Excalibur

As earnest as water runs downhill, so everyone seeks to be "Good." An inviolable law! There is confusion absolutely… but no “evil.” Torque cranks constantly however, breaking-up how we define Good, how we pattern the reflecting flow of that unyielding pressure. And the battle of culture roots in this hydraulic.

When not properly channeled, the desire to be Good crimps under its own pressure. Tinfoil wrinkle the manifold ways it can be colored and refracted. Such excess “discretion” crinkles smooth rules, as angles rationalize and shatter law in every direction. Good becomes feckless. Opinions splinter. And as definitions fray, reflections of Good shimmer everywhere - often off actions most bad… (Hitler even thought he was purifying the human race!) And yet, to this day, the only institutions presumptuous enough to exclaim hard, purposeful, straight definitions are the old, doddering hands of the world's religions - or to a lesser degree, those initially pristine, but typically eventually myopic political ideologies that end fat, slopping partisan feed troughs. And, to be sure, there are slighter movements off into the periphery. But where are the philosophers? Where the blacksmiths that deign to forge new answers? What guiding edge now pulls along our culture? What force now shapes our image that we become in our children? Who leads?

So that it is not a question of what we want, but how we come to understand what we want. We all want Good. But what is Good? All human action turns over this keystone question. It sharpens and quickens our judgment; and repercussions, vast, lean back and clang against the steel core of that answer. Few however hammer that flowing, reflective steel into solid, straight answers. Fewer still polish their understanding against the flint of this question… “What is Good?” But it is “the” quintessential question. “What is Good?” The very answer makes a people. It draws their form and defends their way. “What is Good?”

To date, some answers - like some cultures - are better approximations than others. But we now find ourselves at multiple tipping points, where approximations are no good. We need the answer. We’re lost and running out of time. – And while culture is the very passing of a people's answer (or road map) to the next generation, it is also the corruption of that answer at each pass. So that cultures tend to decline, as morals dissipate with each succeeding generation. – And there's a queer cycle whose nadir is a historical fact – a recurrent, patterned generation (three to four generations after a great war); whose age careens adrift, riding a small raft of questions over a deep sea of answers. Where opinions crest, and crinkle, and “white-cap” into chaos. Where no straight law is cut; and the flow of Good has leapt the tracks. – Familiar? This is our generation. It was also Buddha’s, Confucius’, Plato’s, Kant’s’, and virtually all the great law-givers. They “smithed” Good because they had to. It was up to them to put their culture back on track. Like Arthur pulling Excalibur deep from the rock; they pulled their answer. And so too must we, as it grinding-slides out… slow, heavy, sharp and sparking!

Growing up, at alternating times, I thought it was good to fight or be a hippie; bulky this year or skinny the next; but at each stage, I wanted the same thing - to be Good. Yet at each stage I defined Good differently. And that story I think is not unique. I mean if one could be the most well liked, most esteemed person on the planet, who would not be that person? We all grope after that pattern... and when too many answers abound, often we lurch, so that our actions wobble at that young, volatile age as our feedback “shoe-laces,” looping into greater insecurity and increasing uncertainty.

– Adolescence is this very clamoring, this indecisive flip-flopping around and trial-and-error-like discovery to be Good. Heroes are everywhere! – "…pinball, a kaleidoscope of images darting across their eyes!" And as everyone knows, this is also the age when kids are most impressionable. Every young boy wishes to be cool. Ask him! If it weren't for competing images, it’d be a “piece of cake” to convince a kid, "this is cool!" and have him believe you - which is why some parents opt to so shelter their children. Adjacently, this is also why everyone else focuses on them! Throughout childhood, a veritable circus of pied pipers flute to lure a child's ego to that Good which most benefits the piper. And we are all pipers. Some lead home. Some to the river.

Terrorists.... They too want to be Good. And while they’re comical, don’t doubt they’re considered "cool" by their own. 72 virgins! And I even hear that they have trading cards!

So "yes", what is Good is ultimately subjective - but only when there's no working definition of Good… only when no clear call cries as legend has it, Excalibur did, “Take me up!” There are stories told of ages when man must step to the stone! This is such a time! “What is Good?” We must pull some cardinal blade from the throat of that granite question. “What is Good?” We must evoke some eternal measure to steer-cut our way through this deep sea of ballooning possibilities, and conflict-cresting answers. We must answer “the” question to properly frame all others.

So I propose a new working definition of Good. Challenge it! You grab hold, torque & turn and hammer on anvil something better. If I am wrong, “Cast me away!” But I begin with the premise that life is merely the most efficient cycler of energy: energy's path of least resistance. – The sun’s eddy and whirling dervish! Therefore, Good must then be defined as that which promotes maximum, sustained energy flow on the largest number of scaling dissipative structures - me, my family, local and national communities, humanity, Gaia, and on into the Cosmos. Of course, as with any scale, these scales too at times grind against each other, coiling as it does – that is, what is good for the Cosmos is not always good for man – likewise what is good for man may not be good for Gaia. (In a hydro-carbon economy, for example, my prosperity directly and positively corresponds to my carbon footprint. That is, the greater the resources that cycle through my life; the greater my carbon footprint, the more successful I am. But that may not be good for the environment. And whatever the effect on the environment, it is certainly not sustainable.) Ideally, these scales spiral up like a nautilus - as one coils left, another coils right on top – measured and reinforcing. On balance then, our function should seek to increase the flow of the whole, favoring always the yield of that most immediate scale - starting with the self, Adam-Smith-like, confident that the greater my flow the more I can organize the whole. Our Good must calculate scale yields that then “on net” enhance our affirmation of life. This is what I grip, dead-lifting, from that scabbard-stone… “What is Good?” Huh? What say you? If nothing… then “Take me up!” – Excalibur.

