But, that doesn’t mean it’s not worthwhile.
The second rule of the Church Of Splendor is I am not arguing with you. You can read more about the rules here. I believe that Greg Swann is at 5 now, but, he may have added more. I avidly watch his videos when they come out and try to keep up with his prodigious writings at http://selfadoration.com/ . I am busy maintaining my middle-class status which requires work more than anything. I work at a job and I work at home and, most importantly, I work at my marriage. The last item is the one that listening to Greg helps me with the most. “Marriage is the second most important relationship in your life. The most important, being your relationship with yourself.” “Working at” your marriage: What does it mean – and why bother?
So, I take the rules kind of seriously. Even though the rules themselves are a little whimsical sounding, they are incredibly serious – or more rightly, seriously important.
I still have trouble living up to the rules, especially number two. I love to share ideas. I love to think about my own ideas and test them out and test my own understanding of ideas, my own or otherwise. This makes it difficult to live rule #2. I still feel the need to try to pursuade people to my opinion through arguments.
Although I realize that this may cause me to inflict pain which lowers my own self opinion, I feel that I am entitled to defend my positions in so far as my opponents advocate for action, through elected government that causes me harm. This is a form of self-defence. One day, I may be in a position where I believe I am capable of withstanding government inflicted harm where upon, arguing with people will cause more harm than good. This is still my goal and it is my goal to attain such self-reliance.
For the time being, I am very vulnerable to actions taken on behalf of government and government only seems to be getting stronger. In the present situation, I maintain that I am better off sharing my opinions and arguing with others to defend my positions as well as voting to affect the government to do less harm to my person, family and property. This may make me a bad anarchist, but, pragmatism is still influencing my actions.
So, I continue to argue, argue and argue as long as my fellow citizens are so enamoured by Marxist ideas they can’t even understand. I am currently being goaded by a couple of what Rand called the looter class on Facebook. I wrote this post instead, trying to back myself down from making harmful comments. The comment I want to write is basically this:
The leftist in Canada could shit his pants and blame Stephen Harper. Then he’d call on government to clean up his mess.
This is a devastating comment that will certainly cause anger and could cause irreparable harm to the relationship I have with the person who’s profile I’m commenting on. I hope that I can come up with some way to make my point without damaging the person involved. This is an example of why Greg wants followers of the Church to avoid arguing. I can see why it is right, but, I have difficulty living up to the ideal.
Isn’t that what church is supposed to be about?
culdesachero 