September 10, 2009

• Interlude: Nice isn't always Good

  From a friend's blog - Regarding Emotional Manipulation
  Healthcare Reform - Notes about Obama's Speech, from the Economist

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  When you think about being good, the first thing that might come to mind is being nice.  What's wrong with being nice, after all?  Smile, be gentle and so forth...  I mean, isn't being nice a good place to start being good?

  Growing up in a church, in an environment where a premium is placed on being quiet, courteous, genteel and well behaved, it's easy for a young male to get the message that being nice and well behaved is equivalent of being a "good boy."  Asian culture (read Chinese, for the purposes of this article), with its premiums on respect and being polite and deferential, acts synergistically to reinforce this tendency.  This tendency can make great "followers,"
  in the sense that they don't make waves, but it makes for poor men.

  I've heard more than a few Christian gals complain something akin to the following, "Well, he's nice but, he doesn't really have an edge."  Or perhaps, "He's really sweet but, he's missing something."  Meanwhile, the young man is wondering why his faultless manners and instant deference on any matter of opinion might be construed as anything other than ideal.

  First of all, "good boy" is somewhat of a misnomer.  Good from whose perspective?  From a parent or teacher, it tends to reflect, "well behaved" -- as in, "you're not making my life more difficult" -- and, "you're pleasing me".  This behaviour, from a biblical perspective, isn't necessarily good -- thought it might be.  They're certainly not mutually exclusive.  They are, however, distinct.

  Nice is being pleasant, making the other parties feel better or have life easier at each juncture.  It's about making individual choices to make another person happy, which is intrinsically more ephemeral  (please see: Happiness) than goodness.

  ¹³When it was almost time for the Jewish Passover, Jesus went up to Jerusalem. ¹⁴In the temple courts he found men selling cattle, sheep and doves, and others sitting at tables exchanging money. ¹⁵So he made a whip out of cords, and drove all from the temple area, both sheep and cattle; he scattered the coins of the money changers and overturned their tables. ¹⁶To those who sold doves he said, "Get these out of here! How dare you turn my Father's house into a market!"
  
  

  John 2:13-16

  And the LORD sent an angel, who annihilated all the fighting men and the leaders and officers in the camp of the Assyrian king. So he withdrew to his own land in disgrace. And when he went into the temple of his god, some of his sons cut him down with the sword.

  2 Chronicles 32:21

  "Good", from a biblical perspective, is being aligned with God.  It means operating without sin, and honouring/serving God.  That, therefore, might include whipping money changers, rebuking teachers and pharisees, annihilating whole civilizations, just as well as more traditional forms of "goodness" like feeding the poor, showing compassion to the oppressed and dispossessed and the like.  Being "Good", from this perspective means that your actions are part of a larger fabric of meaning and purpose, as opposed to discrete actions that all bear the shiny seal of "niceness".  Being completely "Good", from this perspective, is also impossible while on earth, for we still struggle with sin.  Nevertheless, for the purpose of this article/entry, being "Good" as a human will be defined as trying to be like God in his goodness/holiness.
  
   ¹⁸A certain ruler asked him, "Good teacher, what must I do to inherit eternal life?"  ¹⁹"Why do you call me good?" Jesus answered. "No one is good—except God alone.
   

  Luke 18:18-19
  (Quick aside about the passage at the end)

  Between the two, being "Nice" is easier.  No one yells at you for being "Nice" -- although "too nice" might be aggravating.  "Nice" allows you a very simple decision tree:  "In this situation, what should I do to ingratiate myself most with the people around me?"  Good is a much more difficult decision tree: "What does God want me to do here?  How can I work for the long term interests of the people around me...?  How do I honour God in that decision/action?  How do I do this in the gentlest/ most tactful way here?  Am I being hypocritical?"

  "Nice" has no edges -- that is, if you've managed to focus on being "nice" all the way.  You don't have your own agenda -- you have no larger purposes or ambitions if you're being absolutely nice.  There's no narrative for another person to take part in, no majestic sweep of vision.  "Nice" is content being an observer in the drama called life. 

  Being "Good" means there's something that you need to do, and there will probably be sacrifices necessary -- and anyone taking part in your narrative will likely need to suffer with you.  "Good" has edges, and it cuts the person trying to be good, and it probably cuts the people around them too.  If society's normal course is disintegration and entropy, then it should follow that progress is hard, requires effort, swims upstream, and will offend.  Jesus did all of the above, was definitely at times "not nice" and absolutely Good."

  Aiming for nice is aiming too low; it's low hanging fruit, and at first an attractive verisimilitude of good.  But the ethos of "Nice" is at best a simulacrum, and at worst a destructive distraction.  Making life count will bruise egos and make waves -- guaranteed "not-nice" behaviour.  But that's a worthy trade right?

  Good guys can be nice, but a good guy cannot always be nice.
  A guy who's always nice, is yet missing some of the big picture.

  Great set up for the last of the trio, right? 
  Next up:  Maturity.

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   ¹⁸A certain ruler asked him, "Good teacher, what must I do to inherit eternal life?"  ¹⁹"Why do you call me good?" Jesus answered. "No one is good—except God alone.
   
  

  Luke 18:18-19

  One of the key aspects of the above passage is that the ruler calls him Good.  Jesus rebukes his attribution of good, which raises the possibility that Jesus is denying his "goodness" and therefore deity.  An alternative (and I believe the correct alternative view) is that he's addressing the disingenuous usage of the word Good.  Used loosely, it's just flattery -- fluff.  "Why do you call me good -- do you really know what you're saying?  No one is good -- except God alone."

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  Back from the past - Time Warp
  I was having a conversation the other day, and the word celibate was used.  Though I didn't bring it up in the conversation, I'll re-post this post as a point of clarification.  Celibate does not equal chaste. 

  Re-reading this post was fascinating, by the way...

  • 10:46 am
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