The Horror

I’ve been pondering these transgender issues of late and have posted before about the importance of our (human’s) psychology (beliefs, mental states) when it comes to things that some consider purely biological phenomena and referenced Louis CK’s bit about americans “feeling hungry” as hunger is a real thing and starvation is a real thing to draw this point out.

So: we are psychological beings

So: our gender identity is not free from this psychology, nor is our sexual identity.

Why? We are psychological beings, through and through. One can’t have a triangle without 3 sides and you can’t have a human without psychology.

Now I also referenced Steven Pinker’s The Better Angels of Our Nature and his claims that violence has reduced and his beliefs as to why this is the case.

One of the strongest, most striking points throughout Angels is what we, humans, used to do. It isn’t pretty. We used to be unbelievably, hard-to-fathom violent. Consider that we used to torture animals, sometimes cats FOR ENTERTAINMENT! Not only was the torture not frowned upon, it was cause for laughs.

Why has this changed? Why has our moral circle expanded beyond immediate kin to now include cats and dogs for example? Here in the U.S. it is illegal for you to abuse or torture an animal. Check out Pinker’s Angels for his opinions as to why the moral circle has expanded to animals.

Let us agree that the moral circle has expanded.

And is expanding, and some call this, wait for it, wussification.

Remember when “boys will be boys” was a popular refrain, a tidy explanation for…

Well, the point above is true, and that we are psychological beings with psychology impacting, gender, then boys, won’t be boys?

Will we lose our binary coding? Male-Female?  Will cats and dogs live together? Mass hysteria?

Isn’t that the fallout in North Carolina, fear of the slippery slope?

Let us not forget that there was resistance to the expanding of the moral circle: the end of slavery didn’t come easy, women’s rights didn’t come easy, children’s right didn’t come easy, animal rights didn’t come easy, and civil rights didn’t come easy.

The mindset that fought those progressions, are fighting currently, fighting against the wussification, against the comfort that is binary biology, against psychology mucking things up, namely their mindset – their tradition(s), and ergo their successes because in their mindset, their successes can’t happen without their traditions (the traditions are necessary and sufficient conditions for success) and lastly, because they know what is right…and wrong. And they won’t go down, with you, as you sink into the moral nihilism that will result from subjectivism and relativism and…transgender restrooms.

So now I ask you to enter the time travel machine. Won’t you come back with us to the middle ages and enjoy a good ole cat burning? Ok, this is easy. You are abhorred by the idea and you don’t want to travel back in time to bear witness to our, your, violent past.

But ah, this time machine goes to the future too. Won’t you come with us to the near/distant future when transgender restrooms are the norm? Are you afraid of the slippery slope? What will become of us if we have transgender restrooms?

The horror.

Simulating Compassion

Wright is essentially (from the greek ontos – that without which a thing cannot exist) saying that our biologically based kin selection style compassion has expanded our moral imagination and that one of the enzymes has been travel and technology. 

He referred to roads, the wheel, and writing which in many ways has just made the world smaller. The internet has made the world smaller and as Thomas Friedman argues, flat (the playing field is level for all). I can recall a photographer I saw speak at Ohio University say that travel is the best antidote to prejudice. This makes sense; once you spend time with people outside your kin selection circle you begin to realize that they share the same life issues as you do…and your what Steven Pinker calls, moral circle, expands. 

This brings me to something I began thinking about after, oddly enough, some sports related events that happened while I was working at the Ohio University College of Medicine with a very smart, opinionated colleague.

The first thing was that he considered Bobby Knight a great basketball coach because he won and because he had a good graduation rate. We’ll come back to Bobby Knight. 

The second thing was Todd Bertuzzi’s hit on fellow NHL player Steve Moore. After this incident began to make national headlines our office began to talk about the hit and I discovered that some people took no issue with this and referred to it as “part of the game.” 

Alright, so how could these two sports incidents in any way relate to Robert Wright’s TED talk?

I think what could help speed up the expanding of the moral circle or moral imagination, if you will, is simulation. S-I-M-U-L-A-T-I-O-N.

Back to Bobby Knight: so while discussing whether or not Bobby Knight qualifies as a great coach with my colleague, I brought up the point that he choked one of his players, Neil Reed, during a practice. So I asked my colleague if he would consider Bobby Knight a great coach if he choked one of his daughters.

I think he was dishonest when he answered “yes, and she’d deserve it.” He hung on to his point to try to save the argument but it got me thinking. 

What if we could simulate these events and put in people that are really relevant to you or my colleagues (in your kin selection circle if you will)? 

So take the Bobby Knight and Todd Vertuzzi videos and use technology to replace the practically meaningless Neil Reeds and Steve Moore’s with your children, or your brother, or your sister? 

Wouldn’t this assist in expanding our moral imagination and bring a healthy dose of compassion to our sports and perhaps to the world at large?

What if we could use simulation to replace the nameless, faceless victims of domestic or sexual violence with those in your kin selected circle? Would you feel the same about Ray Rice if that were your daughter or your wife or your sister? What if the faces of the dead from drone attacks that show on the nightly news were replaced with those in your kin selected circle? What if Eric Garner were replaced with someone you love?

Would you feel the same?