Today I Saw 3 Incidences of Littering and a Brawl

I have approximately a 2.5km walk from my place of work to the place I live, on the other side of the Cape Town CBD.

Today I saw 3 separate people littering.

The first, very close to my office, was an individual among a number of labourers on the back of a bakkie (a small pick-up truck) that threw a almost empty roll of electrical tape into the road. Being the kind of person that has accepted as my responsibility a subset of the problems of society, I picked up the roll of tape and disposed of it in the bin.

On my way to the bin, I passed a guy that threw a piece of paper, quite nonchalantly, into the street. Now, I was still pissed because of the previous guy, so removing my headphones, I rebuked the guy publicly, asking who he expects to pick up the paper he just threw, etc. I feel that this is necessary as (i) it reminds the person that this kind of behavior is noticed and perceived negatively by at least some people, (ii) it hopefully challenges the person to question whether what they did is right, (iii) and I hope it causes the person a tiny bit of public shame that I hope will cause him to feel some guilt at his transgression. My behavior may also have reinforced the perception that whites still live under the misconception that their black neighbors are in some way subservient to their white overlords... obviously this is not my intention, but some people may have viewed it that way.

The 3rd person was just some woman threw a cigarette butt into the road. At this point, I had run out of social currency and simply ignored the person.

Before arriving home I also saw a brawl between what looked like a security guard and a male-female couple. They all looked to be in their twenties and none of them were "street people". I could not tell who was in the right and who was in the wrong, all I know is that it was two against one, with the "authority figure" being in the numeric minority. The fight was quick, violent but without significant repercussions. Being the kind of person that I am, and listening to an Audiobook on morality, I wanted to help; but could not identify who was the perpetrator and who the victim. Instead I watched hoping that the violence would not escalate. Others around me also watched and some even looked ready to join the brawl (as I was), although whose allegiance they would choose was beyond my guessing. The fight was over with the couple leaving the area, and the security guard did not take pursuit.

So, what can we "learn" from all...

Is Cape Town a bad place? No, I don't believe so. In fact I still believe that Cape Town is probably the best place to be in South Africa.

Am I disappointed in these people? Yes, of course. I want people to get along, and to accept their roles of responsible citizens in society.

Are these people bad people. No, I very much doubt it. Careless? yes. Lacking foresight? Yes. Lacking an understanding in how government resources are allocated? Yes.

But more than anything it reminds me that we, as a world society, are not yet at a point at which we can put down tools and say that we have done enough good in this world.

I would love to see the emergence of a society (not based on religion so as to be inclusive to all), that sets an example of how to live their lives as responsible citizens of society. A society that teaches, not about morality necessarily, but about economics (and a million other disciplines) so that people can be brought to understand that the money spent cleaning the curb could have been spent feeding a child, or building a school, or creating a place of psychological healing.

But if a society like this is built, who will join it?

So What Am I Getting At? Part II of II

Ok, so I'll admit the previous post ended somewhat cryptically.

So what am I getting at then, with all that obscurity about Supermarket chains?

Well... there's a reason you don't see Pick n Pay, Shoprite and Woolworths working together to deliver the lowest prices at the highest quality.

The problem is not that these corporations have a reason to conspire against the consumer (ok, there's profit, but let's ignore that for now). Rather, there's a brand associated with each of these companies, and this brand needs nurturing, and the strong image of a brand is easily diluted.

If Woolworths started supplying some very cheap items (lower quality items), one could misperceive that they are dropping their standards. Similarly, if  Shoprite started including some high quality (and more expensive) items with the rest of their low priced stuff, it would leave some consumers with the impression that their prices are becoming "out of reach" of their customers.

Similarly, although I believe that most people that volunteer for a good cause are well intentioned, I also believe that there is an element of religious branding that goes with their good deeds. I think there is a perception, a misperception, that working collaboratively across religions can somehow dilute the apparent righteousness of the act of generosity.

To phrase this scenario less abstractly, if there is a Christian orphanage, then it's clear that it's the compassion of Christian people, presumably inspired by a Christian god, that has brought hope to someone in unfortunate circumstance. If the orphanage was run by Muslims and Christians, then I think some people would be left confused, in the same way that some consumers are confused when they find unexpectedly expensive/cheap merchandise at their favorite supermarket. Is it the Christian god or the Muslim god that has brought hope?

So now, my suggestion for building a better society is as follows:

1. Respect People that Try to Do Good

Respect that not every good person will agree on your ideology. Accept that this does not diminish the good that person does.

2. Do Good for the Sake of Doing Good

When contemplating doing something good, please consider doing it in a religion free way. This action is inclusive; it opens the circle to those that are not part of your religion, not part of a mainstream religion and even those that are not part of any religion.

3. Teach Only When People Ask

Some people seem to do good because they want to teach people what they have learnt about being a good person. I understand this, but I don't agree with the technique of doing good as a means of enticing people to listen to a message. If you are a real leader when it comes to spirituality, then I believe people will be drawn to you.

As an illustration of the point, the religion I'm most interesting in finding out about is Buddhism, because I love it that Buddhists seems so unpretentious. I've never met an evangelist of Buddhism, yet I'm attracted to the religion because of the way in which its members behave.

In Conclusion

So as a challenge, live your life in such a way that people are led to ask your opinion on spiritual matters.

