I realized this when I was still a little kid. And very few people that I have discussed this with actually agree with me. We have been taught, perhaps brainwashed is a better word, that our family is the most important thing for us. When I say "family" I mean to say what the word normally means, that is, your relatives who share the same family tree that you have.
I have heard so many people say throughout my short life, so many times that I cannot keep track of it, "I love him because he is my blood", or a variation, "we must love our family because they are part of our blood". I despise this dreadful comment against the intellect. What does relations to another person have anything to do with the virtues of another person? The fact that I am related to someone does not imply that he is virtuous, and so it follows I cannot consider him more important than non-relatives or strangers.
Two brothers do not have to love each other despite what society has taught us. Just because two brothers are the same blood is entirely irrelevant. All what "we are the same blood" means is to say that we both came out of the same vagina. That is it. Or perhaps not from the same vagina but that somewhere along our ancestors they came out of the same vagina. Why should I love someone more because he came out of the same vagina? I am not trying to be erotic, well that is not true, I am, but the real reason why I bring up the vagina argument is because I want to show how absurd the "we are the same blood" argument is.
Family is therefore unimportant. What is important is friendship. Friendship is the result of cooperation and agreement between people not the result of some mere accident of birth depending whose vagina it was. I really hate to get Biblical but I want to try to appeal to my religious readers. In Proverbs 18:24 it says, "sometimes a friend is closer than a brother". Rav Hirsch comments on this verse saying that friendship is the result of choice, therefore, friendship can far exceed people's blood relations.
Instead of people telling their good friends, "you are like family to me" (I hate this phrase so very much), people should tell their families, "you are a friend to me". I am not saying you should hate your mother now. I love my mother. But I love my mother not because she gave birth to me, but because she is very important to me. She is a good mother who helped me very much. That is why I love her. My "family" happens to consist of so many unrelated people. No one in my family have a same last name. That is how biologically unrelated we are. But it never bothers me. Blood relations are meaningless to me.
If a relative of yours invites you to a meal and a good friend does also. Give your relative a middle finger and go over to your friend if you are not close with your relative. Why should you come over to his house? Just because it is social norms? Screw social norms. It is time to have a revolution in social norms. Friendship. That is were it is all at. Not family.
I love my friends because they have proven themselves to me to be virtuous people. What has ever my blood relatives every done to deserve me love? What have they done that proves their virtuous character? Nothing at all.
Yes, this means you do not have to come over to a funeral of some relative who died and you did not really know him. I am not supportive of funerals. I think they are a waste of time because they are essentially based on the idea that there is life after death. And even the secular funerals are a waste of time. Dead do not need to be honored, only the living, because they are dead and do not exist any longer. But even if you disagree with my position regarding funerals you should agree with me that you do not have to go to relative funerals any longer. It all should be the funerals of friends.
Nationalism, racism, and family are all the exact same fallacy extended to the various sizes of people. Nationalism is based on which country people are born. Racism is based on the relationship to one another as a species. Family is based on whose vagina we came out of. All of these three things are just as stupid. It is good that most people see racism as repulsive. And some people already agree that nationalism is repulsive. But few still see the concept of family blood relations as repulsive. Hopefully, in the future there will be a revolution in the ethics of people that will make them realize the error of their ways.
Subscribe to:
Post Comments (Atom)
Well, I guess I was right. You did indeed take the concept to its logical conclusion.
ReplyDeleteWhile I agree with elements of your position, I still shudder at the full scope of what you are proposing.
However, I will admit that I don't yet have a comprehensive argument to make against it, so I won't even bother telling you that you're wrong, just that I really, really disagree with what you're saying.
Not quite... most societies are patrilinear, so the vagina thing isn't quite accurate.
ReplyDeleteDNA relationships are important because they are constant. They are unchosen, forced upon us, but they are inherent, stable and unchanging. Friendship that is chosen can be just as easily unchosen.
