Dissenting Futilitarian no. 5
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Transcript of Dissenting Futilitarian no. 5
D EAR HONOURABLE MEMBERS.
When the news came that your
vote on Motion no. 312 was delayed until the
fall, I must admit, I heaved a sigh of relief. I
heaved it as far as possible and, in the process,
emptied my lungs so thoroughly that I could
not breathe. But I have not been asphyxiated
by this problem yet and return now, after
recuperating, to my tale. One might think
it would be done by now; one might wish it
to be done (on that point, believe me, I am
with you). One might wish the vote taken.
But duty, my friends. We cannot be done
whenever we want. Thank goodness I have
you to confide in, when so many around me
are washing their hands of the f o u l i s s u e
the very instant it turns f o u l .
We cannot say, ‘I have had enough of this
wretched topic’ and just turn away. We who
have obligations are not Lords and Ladies,
whose reason to be done with a thing can be
nothing more than that they wish to be done
with it. Only a pampered aristocrat employs
‘wretched issue’ as a Principle of Decision.
Proper government, as we well know, takes
work, and that there is more work in this
wretched issue, you know better than all of
us. For why else does it keep flying back,
except that there is more to it?
Of course, it could be that the people who
keep flinging it back, after it has been flung
away, are witless oafs driven by ignorance.
Ha ha - kidding! I know you better than
to project such a view upon you; you have
not stepped forth to lead the country out
of contempt for those you lead! No, you are
ready to acknowledge (of this I am sure) that
the people calling out for justice - Justice for
the unborn! Reproductive justice! - are not
utter and complete boobs. Each one has some
view of things to which they are committed -
‘ideological views’, some would say, that are
thus entirely unfit to undergird public policy
... which, as a matter of fact, leads straight
into the next instalment of my story.
O ne evening I was relaxing in the
comfort (such as it was) of my
home (such as it is) when several sharp raps
on the door shattered the quiet.
“Is this the Dissenting Fut? Out of there
FUT , you meddler!” These were the words
that roared in as I cracked open the door.
I opened it wider and there before me
was an old college friend, Mr. james
m cfaddingtono ’f laddington.How
did he know? How had he learned of these
letters, and how had he traced them to me?
The jig was up, I thought. But then ... what
was the jig? I was soon to get the lowdown.
“JIMMY, my friend, long has it been since
we have chewed cud together. Come in for a
brew,” I said with trepidation.
“No,” he replied. “I drink with
friends, I drink with foes, but
the presence of fools offends
my nose, thus interfering
greatly with enjoyment of
good drink. We’ll take a walk
first and see if you are fit to
drink with, which I very much
doubt.” And thus it began, our
ramble of discovery.
But how had he learned I had
been writing to you? It was
soon clear, owing to certain
phrases he employed, that he
had actually read the letters.
Was it, I have wondered, one of you who
shared them with him? More than one among
you might well know Jimmy, as the
mcfaddingtono ’fladdingtons are a
prominent family deeply involved in our
nation’s politics. If indeed it was one of you
who took him into your confidence, I hasten
now to thank you, as we had an informative
chat that I will not soon forget. If ever.
It is the mcfaddingtono ’fladding-
tons whom we must carefully listen to,
as the exit from our swamp most certainly
depends on them.
JIMMY counted out the Five Points
of edification he said I was most
in need of, folding each point down one by
one until they formed a fist. Which he then
allowed me to have, in the following manner.
“You think you are Helping, don’t you? You
think this is Helpful to people ... this ...
whatever it is you imagine you are doing.”
“Do you think these MPs need you? They
don’t need you. Their job is to represent their
constituents, not listen to you. Most people in
this country are satisfied with things exactly
the way they are, and the MPs know this.
It’s their job. They know their constituents
and they will cast their vote; they will
represent their constituents. I know that
comes as a shock to you, you noxious pox on
the political process.”
I was shocked indeed by that: a pox on the
process? But I was mystified. How was
communicating with you, as I have done,
interference with our system? I did not
think your minds had to be protected from
discussion, information,
and (the horror) influ-
ence. Goodness knows,
you expose that delicate
organ left and right (to
your in-box, newspapers,
novels, movies, the inter-
net, ...). I hoped the ex-
planation would follow
and, sure enough, it did.
As to the other remark,
about the mind of the
nation, I was somewhat
chagrined. I had no
knowledge that permit-
ted me to claim, as Jimmy had just done,
that ‘most people in this country are
satisfied with things just as they
are ’ - but I was aware that al l the
m cfa dd i ng t ono ’f l a dd i ng t on s
possess such knowledge by heredity. As for my-
self, I knew nothing of what the country thinks
about these matters and I had done nothing
to check, having blown all my time looking
into facts and listening to people who knew
something about what they were speaking of.