On Moral Theory and the Moral Act

In the framing of moral theory one should weight the consequences first. That is, one should focus on engineering the particular consequences that emerge by virtue of many people acting as you think they ought to act. The implementation of virtue however should not be judged by its consequences. To err is human! Therefore, any action should then be judged purely by the degree to which that act sprung from a character embracing the "consequentialist" ideal.

Some see morality in the consequence. Some see morality in the intent. Pragmatists, the former; prigs, the latter. But they need not be at odds. We can spiral this around. What if the consequence of a moral act serves to edify the virtue of the person (or system) that generated the intent in the first place, so that the actor is also the acted upon – so that the consequences of the intent, act back upon itself, the intent? It is through such circumstances that we often witness whirling virtuous cycles – self-reinforcing, stable, and good. The whole is the ideal! That is Good.

On Gayness and Marriage

The 14th amendment was enacted in 1868. It was written into the constitution because there were doubts about whether or not congress could legitimately enact the Civil Rights Act of 1866. The Civil Rights Act of 1866 read "citizens of every race and color ... [have] full and equal benefit of all laws and proceedings for the security of person and property, as is enjoyed by white citizens." That is, the spirit of the 1866 Act and the 1868 Amendment, if you were to unfurl its logic, was meant to protect classes of birth - like race, national origin, sex or religion – where modern American jurisprudence would apply “strict scrutiny.” The 14th amendment was never meant to apply to classes of choice. It was never meant to apply to homosexuality. That is clear.

Let me reiterate the point and sharpen it. Homosexuality is a class of choice. It is not a class of birth – like race, national origin, sex or religion. Yes, bores will argue that “they” are “born that way” – whatever that means. And while I will conceded that may well be true for some; it is not true for all. But whatever the case, we must maintain the concept of free will (choice) – for if we do not uphold that foundational concept, then all law – moral or state – simply crumbles. I mean, how could anyone ever be held responsible if they never had a choice? “I had no choice but to kill those three people.” Look, I don’t particularly believe in free will – but for the sake of order and deterrence, it is clear that we must maintain the willing suspension of disbelief when it comes to free will. So the equal protection clause only applies to classes of birth – where one has no choice. You can’t help being born black or female, etc. It does not apply to classes of choice.

Yes, you can argue that religion is a class of choice and that the equal protection clause clearly applies to it. But the heart of the difference is that by making a religious choice and then marrying one is not demanding additional privileges whilst by making a sexual-orientation choice and then marrying one is indeed demanding special privileges – for example, spousal benefits.

I mean, think about it. There is a slippery slope here – not to be glib. But if we start opening up the definition of marriage and extending the equal protection clause to anybody that’s made a choice, then what would stop, for example, an entire community from wedding and taking mutual advantages of marital exemptions for estate tax purposes? I mean, where is the line drawn? We should draw it traditionally – with one man, one woman – just as 7 million Californians did.

Last but not least, the key line at issue in the 14th Amendment is that "No State shall make or enforce any law which shall abridge the privileges or immunities of citizens of the United States.” Well, not to overstate the obvious, but it must be pointed out that homosexuals never had the right to get married in the first place, therefore there is no “privilege” being “abridged” by prop 8 – since homosexuals didn't have the right to marriage in the first place. That is, you first must have had the right to a privilege before there is even the potential of that privilege being unconstitutionally “abridged.”

I won’t bore you with the additional facts that as a society we often discriminate on a whole host of issues based upon what seems reasonable. For example, one can’t vote till they’re 18, etc. Again, it’s largely how we want to organize our society. So it’s not a religious thing, for me, it’s an engineering thing. What kind of society do we want to engineer? And where/what do we prune?

So the issues of gay marriage goes right to the heart of how we fundamentally structure society - what we incent, disincent, suppress, and subsidize. We should cut today what we want tomorrow. It’s the law of gardening. I mean, history proves tha...t civilization is best served by anchoring into absolutes – a handful of absolutes (call them principles if you like) that promote stability and a smooth “baton-passing,” as it were, from one generation to the next: we often call such intergenerational structure “culture.” And the traditional family unit is the keystone to any multi-generational tasks. So I say, let’s celebrate the traditional family unit, keep it sharp and defined – and esteemed, and not castrate it into some ineffectual fog of relativism. Who would argue after all that, as a species, this 21st century presents us with many challenges! And the type of challenges best met by a parent hoping and working toward a better life for their children.

On the flip side, you can chart how history has often morphed when “state-leisure” relaxes in the other direction – yes, art always erupts, and often a flourishing of drama and genius – but always hanging over, light on those heels, drags great monstrosities and ever-lowbrow-ing decline – and the deliquescence is inevitably the rot of the power of a people. Not my opinion. Just historical pattern. So it depends upon what you want - in what garden you want to live. But it’s always with such a seeming innocuous premise as “everyone-should-have-the-right-to” that the inexorable will of history arcs its way… further into decadence.