The flip side of that is that family cutoffs and discord are far more painful and traumatic than friends simply drifting apart, so I realize that people who have suffered from their families are likely to have a family is worthless kind of attitude.
(also 30% of babies in the US today are born by cesaerean)
ReplyDeleteDNA relationships are also important because without it, there is nothing to connect the male human to his offspring, and while humans can get along with just a mother, they do far better with both a mother and a father.
ReplyDeleteThen again, downplaying the "vagina" connection means downgrading motherhood as well. Thus there remains no obligation of the human parent of etiehr sex, towards his or her offspring. Which opens the door to the wholescale abandonment of children, and/or a drastic reduction in the birth rate which is already quite low in western societies.
The model of the family also lays the cultural groundwork for establishing other relationships of permanence. (something fast fading in modern society). Without family, it is unlikely that the society will develop in a fashion that friends will be easily available to produce simiular long term bonds.
What kisarita said. Your family shares your DNA more than anyone else does, so it is to the advantage of your genetic material to feel love towards those who share your genes, and support each other.
ReplyDeleteIt is also thought by some that emotions of love and care developed first in the context of care for children, and then spread outward in an expanding circle.
So, it makes a lot of sense that people feel close to their families. That doesn't mean it ought to be that way, of course, but it makes sense and is not a bad idea at all, given that we're wired for it and that it offers a lifelong support system far more trustworthy than friends.
Ethnic groups are like big families. While it gets problematic when outgroups are treated worse because they aren't in the family, the solution to that would seem to be expanding the moral circle outwards, not rearranging it into a zig-zag.
"Not quite... most societies are patrilinear, so the vagina thing isn't quite accurate.":
ReplyDeleteYou miss my entire point because you took a joke too seriously. My entire point is that you should love your brother more than your best friend simply because your brother is your brother. That is my main point. Just like you should not love white people more than black people simply because they are closer related to you.
"DNA relationships are important because they are constant. They are unchosen, forced upon us, but they are inherent, stable and unchanging.":
The logical conclusion of that argument is that DNA relationships are also important in race as well and we need to love one race more than another because "they are our blood". Why does being forced upon us make them important? Non-sequitar.
"Friendship that is chosen can be just as easily unchosen.":
This is exactly why friendship dominates blood relations. Because it is can be over at any instance. If two friends stick together for 50 years until the day they die shows the strength of their friendship. They must really love each other. You made my argument without even realizing it.
"Your family shares your DNA more than anyone else does, so it is to the advantage of your genetic material to feel love towards those who share your genes, and support each other."
ReplyDeleteCertainly, I agree with that. It is by evolution that these feelings developed. It is the result of evolution that people pick their family over everyone else. But here is the problem. Evolution is not a statement of morality. Evolution is irrelevent to morality. I can make the same exact argument with racism. It is an evolutionary advantage for people to practice racism. One group killing out another group. Does this justify racism? Of course not. The same with family. The problem with the DNA argument is that its logical conclusion is racism and nationalism.
But again that is missing my entire. I do not care what is natural here. I care about that makes sense. Does it make sense to love your relatives over friends who actually help you out in life simply because they are more related to you? No. That is my main argument.
First of all, I don't think it's particularly clear that racism would be an evolutionary advantage..
ReplyDeleteIn any case, though, I acknowledged the naturalistic fallacy and made no moral statement: That doesn't mean it ought to be that way, of course, but it makes sense...
As I continued, I believe it does make sense. It makes sense to have a relationship with a stronger bond than one by choice that is based on reciprocal gains. People can be flaky and selfish when push comes to shove, and those whose genetic interests are tied up in yours and with whom you have natural emotional ties are going to be good to count on.
Does it make sense to feel that you have to like your relatives more or feel they are better people? No. But it makes sense to want to capitalize on a close, stable, and generally trustworthy bond and support network we are innately wired to use.