Dear Members, how I would like to know
your secret: how do you do it - know what
the country wants, learn the minds of your
constituents?
by this point I was already feeling
a tad deflated and we sat down on
a bench, while Jimmy continued. “You think
you are Hidden behind a veil of neutrality.
You imagine that no one can see what you are
up to, because of your earnest-nerd schtick.
Yes, you have been so supremely clever, with
this ‘gosh-and-golly-wherever-do-I-stand’
routine, that no one, you think, can see what
you are doing.”
No.
5 18 JUNE
2012}}
The DISSEN TING FU TILITARIAN {{
L ET T E R S TO M EMB E R S O F PA R L I A M E N T F R OM A C I T I Z E N O N T H E S U B J E CT O F T H E P R O P O S E D I N V E ST I G AT I O N I N TO O U R H U M A N I T Y
O s a y c a n y o u h e a r ? O r a r e y o u a l o g ? W h a t c o u r s e c a n y o u s t e e r , t o e x i t t h i s b o g ? !
B
The Honourable . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . , M.P.House of CommonsOttawa
scow ling sess ion
in progress
sneer ing, d ismiss ing, contempt,
glow er ing DARKLY, STARING ACCUSINGLY,
MOCKING, & any combination ther eof
A L L OW E D
too, that you think we should think through?
Are we not both defenders of thinking-
justice-through? And do you really think the
only issue of justice I care about is justice
for the unborn (because of my ‘continual
reference to the humanity of the fetus’ and
my ‘exhaustive embryology coverage’)? All
I am doing, in all of this, is considering the
reasons why some people say ‘Forget this’ and
others say ‘Don’t!’ All that concerned me was
trying to understand the people who keep
insisting that this issue will not go away.
Are they right or are they wrong?”
“James, you must
understand this,
i f you a r e a
humanitarian, as
I know you are.
In this country -
does it surprise
you? - we have
p e o p l e . Y e s ,
s h o c k i n g , a
country FULL O F
people , all over
the place. And
t h e s e p e o p l e
believe thing s
- are they nuts? - no, that’s what people do!
They believe things, and they get in each
other’s way, and we have to figure this
out. And you don’t do that by flaring your
nostrils and taking a position .”
“God save us,” I continued, “from the posi-
tions ! P eo p l e believe things for reasons,
and that is where you start: with the people,
who believe things, and why . You need to
hear the people, and all the reasons they
bring you. And for this you need patience
of infinite dimension, because you will
be tempted, before you are done, to take
a position and start treating these people
as dupes and minions of the wrong side .”
“This is not a country inhabited by issues .
This is not a land of eternal verities
dangling over us in the sky. It is a country of
people, who believe things, and if we bother
to uncover the root of those beliefs we shall
soon find out that sometimes, dammit, people
actually know thing s about life, for reasons
that are not an unfathomable mystery. Well,
let’s take the trouble. This is not too hard
for us. It is not in heaven, that we should
say, ‘Who will shoot up there to snatch the
answer?’ Let’s hear what people have to say.
But if I start with group A, then you call me
a partisan! Well, I started somewhere: with
Mr. VALEUR-DE-BOIS and Motion 312.”
“Jimmy, my friend, you should believe me
when I say what I am about to say. I have
never said anything with more earnestness. I
may seem sure about this bit or that bit, but
the story isn’t over, and if I knew what all
the bits would add up to, where all of this
were heading, I would say so, and I do not .
I will know what I am - Pro-choice, Pro-life,
or something different - in the end. But now?”
Suddenly, words spoken by the PM in years
past returned to me, unbidden: “I’ve always said
my views on the abortion issue are complex, I don’t fall into
any of the neat polar extremes on this issue.” Sir, I have
wronged you. Once I blamed you for those
words, which I called devious. Could you not
show your colours and label yourself? But
now I had come to see things differently!
Friends, I shall break off here: my companion
that day had much yet to say, but I must
leave all that for another time.
I am, etc.
1 1 D i s s e nt i n g f ut i l ita r i a n . b lo g s p ot.ca
“What am I doing?”
“You know.”
“I confess I do not.”
“There, you are at it again!” - This continued
for long enough to bore a dead squirrel, as I
know because the dead squirrel in the road
opposite our bench rolled over several times
in agony, crying ‘Stop it!’ For your sake, I cut
to the chase.
Reader, please believe that I was not being
coy in my plea of ignorance. I was ‘up to’ (if
we must put it that way) a hundred different
things, and what mattered in this instance
was what Jimmy thought I was ‘up to’. He said,
“Clearly, you are Anti-choice and are only
pretending to entertain Pro-choice viewpoints
so that you can trash them .”
