Young Writers Society

An essay, for a friend of mine.

SALT IN THE ABYSS

Abyss gazing has become something of a habit of late: they say that whatever you practice for appearances eventually seeps its way into your life, and I have to say that its proved unsurprisingly true for myself. The Lover becomes a whore, the Jester becomes a fool: Parlabane becomes the skeptic, to the point where he doubts the reason for his own existence, albeit in a very intelligent and rational way. And that is the great - the greater, indeed - part of the danger in admitting that, yes, other people can think, and yes, opposing views may hold some high and important measure of truth. When you examine someone else's point of view carefully, what that truth might be and might mean become problems that assail our own sense of understanding. In battling monsters, the danger is not just in the classic 'doing what you must' to win only to find you have become that which you would fight; it is allowing yourself the luxury of admitting that the monster has as much right to battle as you have.

Post-modernism allows us that most beautiful and risky of indulgences: believing that everyone is correct. Where once there was 'Yes' or 'No' (and perhaps even 'Maybe' for those bold few!) there is now only one: either will do, though Post-modernism is naturally the last refuge of the 'yes-man'. While the accepting would like to use Post-modernism as a weapon for putting the grey back into black-and-white fundamentalist worlds, they tend to miss the fact that instead of allowing a sort of 'happy rainbow of perspective', Postmodernism is essentially the opposite: a monochrome theocracy, with 'white' as its God. Or 'black', whichever you prefer. It would be lovely to have found some kind of intellectual Bill of Rights, with all philosophies created equal, but that just doesn't hold water: on the journey of life, in which how you view the world plays an enormous part, accepting everything as true will only leave you with no destination, no beginning and probably no landscape to boot. 'Endless are the arguments of philosophers', the old adage goes, but people who quote it in scorn are missing the key ideal: there is always something yet to be uncovered. When you reduce an existence of discovery, possibility and glorious uncertainty to an unthinking, all-encompassing 'Yes', life becomes - to put it bluntly - eat, sleep and screw, 'till death us do part.

It's a fine and healthy thing to live in a society that demands answers: the search for truth, or at least the search for something has been one of, if not the greatest driving force in human history. But to be so proud as to believe that the answer to every question is solved here and now, that the myriad intricacies of the universe come up to 100% positive and true every time: therein is an arrogance no true philosopher would ever deign to touch.

So where does that leave us, with our western bred-in-the-bone liberalism, our desire for political correctness or politeness or - God forbid! - equality of ideas? Freedom of speech makes it necessary to let the idiot vent his spleen (what else have you just witnessed, eh?) but not to accept what he says: Nietzsche may have been a perspectivist - a hatchling post-modernist, to many minds - but in amongst contradictory scribblings and syphilitic one-liners resides a gem that every free spirit should have in their collection. "He who battles with monsters should look to it that he himself does not become a monster; when you gaze long in the the abyss, the abyss gazes also into you."

Freedom of Speech, Freedom of Thought and Freedom of Expression are all products of a healthy society, just as close-minded fundamentalism is a sign of a diseased one, but in listening one must never forget to include that vital grain of salt, lest we play Saruman in our own particular story: becomes trapped by looking to deeply into something we ought to be questioning with more caution.

So all you who are nodding now, stop! What I write is true, so far as I can tell, but my telling you is now reason for you to believe it; run it under the harsh light of skepticism, burn it with dogma and creed and figure out exactly what strikes a chord with you. Because when it comes right down to it, the abyss of other people is one of the most useful teachers you will ever have the fortune of stumbling across, but that doesn't mean you want to spend the rest of your life tumbling downward through darkness. As for fighting monsters: I'll leave that symbol up to your imagination. Personally, I think I'll stick to searching for truth in my own skin, no matter how demonic it appears to others.

He who battles with monsters should look to it that he himself does not become a monster; when you gaze long into the abyss, the abyss gazes also into you.

-- Friedrich Nietzsche