Besides which, I don't think it's falling into the naturalistic fallacy to say, "let's not ignore human nature entirely." As Frans de Waal puts it, if you were designing a zoo enclosure for an animal, you'd consider its natural needs and drives, even if you wanted to rein in some of them, right? Well, when considering human society, it's certainly worthwhile to consider human nature, rather than trying to build from the ground up based on a rational ideal. (Yes, of course there are things in human nature we fight against, but I'm not sure why family should be one of them just because it is not strictly rational. If the goal is to eliminate outgroup conflict, as I wrote before, I think there are better ways to do this that capitalize on human nature rather than fighting against it.)
I should note, though, that I am more tepid towards nationalism, because in the modern world the advantages seem lesser, the potential costs seem greater, and the foundation doesn't seem as clear or sensible, so I'm ok with trying to keep a wary eye on human nature in that case.
ReplyDeleteAlso, regarding racism--I think one would have to define what one means by it before discussing its evolutionary status. Fear of outgroups? Belief that outgroups or particular races are inferior in ability or value? Attempts to eradicate all outgroups?
You sound like a lot of libertarians, imagining the mind to be some kind of rational machine that just happens to exist inside a body. In reality, we have innate emotions that aren't rational at all. Even if you're some kind of exception to that rule, most of us have innately different feelings about biological family.
ReplyDeleteOf course it's true that many families are awful and the friends we choose are bound to have more in common with us (except DNA-wise) than any family members we happen to be related to. But to ignore the innate familial bonds most of us feel is to make a grave error in understanding people.
We are smart animals, not calculating machines.
"First of all, I don't think it's particularly clear that racism would be an evolutionary advantage.":
ReplyDeleteYes it is. Racism is supported by evolution for two reasons. First, what you said. People feel a closer connection to whom they have a more similar DNA structure to. Since whites have a closer DNA structure to whites they will naturally feel a closer connection to white than blacks. Second, consider hunter-gatherer groups. These groups consisted of similar members. So you would have black groups or white groups or other kinds of groups. For individuals to have a high rate of success they need to be depended well upon their groups. Those who favor their group over others will most likely survive. Hence, the development of family relationships and racism.
"Imagining the mind to be some kind of rational machine that just happens to exist inside a body.":
I do? That is what I imagine? I am glad that there are people like you who know better what I think myself. \(^.^)/
JewishAtheist, you are against missing my name point. My main point was that loving your familar over your friends even though your friends are more important to you does not make any sense. My main point was that love needs to be earned on an individual level not automatically gained. You may tell me that this is not how people think because they do not think rationally. But that does not address my main point. Do you agree with me that people need to be loved based on their virtues not on how much DNA structure they share with you? If you say "yes" then we are in agreement. I am sure you do agree with me. You just make a case why this feeling is natural in people.
I guess we pretty much agree.
ReplyDelete"You sound like a lot of libertarians"
ReplyDeleteWhy, thank you! :)
Why on earth would the rational, adding-machine view have much to do with libertarianism? Perhaps I can see it as a historical accident due to the effect of Rand, but even she had more romantic tendencies than that.
ReplyDeleteThe 35 year friendship strong-as-family that ends only death is great, its far less likely to occur than familial relationships.
ReplyDeleteIt is even less likely to occur, if there would be no family relationships to be modeled after.
Certainly building healthy relationship outside of the family would be near impossible in a society of children abandoned and uncared by the people who created them.
"The 35 year friendship strong-as-family that ends only death is great, its far less likely to occur than familial relationships.
ReplyDeleteIt is even less likely to occur, if there would be no family relationships to be modeled after.
Certainly building healthy relationship outside of the family would be near impossible in a society of children abandoned and uncared by the people who created them.":
Do you agree that people need to be loved for what they are rather than how much genetic infromation they share with you? If you answer "yes" then you are in agreement with what I said. What most people do and what is rare and common is not relevant to what is right and wrong.
