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Evil and Givenness Quotes
Evil and Givenness: The Thanatonic Phenomenon
by
Brian W Becker1 rating, 5.00 average rating, 0 reviews
Evil and Givenness Quotes
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“And, in answering affirmatively to such questions, would not such despair further entrench us in this barbarism as we collectively foreclose upon the possibility of what seems to us impossible—the transformation from a society founded upon evil to one founded upon love? Perhaps even to suggest such a thing strikes us as maudlin and trite.
Yet, a path remains open for it, but not one we may wish to embark upon. It is the hope that I may suffer my apathy before barbarism’s decadence. Decadence concerns a collective stagnation of the will that no longer wills anything other than to will itself, i.e., to express its power for power’s sake in an infinite repetition of the same. In such a situation, I am left with the despair of an a-pathetic ego that concludes: “this is just the way things are” or “it is what it is.” Suffering this apathy then means encountering a crossroads whereby I may either more fully assume the thanatonic and participate in the decadence of barbarism or, perhaps, allow this suffering to convert decadence into a crisis, turning from the crisis of crisis that is decadence and, thereby, also convert my a-pathy back toward a pathos that awakens me to this pernicious logic at work.”
― Evil and Givenness: The Thanatonic Phenomenon
Yet, a path remains open for it, but not one we may wish to embark upon. It is the hope that I may suffer my apathy before barbarism’s decadence. Decadence concerns a collective stagnation of the will that no longer wills anything other than to will itself, i.e., to express its power for power’s sake in an infinite repetition of the same. In such a situation, I am left with the despair of an a-pathetic ego that concludes: “this is just the way things are” or “it is what it is.” Suffering this apathy then means encountering a crossroads whereby I may either more fully assume the thanatonic and participate in the decadence of barbarism or, perhaps, allow this suffering to convert decadence into a crisis, turning from the crisis of crisis that is decadence and, thereby, also convert my a-pathy back toward a pathos that awakens me to this pernicious logic at work.”
― Evil and Givenness: The Thanatonic Phenomenon
“And, in answering affirmatively to such questions, would not such despair further entrench us in this barbarism as we collectively foreclose upon the possibility of what seems to us impossible—the transformation from a society founded upon evil to one founded upon love? Perhaps even to suggest such a thing strikes us as maudlin and trite.
Yet, a path remains open for it, but not one we may wish to embark upon. It is the hope that I may suffer my apathy before barbarism’s decadence. Decadence concerns a collective stagnation of the will that no longer wills anything other than to will itself, i.e., to express its power for power’s sake in an infinite repetition of the same.25 In such a situation, I am left with the despair of an a-pathetic ego that concludes: “this is just the way things are” or “it is what it is.” Suffering this apathy then means encountering a crossroads whereby I may either more fully assume the thanatonic and participate in the decadence of barbarism or, perhaps, allow this suffering to convert decadence into a crisis, turning from the crisis of crisis that is decadence and, thereby, also convert my a-pathy back toward a pathos that awakens me to this pernicious logic at work.”
― Evil and Givenness: The Thanatonic Phenomenon
Yet, a path remains open for it, but not one we may wish to embark upon. It is the hope that I may suffer my apathy before barbarism’s decadence. Decadence concerns a collective stagnation of the will that no longer wills anything other than to will itself, i.e., to express its power for power’s sake in an infinite repetition of the same.25 In such a situation, I am left with the despair of an a-pathetic ego that concludes: “this is just the way things are” or “it is what it is.” Suffering this apathy then means encountering a crossroads whereby I may either more fully assume the thanatonic and participate in the decadence of barbarism or, perhaps, allow this suffering to convert decadence into a crisis, turning from the crisis of crisis that is decadence and, thereby, also convert my a-pathy back toward a pathos that awakens me to this pernicious logic at work.”
― Evil and Givenness: The Thanatonic Phenomenon
“Another prominent examination of this gaze is the analysis of the voyeur. This example does not concern the voyeur’s gaze, which might be considered an evil eye on its own terms. Instead, the gaze of interest is the one the voyeur encounters in discovering himself watched by another. The voyeur peers through a keyhole, attempting to see without being seen. In this situation, he finds himself in his total facticity and freedom, a being unto itself, making choices and dealing with limits. However, the moment he hears footsteps and notices someone looking, the entire situation changes. Previously, he could focus on what he was perceiving. He may have been a “peeping Tom,” but he did not think about himself in those terms. When another gaze arrives, and the voyeur encounters the look, his freedom is turned back on himself. He experiences shame as he is revealed to himself for who he is. In this new situation, the other becomes his master, and he experiences himself alienated, removed, and disconnected from his possibilities, no longer master of his situation. As such, “[t]he Other is the hidden death of my possibilities.”
― Evil and Givenness: The Thanatonic Phenomenon
― Evil and Givenness: The Thanatonic Phenomenon