“Do you think they are fools,” he went on. “If
you think they are actually reading your
rag then the only fool here is you. The only
ones who would bother are those already
in agreement with your perfectly obvious
sympathy for the right. As for the rest, if
all is well their staffer - not them, but the
kid working for them - will take one look
at your screed and sail it straight into the
wastebasket, where all this tedious lobbying
belongs, because even that kid will clearly
see that this is just more half-baked, Anti-
choice partisanship .”
I looked at him dumbfounded. “My dear man,
this puzzles me very much. I am Pro-life and
Anti-choice, you say: but what is it that
reveals this to you?” Now it was Jimmy’s turn
to be shy: I could get not a word out of him.
“So is that it,” I asked, “is that
all you have? Some generalized
suspicion about my views that puts you
(I gather) on the left , and me (you say)
on the right? It seems to me that you are
satisfied when you have done no more than
identify who is on ONE side and who is
on the other - so that we can scowl at
each other in silence, as you are now doing,
scowling at me! Is that your idea of our
political process?” (I could picture oddly
quiet days in the House of Commons.) “No,”
I continued (as I had hit on a ploy to break
his silence), “you are reluctant to cite the
specific evidence that in your mind betrays
my position, because when you do so, you
know that what you cite will be evidence
not of my rightwardness but of your feverish
habit of reading-things-into what I say.” My
plan worked. Rather too well.
“Well then, genius, don’t say you didn’t ask
for it. O n e , that you want to talk about this
at all; tw o , your obvious sympathy for and
comprehensive treatment of the Motion’s
rationale; t h r e e , your continual reference
to the humanity of the fetus, with your
exhaustive embryology coverage; f o u r ,
that you are a man, anxious to butt into a
woman’s business; f iv e , that whenever you,
out of your great largesse, treat the concerns
of your opponents, you quickly default to
‘logical minutiae’ rather than the emotional
reality of conscience-stricken actual women;
s ix , your conspicuously absent critique of the
appalling tactics of the Pro-life movement -
busing teens in to March for Life, the High
Moral Tirades, the guilt-tripping, and all the
rest of it! People can see you coming from
miles away, you partisan !”
I hung my head. But then I quickly lifted
it, thinking I would now be accused,
s ev e n , of emotional manipulation. Was this
the jig? And was it up?
There was truth here, in what James had
said. I had done all that he had said ,
done it all - this was now clear to me - and
it had driven us apart. This man, my friend,
though seated on a bench beside me, was
sitting very far away, across a great divide.
We stared at each other, across that gulf, in
opposition. I had done all that he had said,
but did it mean, as he had said, that he and I
were opponents? - Could I say anything at
all, in reply to him, that would not confirm to
him my partisanship and opposition to
what he considered to be right?
“James, it seems to me that you just spoke
to me - yes? But why? Why come to my
door?” He looked at me with an expression
I could not gauge, but said nothing. “If I
am up to something , in what I am asking
you now, this very minute - that is, if I am
being devious and partisan, and trying to
manipulate you into agreement with me, as
I was doing, you said, with the MPs - then
why should you listen to me? Why stay and
listen? What good could possibly come of it?”
As his silence persisted, I said, “If we are
just partisans across a divide, you will
expect me to spout more partisan nonsense,
and, indeed, that is all I will be capable of.
But is what I am saying right now more pro-
life drivel?”
“I don’t know what it is,” he said.
“It is my response to what you have said
to me, because we are talking together ,
not pelting each other with labels. It is what
I say back to you because I have heard you.
I don’t know if you will believe that I have
heard you, or if you can believe that a person
such as you take me to be could hear anyone
but his own kind! My friend, I am of no
kind but one - of your kind. I am a partisan
of thinking , just as you are, because you
think , as I know very well.”
“Because I am talking to you,” I went on,
“you know that I see you as a defender of
thinking, a partisan of thinking. I don’t
label you an opponent and write off all you
say: I hear you; I am listening! And it is not
partisanship to think together, because the
opposite side to that (refusing to think, not-
thinking) is nothing, no side whatsoever!
We reject it absolutely, together!”
In the heat of my speech I stood up. “You do
not understand that I do not have a position
on this issue. You do not understand the
first thing about me. You think you have
been given all these signs, so that you know
where I am g oing , on account of all these
clues I have dropped - but you have no
idea! Clue: ‘That I want to talk about this
at all’, you say. But why do I? What are
my reasons? There is a question of j u st i c e
here, which I want to think through. Yes, I
‘have sympathy for the rationale’, I admit it
- but what have I admitted? That there is a
question of j u st i c e , which we ought to think
through! And don’t you admit it with me? Is
there not a question of j u st i c e here for you,