I believe first and foremost it is important to be loved and accepted for whom we are, by those with whom we share a first degree blood relationship.
ReplyDeleteLove and acceptance from others is also important, but secondary.
... when we do not get that from our family, it is infinitely more damaging than when we do not get it from other folks.
ReplyDeleteBut that shows how important it is. Just because some families do not live up to their role, doesn't mean that the whole idea of family is bad.
"I believe first and foremost it is important to be loved and accepted for whom we are, by those with whom we share a first degree blood relationship.":
ReplyDeleteWow, I am scared by you. Seriously? You seriously believe in that? You do realize that argument can be made about racism and sexism.
I can say that I love men more than women because they are more genetically related to me. I can say that I prefer Germanic Jewish people than non-Germanic Jewish people because they have more in common with my blood.
You are judging the virtues and the love of other people not by what they have achieved in their own life or from their own hard work but by how much genetic material they share with you. Wow.
1. Love isn't based on virtue.
ReplyDeleteIsn't that what you were asking? For people to love you as you are, regardless of your virtue or lack of it?
In fact love isn't based on judgement at all. You don't love someone because of some logical formula says you should or you shouldn't.
3. Love is a limited commodity.
On average, most of us are capable of sustaining only a finite number of intimate relationships. Thus, fear of love extending to one's entire race, thereby leading to racism, is unfounded.
People who claim to love their entire ethnic group, such as those who claim to love all Jews (or all of humanity for that matter) are probably lying, or at best, speaking in the abstract only. Sure, they may love the only other Jew they meet when they are stuck in Olololunga, Kenya. But they may hate the guy who sits next to them in shul. It's impossible to really love everybody.
I reiterate, because this point is so, so important, that the love of one's first degree relatives is one of our most basic psychological and developmental needs.
ReplyDeleteIt occurs to me that perhaps you did not understand what I meant by a first degree relative- a parent, child, or sibling.
ReplyDeleteKisarita you are not addressing the point I am making. I said to love people for who they are. You find a person you really love and you love that person because that person is a great person. Do you care that he shares similar DNA material with you? If you do then that is a form of racism that is specific to smaller groups of people. This is the point I am making. I do not care if this is what is natural or not, what is natural does not need to be good.
ReplyDeleteSpinoza,I don't know you, but your own history as you describe it seems to back up my theory.
ReplyDeleteYou claim to have arrived at this conclusion when you were a small child. This indicates to me that you did not form loving bonds in childhood as most children do.
This could be because you had very poor parenting, or that there is something neurologically atypical about you.
Your description of love being based on a logical assessment of a person's traits seems very atypical to me, psychologically speaking. It also seems very judgmental, exactly the opposite of the unconditional acceptance families SHOULD provide (although admittedly they often don't.)
I think it is telling that as an adult you also describe yourself as not having postive relationships. Perhaps this is a more pressing concern to you at this stage in your life, and that is what is fueling your opinion.
However, you claim that this doesn't bother you very much as you can always retreat into the world of philosophy.
Perhaps that is why you feel so comfortable downgrading family relationships- because relationships, and your emotional world in general aren't important to you, so you have little to lose.
"Spinoza,I don't know you, but your own history as you describe it seems to back up my theory.
ReplyDeleteYou claim to have arrived at this conclusion when you were a small child. This indicates to me that you did not form loving bonds in childhood as most children do.":
You think that a person cannot form an intellectual position simple for the sake of forming an intellectual position, but rather there must be some emotional motive that made him change. That is exactly what theists tell atheist Jews. They cannot imagine an atheist coming to an intellectual position so they think the primary motive was that they had bad experiences with Judaism. This is of course not true, most become atheists because they realize that Judaism is false. The fact that I am against family love does not imply that I had a bad experience. Furthermore, I have a very good relationship with my mommy. Whenever I go somewhere with her we always walk with our arms interlocked as some couple would. I love my mother very much. But I love her because she is an important person to me not because she is related to me. I could not care less if she was my adopted mother or my biological mother.
