Balls and Walnuts
more than you ever wanted to know
Come it ran dumb axe of cents less kine, Ness
I’ve learned that Bakersfield is famous for three things:
and the creator of this bumper sticker slogan.
This ran dumb axe of kine Ness shtick is the brainchild of this guy. What a doofus.
Now I know what you’re thinking. You’re thinking, Walnut, how can you possibly find fault in a man who only wants to promote altruism? And before yesterday, I would have been all for this guy. There’s nothing wrong with altruism. There’s nothing wrong with being kind to people for no good reason, expecting nothing in return. But then I met the concept’s author.
He was the keynote speaker at last night’s annual medical staff meeting for our local hospital. This guy is all about himself: the hundreds of radio and TV interviews he’s given. His time on Oprah. His write-up in People magazine. His meeting with the King of Singapore. The way his “trademark phrase” has circled the world, has changed so many lives. Fifteen minutes into this, I wanted to cry out, “So YOU’RE THE ONE we can thank for the current Golden Age of peace and tranquility!” but he kept going for another half hour.
The whole thing bothered me so much, I spent the rest of the evening trying to puzzle out why it bothered me so much. There’s no single answer, I’m afraid. Partly it was the man’s arrogance, partly his presumptuousness. By telling people to — well, you can read the coffee mug — he’s assuming his audience does not act with kindness to the people (including strangers) in their lives.
Last night, after picking up a pizza for my family, I ran after and snagged a little orange ball that rolled into the street so that the ball’s owner, a four- or five-year-old girl, wouldn’t have to go into the street. Today, coming home in traffic, I let someone cut in front of me since no one else was letting him in. I’m not even going to scratch the surface of what I do at work every day (since I’m paid for it, you could argue it’s hardly altruism to be kind to my patients . . . although I would get paid just as much if I were a total shit to them). I honestly DON’T think I’m anything special. I’m polite. I believe in the Golden Rule. And I really think most people I deal with, including strangers, are every bit as polite and kind as I am, if not more. Rude buttheads are more the exception than the rule. They just draw more attention, and somehow they’re the ones who get elected to public office.
This guy’s implication is that an altruistic act is somehow exceptional, that we’re all greedy bastards who only do things out of self-interest. But then he undercuts his argument by returning again and again to the benefits of these altruistic acts to the perpetrator. You should do these things because it’s good for you, and everyone will naturally “pay it forward” because it’s good for them.
The sad thing is, I think at the core of it all, there’s nothing wrong and everything right with the concept of altruism. Sociobiology teaches us that altruism is evolutionarily sound because the altruist indirectly benefits his own gene pool. So perhaps I shouldn’t be aggravated by the undercurrent of selfishness in the random axe-guy’s talk. If we think about the ultimate in altruistic acts — say, for example, sacrificing some of our nation’s wealth to do something about global warming — then it’s quite clear that altruism benefits the altruist. If we make the world a better place, we get to live in that better place.
If the messenger had had a bit more humility, I think I would have been more receptive to his message.
D.
Well Bakersfield, two out of three ain’t bad.
Shouldn’t kindness be constant and intentional and not random and occasional?
So what you’re saying is that the guy who tells people to do altruistic things which turn out to be to their own benefit also benefits, and happens to tell people about it all which makes it much less altruistic and much more beneficial than all the altruistic action by the people he told (and keeps telling people he told) to do the altruistic action even though it would not benefit them, even though it does in fact benefit them, so it really isn’t all that altruistic all round, is it, although it does seem like someone, somewhere, benefits.
I think.
Lucie: what Dean said 🙂
Followup coming.
Walnut.. you seriously drove me crazy with the heading to this blog… cents less kind, Ness… ARGH! My brain WAS on holiday! 🙂
Oh I figured you’d all think it was a post about the Loch Ness monster or something . . .