Take it from this old hack: you cannot conduct your personal relationships as though they were creative works of art. 

Personal relationships are fragile, banal and mundane things. They are more like the easel or the brush than they are the image or the texture of the work. 

Personal relationships are the framework around which our creative energy comes forth. They are the studio and the materials of our creative force.

Between our personal relationships and the creative result in the world exists the action of our inspirations and our passions, therein rests the outcome of our most profound love.

These actions are the source of our creative energy. It is they that produce the "Starry Night" of Van Gogh and the "Aufbau" of Rudolf Carnap. And if there is any just poiesis in the world then it is they that produce and raise our children too.

Rare individuals, and I like to count myself among these, have a personal relationship with the world itself. They experience the "Autoaesthetic," the acute sense of self with respect to the world not only focus upon the superficiality and illusion of interactions in our species.

In the past this experience was called the "mystical" experience and those that sustained it would claim to be in eternal grace, eternally in the presence of God. In science, although not expressed in these terms, this experience continues to be what drives us onward in our war against illusion and the superficial.

When we apprehend a truly great work of art or science we embrace something of the artist's or scientist's autoaesthetic and with it the unknown myriad of personal relationships that they have sustained. If the autoaesthetic is, and/or the personal relationships are, impoverished then the product of that creative energy will tend to pass us unnoticed and diminish in the world.

As a parent we have served the inevitable only when our children leave the world untouched, that is when they are not a disruptive force that upsets the inevitable. As lovers we serve the inevitable only when our passions have no effect upon those around us. Beyond the inevitable, true love shakes the world and disrupts it entirely, taking us on unexpected and yet wholly avoidable journeys. Our embrace of these journeys is the creative essence of existence in our species.

When viewed externally this collective behavior has meaning only when it makes a difference in the world. Only when we are derailed from our inevitable course can we tell that the creative experience is moved beyond illusion, only then can we see the mystery behind the superficial.

Only when we are driven to madness by love and it has changed our world completely, can we truly love.

In conducting our relationships then we can care for them and know them not by their presence as works of art, as subjects under our brush, but by the degree to which they provide the space, tools and materials of our creative work.

I am reminded of issues that arise again and again in online interactions. Since FIDO and then Usenet, we have navigated the difficulty of online communication in the presence of diversity not peers. 

As a Wikipedian I converse with the 16 year old author of the Wikipedia article on British Monarchy, he lives in Ohio and as far as I know has never been to England. His article (a featured article on Wikipedia) reflects his well-intentioned but naive understanding of the subject. Between us we negotiate a rewrite that is a more accurate presentation of the facts. I advocate the removal of opinion and common perceptions, and the simple presentation of the facts as befits an encyclopedia. But I will fess up that, as an English anti-monarchist, I believe the simple presentation of the facts serves my cause. 

Within a day, our delicate negotiation is usurped by the self-righteous indignation of a UK student who embodies a completely different view of the matter and believes we should dilute the facts to represent the accepted point of view that the monarchy is powerless (nothing could, in fact, be further from the truth). None of us are experts, and though I am an Englishman and more knowledgeable of the facts, I do have an agenda that is served by this simple presentation of the facts, that is why I put the effort into the British Monarchy article in the first place. 

In the BlogHER chat, we are amused by a visiting father-to-be who seems obsessed about why women do not talk about sex. We politely point out that this may not be an appropriate subject in the middle of our mother-blogger discussion but he persists. He can’t understand why the conference is not called BlogEVERYONE, he flirts with the ladies, and in a comedic finale leaves us because his dinner is ready. Guess who makes dinner at his house. 

By virtue of assertive belligerence or fierce self righteousness the loud often dominate free expression and oppress the voice of the gentle, the compassionate and the wise. In the lands where free expression is possible it is too frequently sacrificed to those who can buy, through favor or cash, privileged access. 

In the so-called “free world” the ignorant parade their agendas at the expense of the wise in a frequently unchallenged appeal to convention and steam over the quiet wisdom and suffering of the hidden, the complex and the unpopular. 

The “free press” cannot help but distort our perception and our thinking by mediating facts through personality, and “balanced reporting” is constrained by the availability of the articulate on each side. 

Freedom of speech is not a balanced thing. There is no requirement that the playing field be leveled. The loud too have the right to be heard; as much right as the meek, the poor and the uneducated. The ignorant – or merely those without the education to appreciate their predicament – have as much right to be heard as the wise. 

Today the cause of peace in the world demands that those of us with the ability to speak well must defend those less able. That those of us with the education to appreciate the predicament of others, speak on their behalf. 

Yet it is the responsibility of each of us first to listen. In the vast noise there are quiet voices that need to be heard. They will uplift us. They will alert us to injustice. They will inspire and awaken us. They will warn us of the coming storm and they will lead us to discovery. They will humble us. 

It is the responsibility of each of us to discern. To think for ourselves and draw our own conclusions. To dismiss the ignorant and favor the wise.

Republished © 2005, Steven Ericsson-Zenith

A warm and beautiful afternoon in Saratoga
Fine Pinot Grigio and good conversation
The dappled passing of the day
The evening chill
Los Gatos darkness revealing
Oceans of emptiness
Framed by Redwoods and Laurels
Springing into the night from the mountain side
From which a tumbling creek echoes
Light from the stars and galaxies
Chasing memories and uncertainties
Amplified anticipations
The passing time in the hot tub
.