Some Thoughts

When we think of modern society compared to previous eras, there tends to be one underlying assumption, and it is this: that even if we are no happier than before (although we strongly suspect this to be the case) we are nonetheless better off. What 'better off' means in this context can vary from person to person, but by and large, it equates to intelligence: that is, we know better, therefore act better, and therefore live better. Tuning semantics even more finely, we might ask what 'better' alone means, which provides a much more variable answer due to the vast range of subjects and issues that 'society' encompasses. Sometimes, it is a flat-out value judgement: medicine and science, for instance, are inarguably better than in the sixteenth century. Othertimes, the matter is more clouded: there are enough monarchists, zealots, anarchists, malcontents, theocrats, thinkers and others of a similarly contrary mindset in the world that 20th century democracy isn't universally lauded as the political panacea it is often touted as, which makes it impossible to state declaratively that our social institutions are, as concepts, better than those which preceeded them, even if we might argue the comparative success of their results. And then there are moral (or purely social, which is to say, random and behavioural) gains or losses: alway nebulous, as individual bias tends to fling any measuring needle across every extreme with all the circular abandon of a broken compass.

With all that in mind, then, here are a few of my own thoughts on a select gamut of modern phenomena. A very select gamut, in point of fact: namely, feminism.

This is a word with which I've always had an uneasy relationship; not because I disbelieve the concept, but because of a tendency to challenge its ongoing application, at least in my part of the world. Certainly, there has been unexpected fallout from society's overdue decision to acknowledge women and men as equal creatures: fallout, in the sense that (a) every action has consequences we don't always anticipate; (b) that not all of these are welcome; and, more specifically, (c) - that even though the political and legal institution of social mysogeny has been abandoned, other customs and mores which developed alongside (or because of it) haven't, and the fact of that association doesn't necessarily mean they should be. This is, essentially, the crux of the matter: we went ahead and created a new world, but are still learning how to live in it, unsure of which relics to cast aside, keep or reforge.

Equality, for instance, cuts both ways. As women have the right to be breadwinners, so do men have the right to be stay-at-home parents or partners. As women have the right to delay having children (or remain childless), become defactos, seek divorce or remain single, so too do men. And yet, the logic of these positions is often grating or unobvious. Many a recent female columnist has lamented the idea of 'lost boys', grown men who refuse to get married and seemingly cling to childhood - but if marriage and parenthood are no longer socially compulsory for anyone, any right to such complaint is absent. This is a prime example of unexpected fallout: at least some women imagined that, once the old rules were broken in their favour, men would continue to keep playing the same game with just that single exception. It has been a shock to many to learn otherwise.

When we look back at other historical periods, we are quite often able to tease out certain social concepts with which we agree, albeit for different reasons than were offered at the time. This, I feel, is the most crucial and significant gain the passage of time has offered us: that where we once acted ignorantly in accordance with current practice, we have subsequently searched out the relevant theory. To divert momentarily from feminism, an example can be found in the practice of conservation. Tribes and subsistance farmers comprehended the principle of 'leave some for next year' generations before science ever popularised the language of 'environment' or 'conservation' - and yet, when our societies grew and industrialisation emerged, we lost those ideals because, in a sense, the global theory had never been understood. For the main, old-world 'conservation' applied, not because of any deep-seated knowledge about the limitations of natural resources, pollution or deforestation, but because it was practical in the short-term. Once that immediate practicality was lost, we stopped short of looking over the next horizon, and it wasn't until (ironically) our new societies allowed us space to examine our own mechanisms and impact that we realised the unintentioned sense of what had come before, and began to apply it again with the theory in mind.

Socially, then, we are now in the process of learning similar lessons, most prominently biology: no matter how far modern medicine has come; no matter the importance of gains when it comes to women's rights, equality, the demands of the modern workforce and social practice, there is still a time limit on when any given person may have children. To pretend otherwise is folly, and to act as if social learnings somehow prohibit or overrule the fact is similarly foolish. This, I think, is the single greatest question that feminism has produced, and it tends to suggest some uncomfortable bedfellows. No matter the law or society, men do not fall pregnant, give birth and breastfeed. Women do. Ultimate equality would entail a world in which, regardless of gender, these functions could be passed to whichever partner was deemed most willing or best suited; and while science fiction would have us believe that this is not entirely out of the question, we still needs must live in the now.

Ultimately, I feel, the lessons of feminism and equality can (and, perhaps, should) be boiled down to two core concepts: the freedom for each to choose their own roles in life, and the space to be happy in them. There will always be restrictions on that choice - biology, mortality, finance and whatever other social burdens the given age seems fit to impose - but if we can cling to those two ideals, uphold them and continue to believe and know the theory behind the practise; then, I believe, there will always be hope for us.

Mirror, Mirror

When I was little, my grandmother would take me to the Chatswood shops on weekends. We'd walk around for hours, and at the end of the day, I'd usually end up with a new book, ten or so dollars in coins and a McDonald's lunch. I've got a lot of memories from those outings, but one of the clearest (and most abstract) is of standing between two mirrors in a ladies' bathroom, trying to see my face in a series of echoing, bending reflections.

I don't recall whether it was my first experience with the sensation, or exactly how old I was - around six or so, from where I remember my eye level resting - but there was something powerful and a little scary in it. After turning my head this way and that, I finally realised that I could never see myself reflected all the way through: but I could see everyone else.

Reading Terry Pratchett's Witches Abroad for the first time in high school, I was captured by a paragraph warning of the danger in standing between two mirrors. It was this:

"You can use two mirrors like this, if you know the way of it: you can set them so that they reflect each other. For if images can steal a bit of you, then images of images can amplify you, feeding you back on yourself, giving you power...
And your image extends forever, in reflections of reflections of reflections, and every image is the same, all away around the curve of light.
Except that it isn't.
Mirrors contain infinity.
Infinity contains more things than you think.
Everything, for a start.
Including hunger.
Because there's a million billion images and only one soul to go around.
Mirrors give plenty, but they take away lots."

And the more I think on it, the more it seems like standing between two mirrors is the best way of describing human belief. We can never fully scrutinise how faith or scepticism suits us: always, our head gets in the way of looking at itself. We can only ever watch other people, and be watched in turn, but no matter if we shut our eyes or ignore the glass, the reflections keep on bending away into ever. And what's being reflected is us: bounced back, altered, observed and in plural, but if we didn't stand between the mirrors, there'd be nothing to reflect.

Which is a poetic way of saying that no matter what we believe, or our meta-thoughts on why and how and we believe it, the process always has more to do with who we are in the first place than most people will comfortably acknowledge.

Just as the reflections in the mirror can prompt us to alter our appearance, or prolonged staring engender a perception of beauty or ugliness beyond what is actually shown, so too can examining our beliefs lead to their alteration. But in arriving at them first off, no matter how unconsciously, we still choose the terms and conditions of our faith.

While some are strengthened from seeing their convictions reflected, others are weakened, or humbled, or shamed - and some see only themselves.

If you were to stand between two mirrors, what would you see?