But even if I did have a bad experience, which I did not. It still does not invalidate my entire argument. My argument still stands and you have no refuted it at all. I said that it is stupid to love people for sharing a similar blood with you. This is the same kind of justification that can be used for racism or nationalism. Even if I had a bad experience it does not make my argument wrong automatically. My argument is an intellectual argument, even if it inspired by a bad experience it is an intellectual argument nonetheless. Trying to figure out how I came to such an argument would not invalidate it.
Then you go on, again, to explain why it is psychologically normal for people to love their families. I do not care what is normal and what is natural. I told you this many times. I said that what is normal and natural is not necessarily correct.
Let me repeat my argument again because you are not refuting it. You love your mommy very much. More than anything else in the world. One day you find out that she is not your biological mother but your adopted mother. My argument is that it should not bother you, because similar blood is irrelevant, what is relevant is what kind of person she is to you. If you tell me "it would bother me very much and I will love her less". Then you are think in a stupid manner and you think in a way which is similar to how racists and nationalists think alike. Same argument just more specific to smaller levels of people.
"I think it is telling that as an adult you also describe yourself as not having postive relationships. Perhaps this is a more pressing concern to you at this stage in your life, and that is what is fueling your opinion.":
The reason why I am not in any relationships is not because I hate people and I hate relationships. I love people, I think people are the most interesting aspect of the universe. The problem is not them. The problem is that I am psyhically repulsive and have a tiny penis. Besides I have social interaction problems as well as a form controversial positions. All of this when taken together make people highly repulsed by me and I never can find a relationship. But I am certainly happy to accept one, it is just highly impropable for someone like myself.
Indeed adopted relationships can simulate biological relationships very well.
ReplyDelete(Although a fair percentage of adoptees, despite having wonderful relationships with their adoptive families, are still traumatized by the cut off from their first families.)
However, an adopted relationship is successful BECAUSE it is modeled after our ideal of a genetic relationship. If it was modeled after your ideal of relationship based on virtues and choice,that can be ended at anytime, the adoptive parents would throw the kid out when he turned out not to be perfect.
You wrote: "You think that a person cannot form an intellectual position simple for the sake of forming an intellectual position, but rather there must be some emotional motive that made him change."
ReplyDeleteI think it very unlikely for a small child.
The question is more valid with regard to our opinions formulated as adults. However I believe that even as adults, our opinions often reflect our own psychological reality. As you yourself stated, you often come by your opinions via "introspection" rather than research.
There's nothing wrong with this. Our own psychological reality is the actually the best basis for our own decision making. It becomes more problematic when making prescriptions for the rest of society.
You also write that you do not consider what is psychologically normal to be relevant. I can not think of any criteria that is more relevant, to the question of relationships which is primarily a psychosocial issue.
Frums and ex frum for the next course.
I've written a bit about this typical frum and ex frum interaction that you mention in my post:
ReplyDeletehttp://kisarita.blogspot.com/2009/06/in-defense-of-emotions.html
One think that most bothers me about frum families is that they place frumkeit ahead of biology. My sister would rather cut me out of her life if she does not approve of certain aspects of my lifestyle, rather than respect the bonds of sisterhood.
I do not take it amiss if you accuse me of my experience with my family fueling my opinion- I proudly admit it.
Perhaps you think that is fine. Would you abandon your mother if she did something you didn't approve of?
Kisarita you did not answer my question. Would you care if your mother turned out being your non-biological mother? Now on to the next question. If you had a sister with whom you had average relationship with and a friend who you had an awesome relationship with who would you help first? Would you help your sister just because you share the same blood? If you answer "yes" then you are a douchebag.
ReplyDeleteYou still fail to answer how racism is different from loving your family more than strangers who are much better people than your family.
