Curious Thoughts in the Shower

I had a very profound thought in the shower today morning, but I forgot what it was.

So you'll have to settle for just a thought.

You know, I'm really not a mean person. I just think that being nice should be taken more seriously with less flippancy, with less crassly polished mobilizations, and with absolutely no aesthetic gloss and laminations. How dare we sensitize suffering into a pleasing form? Shouldn't suffering be portrayed as it is, not behind screens?

Today, I saw the advertisements around campus, on the vigil for Mumbai. Of course, with all such things, it demanded, "Care! Care about me! Care about the suffering!" Our natural reaction was (and ought to be) surrender to the call of the Other, "I care! I do!"

Unfortunately, its limit was "Care" and did not venture further into "Do!" The emotional expression of "caring" died before it was actualized in the here-and-now, before it could be reified into aid and help.

It is an error on our part to believe that all suffering within mankind cries out, "Pity me! Empathize with me!" No, the first primordial voice is "Do! Do something! Anything! ALLEVIATE!" The suffering does not ask for your pity, your empathy, your sympathy, your "smile" (ugh, I hate that sensibility). They ask for alleviation, now. In this sense, action must come first; Your right hand ought to not know what your left hand is doing at the moment of charity.

In this sense, all compassion is worthless without action. Feelings are not "real" in this sense, but they must be "realized" in language and action. Compassion is the prime mover for our actions.

Why should I commemorate anyone for their deaths? Isn't commemoration essentially "selfish" since there is no relation to the other, a relation that can only be established through language and action, directly to the suffering, the Other? If there is no action behind it, there's no point.

Vigils are worthless without action. Help the Other, don't just think about them.

or maybe, im just writing all this as an excuse for my laziness.

Jae Han