Either/Or Thinkers [essay]

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"One and One Makes Nothing: Dualism Equals Nihilism"

Some personal reflections:

1

When a guy walks down the narrow hall looking for a public restroom and sees two doors facing one another in a small alcove, one of which is marked "Women," he goes through the other door. He doesn't look to see if that door is marked "Men." It's the only remaining option.

(I presume it would be comparable for a woman, but from experience alone I can't be sure.)

Some people in our world - evidently a lot of them - see all of life that way.

For such people, there are only two possibilities. Everything either is or is not something or other; everything either has or does not have Quality X or Quality Y. While I myself am not, I believe, this kind of dualistic thinker, I respect them. I have a growing respect for their numbers. And I think I even understand where they're coming from.

2

Even dualistic thinkers do in fact recognize that some qualities exist in degrees, falling at some point between the one extreme and the other. A person is not necessarily tall or short, for instance; she or he may be "average" (probably meaning, the same height as "me"). The sky may be cloudy or clear, or it may be be partly cloudy; everybody knows that.

Despite the over-used metaphor often applied to dualistic people - namely, "For them, everything is either black or white" - they in fact do recognize that in questions of color, there are shades of gray: dark, light, or "medium" gray, perhaps even finer distinctions ("medium-dark"? "grayish"?). And in relation to skin color - or rather race - the folks I am describing do most often recognize, in our times, that one is not simply white or non-white; one may also be mixed race, even mixed-race in varying degrees. (I myself am apparently something like 0.15% Native American, for instance.)

But for most things, these many friends, family members, co-workers, neighbors, political leaders and followers, voters and non-voters... all these dualistic thinkers see things as either this or that:

• You are either my friend or my enemy.
• You're either with me or against me.
• One's answer to a question is either correct or incorrect.
• You are either a person of principle, or you sometimes change your mind even on important issues
• The bathroom light is either on or off.
• You either win or you lose.
• What you say is either true or false, and what you think is either right or wrong.
• You either succeed or you fail.
• You believe, or you are a non-believer.
• You fight or you flee.

 (And so on.)

3

And about moral distinctions in particular, these dualistic-minded folks are peculiarly definitive in applying the "either-this-or-that" method to their daily lives.

 In life, they find either:

   1. truth or lies (usually found in "packs"),

  2. justice or injustice,

  3. patriotism or treason,

  4. dignity or humiliation,

  5. honor or dishonor, and

  6. people who are either:

      a. loyal or disloyal,

      b. free or enslaved,

      c. moral or immoral,

      d. right or wrong,

      e. good or bad.

As surely as we know that the sky might be partly cloudy, everybody also knows that our world is decidedly not simply good. It must necessarily be bad, then, right?

So - in their heart of hearts, dualistics know that:

• Life is basically simple, either one thing or its opposite.
• Everybody is probably your enemy.
• Although some things may seem okay, they are probably really inadequate
• The powerful are out to get you. 
• Most people are losers, "lazy good-for-nothings."
• Big words and long sentences are intended to hide the simple truth,
• Everybody lies and swindles and cheats.
• Although what you do, most of the time, is good, what most other people do, most of the time, is bad.
• You have to keep your guard up
• It's - as we say - "Every man for himself."

4

Okay.  So -

If you're surrounded by enemies, you doubt anyone's apparently good intentions.

If  everyone's a crook, you have to get your own as fast as you can.

If most people are losers, you have to be better than anyone else you see.

If everyone lies, you must question what anyone tells you.

If everyone cheats, the rules don't matter.

If the powerful are out to put you under their control, you must stand up to them and fight for your freedom and dignity.

If you can't depend on anyone or anything, you must vigorously protect yourself with an iron discipline.

5

As the result of perceiving the world this way, the either-or-way, these many people - rich and poor, southern and northern and western and eastern, educated and uneducated, urban and rural, sophosticated and rough-and-ready, upper class and working class - these dualistic thinkers throughout their whole lives are:

• persistent and consistent,
• independent,
• impatient with complex questions or explanations,
• unforgiving and uncompromising,
• angry,
• courageous,
• defensive,
• focused on the present, rather than on historical trends or future probabilities,
• passionate,
• suspicious,
• combative or aggressive,
• fierce,
• proud,
• intolerant of uncertainty and opposing opinions,
• fearful,
• prone to violence,
• lonely or "loner-ly."

As they see it and live it, the world is hostile, undependable, immoral, and seductive. They may recognize that it shouldn't and probably needn't be that way, but they know it is.

So - as they see it, a person should consider himself or herself morally superior to the world around her or him, but powerless to fundamentally change things. Such a person can never be satisfied or relax and must be ever-vigilant against the immorality of other people and the uncertainties of an evil world.

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