Last week I wrote an “essay-post” on INTERDEPENDENT Relationships, where pursuit of personal growth and personal transformation are prized over comfort and autonomy.<\/p>\n
As a result conflict and uninvited intervention is both expected and desired.<\/p>\n
It received quite a bit of feedback and one back and forth with a friend sparked such a long response from me, that it deserves a re-post of its own.<\/p>\n
While I wrote it “to” a friend, I didn’t write it “for” him.<\/p>\n
I think his worldview, which I would characterize as basically politically Libertarian and Socially Post-Modern, is actually quite mainstream, so my criticism is primarily about the individual as a representative of a worldview and the behavior it confers.<\/p>\n
(Original thread can be found here:https:\/\/www.facebook.com\/maxmarmer\/posts\/4396798312176<\/a>)<\/p>\n Without further adieu here is the post, nearly unadulterated:<\/p>\n ——<\/p>\n J,<\/p>\n Okay, seems like you really want to engage even though I said I thought it didn’t make sense because we have too many fundamental disagreements and are very far apart.<\/p>\n In general discussions are only productive when people have enough similarities in common that differences be can be bridged.<\/p>\n In the private sphere I would probably walk away. But now you’re trying to egg me on with baseless, derogatory attacks in the public sphere and it is probably prudent for me to defend myself.<\/p>\n I would ordinarily not respond in such length, when all signs point to an unproductive discussion, but as many have noticed, I have recently been sticking my neck out much more in the public sphere, and it probably makes sense for me to set the right precedent when faced with arguments such as yours.<\/p>\n So now I will return serve and try my hand at defending myself by addressing each point directly.<\/p>\n 1) J,: “LOL so Max, you in fact agree with me. Or you disagree with your original post, since you are not bothering to push me further and thus are depriving me of my chance to transcend my personal boundaries and the opportunity for growth. ”<\/p>\n Max: You and I know each other. We’ve had a number of good conversations over the years. We are “casual friends”. We have nothing close to a “interdependent” relationship. Therefore saying I don’t agree with my own post is a gross misinterpretation of my whole post and calls into question either your intentions with these long diatribes or your interpretative ability, because I was only talking about CLOSE interdependent relationships, not casual friendships.<\/p>\n 2) J: “but every now and then, when somebody posts something on facebook without thinking it through from all angles, it can be fun to open a can of philosophical whoop ass.”<\/p>\n M: How presumptuous of you to start gloating as soon as you finish speaking. How do you know you haven’t misunderstood or misrepresented my arguments? How do you know haven’t committed any fundamental logical or philosophical errors? You didn’t even wait to see if your peers agreed with you. How self-validating a mind you have\u2026 Even if you would be right, how infantile a response\u2026<\/p>\n This is one of the many signs my initial intuition was right that it would be unproductive to debate the details of what type of personal interventions are recommended in pursuit of enabling the transformation of close friends.<\/p>\n 3) J: “My grandmother was always hypercritical of us growing up and though it stemmed from some undoubtedly well intentioned maternal instincts, it only had detrimental effects on all the grandchildren.”<\/p>\n Max: If your conclusion from this is that nobody with good intentions should try to help close friends and loved ones, even if they have the best of intentions, because it failed when your grandmother tried, then you have acquired the condition of Learned Helplessness (http:\/\/en.wikipedia.org\/wiki\/Learned_helplessness<\/a>)<\/p>\n A failed experiment with the right initial conditions should not preclude another attempt as long as the methods are different.<\/p>\n “Insanity: doing the same thing over and over again and expecting different results.” – Albert Einstein<\/p>\n We all have the right to try again to achieve the results of behavior change with different tactics.<\/p>\n This is not to say this isn’t a dangerously delicate affair. But its up to the individual to monitor whether their strategy or tactics are actually working and not just mere good intentions that are backfiring. It is their right to stake the future of their relationship on this intervention if they believe it is necessary.<\/p>\n Your implicit perspective of learned helplessness along with a number of other comments in your posts leads me to believe you have an overly cynical view of human nature and the ability of humans to learn and grow.<\/p>\n Here is another one of those comments of yours:<\/p>\n J: “Even solicited advice can backfire. It is very easy to trick yourself into thinking you are giving friendly advice and helping the other person’s growth when in fact, you are being a control freak and\/or projecting things onto them. This is a huge problem in romantic relationships and a common cause of failure when one party is trying to “improve” or “save” the other.”<\/p>\n M: Just because solicited advice has failed before, doesn’t mean it is a priori bad. Believing that is learned helplessness.<\/p>\n 4) J: “But positive self-transformation is exactly that, SELF. It has to be initiated from within or else it is someone else imposing their vision of what your behavior should be. ”<\/p>\n M: I don’t believe I ever said that the intervener would “transform” the other person. Of course it has to come from within. But in our close relationships it is our duty to do our best to be guides to those we are interdependently intertwined with. No interaction is no relationship at all.<\/p>\n John Donne:<\/p>\n “No man is an island, entire of itself…any man’s death diminishes me, because I am involved in mankind; and therefore never send to know for whom the bell tolls; it tolls for thee.””<\/p>\n Here’s what I did say:<\/p>\n “It is immoral to bite our tongue and withhold a truth that can enable a loved one to grow.<\/p>\n We must find out if the person we care for is ready to accept the truth we know they need to hear.<\/p>\n Most of the time they will not be ready.<\/p>\n Rarely are the preconditions so fertile that a slight suggestion is enough to trigger a reorganization of motivation, decision and action.<\/p>\n But it is wrong not to give them the chance.”