taxes are ultimately enforced at gunpoint.

Naturally, people recognize that benevolent tradeoffs are necessary in life.  Sometimes you do have to give up important-but-lesser-values, like your time, to care for entities that you know yourself to value more highly, like your children.  When someone labels those necessary -- and still self-interested -- tradeoffs as sacrifices, that encourages that person to psychologically equivocate those tradeoffs with the real sacrifices: the arbitrary demand that you turn over greater values to lesser ones.  A true sacrifice requires a victim.  The very word victim comes from victima, which means sacrificial animal.

One might charge that such a distinction simply amounts to semantics.  A critic may say that the sacrifices I inveigh against are "undesirable sacrifices," whereas the benevolent tradeoffs I speak of, wherein someone spiritually profits by letting go of lesser values to gain greater ones, are "desirable sacrifices" or even "sacrifices that are profitable in the long run." I recall that religious-right conservative apologist George Gilder even states that when an entrepreneur makes an investment and pays off his business expenses -- all in the quest for future profit -- the short-term expenses amount to "sacrifice."  But that's silly; "ultimately desirable sacrifice" is a conflict in terms.  To say that an action is a "sacrifice" is to categorize it as undesirable per se.  Ayn Rand's interpretation makes more sense.

This brings us to Anne Hathaway.  Perhaps she does not agree with me, or would not approve of my interpretation.  After all, she even hosted a fundraiser for the 2012 re-election of President Obama. :'-( But I like her particular choice of words in this interview, beginning at the 37:51 mark:

Caitlin King, Associated Press, interviewer (referring to Anne Hathaway cutting off her long hair for Les Miserables):  "That's exactly what he's talking about; making sacrifices for the roles that you're passionate about.  Can you talk about those sacrifices?"

Anne Hathaway: "They don't feel like sacrifices when you're making them. I mean I love what I do for a living, and getting to transform is one of the best parts of it.  So I never think about it like that."

Incidentally, Anne Hathaway publicly praised The Fountainhead in 2005 (see here) and, despite some unspecified reservations, Atlas Shrugged as well in 2012 (here).

Narcissus Didn't Love Himself

Narcissism -- in both the clinical and colloquial sense -- is commonly considered malignant self-love.  But today it occurred to me that the Narcissus of Greek myth doesn't really love himself; he loves his reflection, which is merely a surface image.  The image has visual traits derived from the real Narcissus, but it is far from encapsulating the whole person. 

Narcissus focuses on maintaining the image -- just as some people maintain their outward persona -- while the needs of the true self go neglected.  Narcissus was therefore self-sacrificial; he sacrificed the life and fulfillment of the true self for a much lower priority, an image.

Look Alive, Mate

This should be obvious, but you're at your strongest when you present yourself to the world as what you really are:  alive.  :'-)

The Dan Brown Code

Dan Brown's novel Angels & Demons opens with an elderly researcher being brutally murdered by a shadowy assassin. Then Harvard symbologist Robert Langdon enters the scene and meets a sexy young woman related to the murder victim. Together, they use their knowledge of history to find hidden messages in Renaissance artwork, slowly uncovering a grand conspiracy involving an ancient Secret Society and its feud with the Catholic church. *SPOILER ALERT!* A character perceived to be benevolent and on Langdon's side, is actually a heinous villain!

On the other hand:

Dan Brown's novel Da Vinc Code opens with an elderly researcher being brutally murdered by a shadowy assassin. Then Harvard symbologist Robert Langdon enters the scene and meets a sexy young woman related to the murder victim. Together, they use their knowledge of history to find hidden messages in Renaissance artwork, slowly uncovering a grand conspiracy involving an ancient Secret Society and its feud with the Catholic church. *SPOILER ALERT!*  A character perceived to be benevolent and on Langdon's side, is actually a heinous villain!

Faithless

I don't want you to have faith in me.  :-/


I want you to have evidence-supported confidence in me.  ^_^