On Kindness

For me, this reading was personally relevant and often directly expressed feelings that arise in my own mind on a daily basis. The reading catalyzed introspection that was at times scary and at other times hopeful and inspiring. I was also struck by the passage early in the reading that Professor Van Der Ryn opened with in the prompt. The authors, Phillips and Taylor, assert:
Most people appear to believe that deep down they (and other people) are mad, bad , and dangerous to know; that as species-apparently unlike other species of animal – we are deeply and fundamentally antagonistic to each other, that our motives are utterly self-seeking, and that our sympathies are forms of self-protection. (p. 4)
What struck me about this thought is that when put into words, it sounds so sad and hopeless, but at the same time it is often how I feel about myself, and others.
For me it is important to look at this topic (kindness and interactions between human beings) not as an idea of absolutes, but rather as a result of many interacting factors. By this I mean that I do not believe that people are always kind or always malevolent, but rather, I believe that peoples’ treatment of others is s complex interaction of genetics, upbringing, mood and surrounding. The author suggests that kindness is what makes people most happy and content. “His astonishment is echoed in headline reports of studies of “what makes people happy,” which show kindness registering much higher on the happiness scale than self-focused behavior” (p. 3). This is a point that I totally agree with, but at the same time, in light of my own experience, calls for further exploration.
As I thought about this reading, I began to recognize my own patterns of kindness and more commonly, lack of kindness and benevolence (my most common description of myself is that I am a “misanthropic f***”). What I realized is that I am much more likely to act kind and feel a connection to humanity when I am happy and feeling positive about my own existence. When I am feeling badly about myself or the state of the world, I tend to project negative traits onto others and thus am much less interested or motivated to act kindly. In fact, when I am stressed, I often act antagonistically towards others and seek out confrontation. I guess my question is what comes first, the kindness or the happiness? I would suggest both. Not only does kindness result in increased happiness, but happiness results in increased kindness.
Another component that is critical to kindness is the belief of interconnectedness of all humans. My educational background is mainly in psychology and biological sciences and in both these disciplines, the idea of altruism is largely discounted and at best met with a great deal of skepticism. One reductionist view is that we are nothing more than vehicles for propagating our genetic material from one generation to the next. However, I don’t believe this is our innate drive, but rather a biological vulnerablility that has been exploited by businesses, media and Government. In light of these two critical components of kindness (happiness and interconnectedness) it logically follows that kindness has dissipated in our country. We are living in an age of ruthless corporate capitalism in our country, which not only creates economic divisions, but also is inherently competitive. So in a sense the connectedness we should feel to one another is being replaced by something that is deemed more important, power and status. The result is that we see fellow human beings as competition for a diminishing and already limited pool space and resources. In addition, happiness has become intimately tied to possessions and things. Marketing schemes and businesses now supply an endless stream of new releases, new versions and upgrades. By placing your happiness in things, it remains always in sight, but just out of reach. As we become more advanced as a nation, we have simultaneously become less and less happy and content. This is an idea suggested by the authors, in which they state, “…but entry into society with its vicious inequalities and rivalries, transforms this innate self-concern into amour proper, a “hateful and irascible” egoism based on the envious comparison of self to others” (p. 31).
I do not believe that we are innately malevolent, hateful beasts as the authors pose early in the reading. However we are clearly not saints who are impervious to the influences of this world. We are complex interactions of our genetics and our environment and we are incredibly social beings, as we have seen in other readings. Ironically, I believe it is this drive to be accepted and surrounded by others that has driven us away from kindness. We have come to believe, over years and years of brainwashing (I’m hesitant to use this word, but at the same time, I believe it is a form of brainwashing) that resources and power are the most important “traits” of a person. It seems that money and power has replaced moral integrity and personality as the basis on which we judge people. Being successful (in a fiscal sense), important and powerful has become the surefire way to be assured that you can have some control in your social surrounding. It is the setup of our society that makes us believe that kindness will be counterproductive toward reaching these goals. As Rousseau stated, “society corrupts.”