"Would you abandon your mother if she did something you didn't approve of?":
Of course I would. If you had a brother who was the next Joseph Stalin would you still love him? Why muse you love evil just because it is related to you? It makes no sense.
I touched on the comparison to racism in my comment from yesterday: "On average, most of us are capable of sustaining only a finite number of intimate relationships. Thus, fear of love extending to one's entire race, thereby leading to racism, is unfounded."
ReplyDeleteTo elaborate: Racism is not based on love at all, as in reality we have precious little actual love for most of the members of our own race. we can't. Thus when we despise others of another race, typically something else is going on.
American anti- African racism is a good example of that. The philosophy of white superiority developed as a means to justify the exploitation of Africans, the motive which was economic. It had nothing to do with family love.
Adoption: Adoption is not a good example because it is modeled after family relationships. I don't oppose extending the family model to include some others(within the limits of our psychological capacities). But your position is not to extend the model, your position as I understood it is to demolish the model. I hope this answers the question about my sister v. my friend as well, which is a choice that I don't wish on anyone to have to make.
I am sorry that you seem to think that family members who reject eachother based on their lifestyles are doing the right thing. Loss of love is a formidable threat. It seems you support families trying to control eachother's thoughts and behavior using the relationship as a threat.
"I love people. I think they are the most interesting aspect". That's not love, that's an abstract appreciation. I continue to suspect that you are simply wired differently than most of us.
Revisiting the good friend v. sibling question:
ReplyDeleteAll other factors being equal, I would invest in my brother instead of my friend.
There character and the degree of similarity to my lifestyle would not even be a factor, unless it affected how the money was to be used.
I would choose to invest in family because of the potential that my brother's children will care for me in my old age.
This is one of the way familial- inherent, obligatory relationships differ from friendships that are chosen.
Familial relationships can be passed down. Relationships that are chosen, by the very definition of choice, can not be passed down by the person who chose them, to someone else.
"I am sorry that you seem to think that family members who reject eachother based on their lifestyles are doing the right thing.":
ReplyDeleteSo if my brother is Joseph Stalin I should love him no matter what? Because he is my brother?
"I continue to suspect that you are simply wired differently than most of us.":
And? So what? That does not make what I say wrong. I happen to different from people that I know but that is irrelevant here.
At the end of the day what your position comes down to, even if you try to make it sound more intellectual by avoiding this issue, is that you would love more someone based on how much blood you share with that person. You already admitted that several times.
Yes, that is correct, with the exception of a spouse or stepchild, if I should ever have any.
ReplyDeleteI further believe that it is beneficial to society to promote stronger families, and not weakening them or declaring them irrelevant as you would. Caring for children, caring for the elderly, maintaining networks of support are all good for society. Friendship does not get stronger as the family gets weaker, rather the more the state steps in and assumes the role, and not very well.
If you are wired differently that is very relevant, as you are making prescriptions not just for yourself but for the rest of society.
"I further believe that it is beneficial to society to promote stronger families, and not weakening them or declaring them irrelevant as you would.":
ReplyDeleteWhere do I say that people should not care for family members? I said people should love eachother primarily for the kind of people they are, not whether or not they came out of the same vagina. That was my argument. Now it may very well happen that there will be a lot of family love that is based on the acknowledgment that the family members are actually good people. For example, I love my mother and am very close to her but that is because she is a good person not because I came out of her vagina. You are twisting my argument into something it never meant.
"If you are wired differently that is very relevant, as you are making prescriptions not just for yourself but for the rest of society.":
Truth is independent of who speaketh it, be he virtuous or vile. I can be a child molesting neo-Naz, if I say something which is true it stays true. My charachter, not matter how strange, is irrelevant to what is true or not.
You are correct. Many master teachers have also spoken of this. "Family" they would say, is neither important or not. It neither stands out above nor below. I have been saying this on my podcast and in my office for years now.
ReplyDelete