I have been struggling with my inner Alf Garnett . Alf Garnett was the leading figure in the 1960s sitcom Til Death Do Us Part , who astounded the nation with his racist , mysoginistic and homophobic ways . He was seen as a bigot but was actually a bewildered man who could not cope with change and ranted against a world he did not recognize any more . Close to where I live , there is a Moslem mosque which causes all sorts of parking problems and when my driveway is blocked by one of the Mosque goers , I feel hate for moslems . When I am cut up by a woman driver , who are getting incredibly aggressive , I feel hate for women . When there is a gay guy in front of me ,holding me up in the supermarket I feel hate for gays . But then the guilt hits me – I shouldn't have these feelings .Society says so . The problem is that we all feel hate – the Moslem hates , women hate and gays hate , but we are supposed not to have these thoughts . We even have Thought Police now telling you what you can and cannot think . It won't work –these feelings cannot be denied and the more they are suppressed the worse the final outcome will be.
Sometimes I wish I was the Devil . He can do whatever he wants – if the Devil wants to smoke in a pub , womanise , swear , get drunk he will do it . But the best part is that he never gets punished . I think we can assume that God is ok with this as the Devil has being going since the beginning of time and nothing has been done about him . He appears to have total freedom – death, destruction , murder . Anything goes . He is guiltless and I feel jealous of this . Guilt is the most pernicious of our ' negative ' feelings .It stops us doing what we want to do and leads to repression and eventual frustration in ourselves and the world .The definition of guiltlessness would be innocence , but in our ' Alice in Wonderland ' world it is supposedly God who sees wrong but the Devil who is innocent .I do not believe in either a literal God or Devil .Our beliefs are topsy turvy – where guilt is good and innocence bad . It is Guilt where all the fear , anger and hate come from . Innocence is where Love comes from .
2 comments:
Hi, Frank. You remind me of Aleister Crowley a bit, or the Yahzidi faith. Of course when you've unpicked establishement religion you eventually find that the Devil is not as bad as he's made out to be; nor is God as good. The Devil at least doesn't drown people while saving for Noah and his family of backslapping yuppies! The Devil doesn't bring locusts, boils, rivers of blood and diseases on innocent people just because their Pharaoh made some of his chosen people ("cool kids") slaves. The Devil merely prosecutes "sinners" who are convicted by God and God alone. Guilt for not doing God's will is terribly misplaced, but any kind of guilt is bad because it's a way of controlling us and breeding psychological repression. It's the most third most destructive emotion after 1= Hate and 2= Fear. I often feel resentment at people, not just people who's cultural aspects are obtrusive but ignorant nurses and doctors! I often feel like tarring all nurses and doctors with the same brush! But I find that once I come to terms with my feelings I lose any guilt over them. I can say things like "Damn Asian shops are a rip off!" and not be bothered by the PC thought police who tell us to supress those feelings. Supression leads to violence. I'd never dream of carrying out a violent attack on a person because of their colour, creed etc, but I assert the right to criticize their traits. Hopefully then the more considerate of them will respect me. If I don't tell them how I feel how will they know? Could it be that by letting go of guilt we can let go of hate?
BTW: I love Alf Garnett! The damn BBC trendies banned him! His actor Warren Mitchell often says that he feels proud to have done more to diffuse and neutralize racial hatred than anyone else.
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