If the above-mentioned principles are adhered to, then I think it will be much easier for people to collaborate across ideological boundaries; because the volunteers will be doing good for the sake of doing good. They will specifically not be trying to broadcast a signal. Instead they will be making themselves available to those in need of spiritual, intellectual and perhaps even physical nourishment.

I believe that if people lived their lives in this way, the world would be one step closer to becoming a more ideal place.

So What Am I Getting At? Part I

So, what am I getting at here?

Well, what I'm trying to do with this post is stimulate a conversation about morality, about government, society and life in general by highlighting some observations about the way we all behave, and challenging whether or not our behavior is sensible.

Obviously I cannot do this all today, as I'm supposed to work on a Latin assignment tonight, but maybe I can get the conversation started.

In particular, a big issue I want to discuss is why various religions and organisations cannot seem to get along. And then I want to take it one step further and broadcast a proposal that may help us all.

When I imagine a perfect world, I see a Christian man and a Muslim woman working together to offload bread off the back of a truck, like builders passing bricks. The bread is being passed on to a retired Hindu man that is slicing and buttering the bread before passing it an atheist teenager that is adding the slices of tomato and cheese before handing a completed sandwich to a vegetarian African child of Asian descent and his Xhosa friend.

These volunteers doing the "work" in this scenario are all operating at Level 4 in the hierarchy of morality I discussed earlier this month. Let's call these people the Resource Benefactors, in other words, these are the people that have the ability to share some of the abundance of their resources with others.

The children, for the sake of completing the symmetry in the story are at Level 2, they do not have an abundance of resources to share with society. In fact, they don't even have enough to feed themselves. This doesn't make any less valuable members of society, in fact they could be the resource super-benefactors of the future, if they are given the opportunity to grow.

But I digress, the point is... why don't people from different ideological backgrounds work together in this way. In fairness, there probably are isolated cases of this kind of collaboration, but my observation from a Christian background, is that Christians will get together with other Christians and do this kind of thing... but wouldn't it be better if we could pool our resources... Economies of Scale and all that?

I don't know the answer to this question, in truth it probably cannot be answered; but I think a factor in answering this question can be found by looking for clues in the behavior of supermarket chains...

Give it some thought. ;)

Focusing on Commonality

So what can we agree on when it comes to right and wrong?

I think it is appropriate to divide morals into levels of acceptance. The reason for this is because while it seems obvious that stealing is wrong, not feeding your children is a greater crime than theft. If you have children and no food, and you are really unable to find work nor earn enough to eat (which is a reality for some South Africans), then surely we cannot criticize someone for stealing enough to feed their family?

Level 1: Survival Level: In a society in which people are fighting for survival, the following foundation level of morality still applies:

1. Do not rape (there is never a good enough reason for this)
2. Do not steal for profit
3. Do not kidnap
4. Do not physically force someone to do something they do not want to do
5. Do not murder for any reason, other than as a form of defense
6. Do not cause someone harm for no reason (to me, this is the very definition of evil)
7. Do not sell people (seems obvious, but it wasn't for a very long time)

Level 2: Members of a society not fighting for survival can extend their morals to include the following:

1. Do not murder
2. Do not steal
3. Honour your contracts
4. Accept responsibility for your own actions
5. Do not cheat
6. Do not practice revenge
7. Minimize your harm of animals

Level 3: For members of a society that have more than they need

1. Do not be a burden on society

Level 4: Make the Circle Bigger

1. Accept responsibility for society. i.e. Work towards solving the problems of society, not just those problems that effect you directly
2. Recycle
3. Sacrifice some of the abundance of your resources for the betterment of the lives of others

Level 5: Minimize Harm

1. Vegetarianism
2. Drive a hybrid car instead of a purely petrol car ;)

I believe I am at level 4 in this list. I believe that it is better to be vegetarian, than to eat meat, but at this stage I still eat meat and have no intention of becoming vegetarian anytime soon. I include it in the hierarchy of morality because what I'm trying to do here is create a hierarchy in which people can find A level of morality on which we can all agree. While some people may feel it's important to not eat meat, I think that we can all agree that's it's not morally better for us to eat meat, than not to eat meat.

A New Ideal

I live in South Africa, a wonderful country filled with people with all kinds of religions, diets, colours, languages and philosophies. South Africa consists of Christians, Jews, Hindus, Muslims to mention only the blockbuster religions; it has 11 official languages (last time I checked); it is home to Khoi San, Xhosa, Zulu, descendants of the Dutch, descendants of the English,  descendents of the French, and descendants of the Portuguese; and many, many other cultures and peoples.

Living in a society like this, helped me to realize that knowing the difference between right and wrong, is not always an easy process. How do we decide, what is right, when my next door neighbor cannot find it within him to agree with me. And once we reach an impasse, surely it wise the consider that perhaps it IS him that is rights, and not me. Just because I think something is true, doesn't make it any more true that my neighbor's opinion; because to him, he thinks his opinion is true too.

So lately I've been thinking... maybe we need to step outside the boundaries of our own perception of truth, and try and find a new truth. We as a nation have been able to define a legal constitution despite our differences. Perhaps we can do the same thing for morality. Perhaps we can establish a foundation of commonality on which we can build with unified purpose, for the betterment of society.

I believe it is possible to change the world into a better place, by doing the following:

• By focusing on the things what we have in common (philosophically)
• By tolerating what we don't have in common
• By accepting as our own the responsibility for change
• By accepting that others will not accept this responsibility, and not letting their rejection diminish our responsibility
• By building up, instead of breaking down
• By creating... (that's it, just creating)