<\/p>\n 5) J: “[Transformation] has to be initiated from within or else it is someone else imposing their vision of what your behavior should be. ”<\/p>\n M: If you’re implying I believe this then you are wrong. In fact, if you actually read my comments instead of just picking out the facts that conformed to your blinded diatribe, you’d see that I actually said something very different:<\/p>\n “We also shouldn’t assume that “knowing better than someone else” is wrong a priori.<\/p>\n Many times people do know what’s better for someone better than they know themselves.<\/p>\n It is very easy for humans to delude themselves or trap themselves in self-limiting beliefs and it is the role of people close to them to help them break out of these traps.<\/p>\n Of course this should be done with as much respect as possible, while still pushing for what you believe is best for the person, based on your understanding of THEIR values.<\/p>\n Definitely don’t get stuck in pushing for what you think is best for another person based on YOUR values.<\/p>\n That is a grave sin of friendship committed all too often.”<\/p>\n That is actually quite similar to the golden rule: One should treat others as one would like others to treat oneself.<\/p>\n But the golden rule actually does not go far enough. Rather we should adopt the Platinum rule:<\/p>\n “Treat others in the way they like to be treated.”<\/p>\n They reason we need to move from the Golden Rule to the Platinum rule is because not everybody has the same value system. And the golden rule only works in the context when value systems are the same. When value systems are different, we need to respect and understand the other’s person value system so that we treat them how they want to understand.<\/p>\n Another person can’t grow unless we meet them where they are at.<\/p>\n 6) J: “Seriously, though, there are a TON of urgent problems to solve (eg curing cancer). ”<\/p>\n M: This argument is bull. Oh, okay we shouldn’t help our friends and loved ones when they are in need because god dammit cancer hasn’t been solved yet. Why don’t we just stop all economic activity, all social interactions, line up like automatons and march into the wet lab and toil day and night until cancer is solved.<\/p>\n J, did you finish the food on your plate, because children in china ARE STARVING.<\/p>\n This statement also points towards a gross or subtly reductionist scientific worldview, that completely ignores the human element of the scientist who is working on the cancer research problem. Do you really think an emotionally distraught or confused scientist will be in a good mindset to innovate? Does your worldview even take into account the subjective psychological experience of an individual? Or are humans emotionless robotic machines who will innovate and solve hard biochemistry problems if we just stick intravenous tubes in their arms and pump them with food and water until creative breakthroughs are made?<\/p>\n 7) J: “Way, way, way down on the list is some hypothetical imperative to go around challenging everyone’s comfort zone and inducing them to transform to reach their supposedly greater potential.”<\/p>\n M: Again. You create phantom inferences of my arguments, and proceed to speak in grossly inaccurate generalizations.<\/p>\n Did I ever say there was an “imperative to go around challenging EVERYONE”S comfort zone”.<\/p>\n No this was about challenging the comfort zone of those people we have the CLOSEST relationships with. Our INNER CIRCLES are not EVERYONE.<\/p>\n Here’s another instance where you over-generalize:<\/p>\n J: “” You are not tasked with “saving” everyone you come across, and in many instances they can pull you into their downward spiral.””<\/p>\n I never said anything about saving EVERYONE. This essay was about the close interdependent relationships.<\/p>\n 8) J: Concentrate on negative freedoms (freedom from pain, hunger, and other obstacles to the good life) instead of some arbitrary definition of positive freedom that you are tempted to impose on your friends.<\/p>\n M: I fundamentally disagree with you about only focusing on negative freedoms and not positive freedoms. There is no reason we shouldn’t focus on BOTH. Focusing only on negative freedoms is one reason why the Modern Western Medicine system is so fucked up. Focusing on only NOT BEING SICK does not make you healthy. Do you know why? Because they have a biologically reductionist worldview (http:\/\/en.wikipedia.org\/wiki\/Reductionism<\/a>) that doesn’t value the Psychological or Social dimensions of life. As it appears you do not properly value either.<\/p>\n We must integrate the east with the west. The interior with the exterior. The negative and the positive.<\/p>\n 9) J: “Just adding a few final thoughts and then I am getting OFF Facebook, because if there is one thing we can probably all agree on, is that spending all this time posting stuff probably detracts from our positive self-transformation in the real world.”<\/p>\n M: I disagree. Constructive conversation, self-transformation, and working on improving the world are all interdependently intertwined. Focusing only on one diminishes the potential of all.<\/p>\n Posting about LOLCats on Facebook is meaningless you’re right. But at the same Facebook can also become a wonderful facilitator of edifying conversation.<\/p>\n Two relevant thoughts:<\/p>\n a) https:\/\/www.facebook.com\/maxmarmer\/posts\/4240294119669<\/a><\/p>\n b) https:\/\/www.facebook.com\/maxmarmer\/posts\/4384322120279<\/a><\/p>\n 10) J: “[Isiah Berlin] stated that positive liberty could only apply when the withdrawal of liberty from an individual was in pursuit of a choice that individual himself\/herself made, not a general principle of society or any other person’s opinion\u2026<\/p>\n \u2026For the remover to remove the keys in the absence of such an expressed intent by the driver, because the remover feels that the driver ought not to drive drunk, is paternalism, and not positive freedom by Berlin’s definition\u2026.<\/p>\n …Isaiah Berlin opposed any suggestion that paternalism and positive liberty could be equivalent”<\/p>\n M: I agree with you that paternalism and positive liberty are not equivalent. But I fundamentally disagree with you that paternalism is something to avoid at all costs, in order to preserve the sanctity of positive liberty.<\/p>\n If I see my sister, or my girlfriend or my co-founder, is about to drive drunk, I’m going to take their keys away regardless of whether they have previously given me permission to or not. I know that their judgement is impaired and that if they drive drunk they are likely to endanger themselves and others. I won’t let that happen.<\/p>\n
\nIt’s not an “either or” proposition.<\/p>\n
\nThis is the great travesty of Western Medicine. It only studies illness and nothing about creating health within us.<\/p>\n