Posts Tagged death

Date: April 23rd, 2011
Cate: observations + conclusions + beliefs, society + culture, things to think about

Dying is the last thing I plan to do.

Either by design or thought
we are doomed to know our own end

- “The Fall Of The House Of Usher” by Lou Reed

Mortality is probably a good thing to cover in the Mortality Blog. Death is a fact of life (so far as we know) and it’s a pretty depressing one -- the boon of self-awareness comes with the bane of knowing we are all going to die.

(okay, bad video, yes. just pop it out and let it play in the background.)

Shatner’s song makes light of our common destiny, which I support -- because there’s really not much else you can do about it. You can sit around and fret about inevitability, or you can accept it and try to pack in as much living as possible before your time is up.

My beliefs, such as they are, are balanced on this tiny little pearl of truth (if you’ll pardon the flowery prose) -- that after you die, it’s over. It’s totally and completely over, you cease to exist, maybe everything else ceases to exist, but it’s a moot point, because even if reality continues without you, you’ll never know it, because you’ll be dead. And everything, and everyone dies.

This simple little fact drives the instinct to survive and procreate -- to try to spread out as much as possible before entropy catches up. If you truly feel that you’d rather be dead than alive, even in an extreme situation, there is something terribly and fundamentally wrong with you. Life, any life, any terrible life of pain and misery, is incalculably more valuable than the absence of life.

The idea that a life of torture is better than no life at all is probably a luxury that I can afford, having lived a life of comfort (likely mostly undeserved) thus far. It’s the only belief I hold strongly enough that I would consider imposing it on someone else. Which is why abortion, war, and capital punishment are all extremely uncomfortable issues to me -- existential angst bothers me like nothing else I’ve experienced, in a manner that seems profound and untouchable, impossible to deal with directly, better relegated to a deep dark corner of my mind that I rarely purposefully venture. We’re not talking Thanatophobia - I suspect I’m far too ‘well-adjusted’ to have any seriously irrational phobias. Still, just thinking about it causes anxiety, speeds up my heart, makes me grit my teeth, makes my thoughts swirl around and keeps me uncomfortable until I can come up with something else to distract myself.

Since there ain’t anything new under the sun, Ernest Becker has already described my outlook in Terror Management Theory. You can read the wikipedia article yourself I’m sure, but this first paragraph is exactly what we’re talking about:

Terror Management Theory (TMT), in social psychology, states that all human behavior is motivated by the fear of mortality. The theory purports to help explain human activity both at the individual and societal level. It is derived from anthropologist Ernest Becker‘s 1973 Pulitzer Prize-winning work of nonfiction The Denial of Death, in which Becker argues all human action is taken to ignore or avoid the inevitability of death. The terror of absolute annihilation creates such a profound—albeit subconscious—anxiety in people (called cognitive dissonance) that they spend their lives attempting to make sense of it. On large scales, societies build symbols: laws, religious meaning systems, cultures, and belief systems to explain the significance of life, define what makes certain characteristics, skills, and talents extraordinary, reward others whom they find exemplify certain attributes, and punish or kill others who do not adhere to their cultural worldview. On an individual level, how well someone adheres to a cultural worldview is the same concept asself-esteem; people measure their own worth based on how well they live up to their culture’s expectations.

How convenient that there’s an all-powerful all-knowing invisible being who can save you from death; or that you’ll be re-incarnated after you die in this life and live another; or that you’ll ascend to godhood and get virgins or whatever. Yeah, so much for religion. This is why it will take an act of god (or something) to make me a believer -- otherwise, Occam’s Razor leaves me with Atheism, because I can’t see religious belief as anything other than “The terror of absolute annihilation,” and I can’t help feeling that I’m more willing to face reality than religion’s advocates. There is no god to save us from death. It is terrifying, yes.

The value of human life in general is an easy transitive relation to make, empathy making it simple enough to jump from “I don’t want to die,” to “they don’t want to die,” and “I don’t want them to die.” Survival instinct extends in an inverse pyramid from self, to family, to friends, to peers, etc. On a very basic level, I don’t want anyone to die, and it seems so simple and easy to me that I can’t help being a little baffled by people who disagree, and justify murder.

If life is the essential element, then to deprive someone of life is the most vicious and terrible act you can commit, an expression of the darkest part of humanity: a life of self-awareness and free will, including the choice to erase another person from existence. If the prospect of my own mortality is my deepest fear, the idea that my death could be a result of another person’s action is buried directly above -- and if a man can kill another man, he can kill me. So when we start talking about whether murders and rapists and traitors deserve the death penalty, or how young a person can be and still be aborted with impunity… it scares me. Since the fear of death is already there, that slippery slope leads straight from strangers to peers to friends to family to myself, and when I’m lying in bed at night in the dark and I can’t stop thinking about that last moment of consciousness…

Audio MP3

One sees one’s own death
one sees one committing murder or atrocious violent acts

- “The City In The Sea / Shadow” by Lou Reed

So that’s awful. I mean, there are other things that worry me, but this is the only one that really matters -- I’m worried that we still don’t put enough importance on the value of human life. I’m afraid of dying, and I’m afraid that other people aren’t as worried about it as I am, when it’s the only thing anyone should really be worried about.

Date: December 25th, 2010
Cate: matt's life

ann

I knew Ann ever since I can remember… according to mom, the first word I figured out how to say was ‘meow,’ and I knew that Ann was the lady with the cats. Ann and Ty were probably my favorite couple out of my mom’s friends (right behind Tom and Michelle, who won by default for owning a SNES) because they were nice patient people, and had some dogs and cats. I’ve always liked animals. It was weird when Ann and Ty split up, though it makes sense now that I know a little more about it. It was weird when Ann died, too, and it makes sense in a horrible sort of way.

Mom got a call from Ann, who said she’d been having trouble breathing – a trip to the hospital was in order, and while we waited to hear back on how she was doing, we went to grab dinner. The next morning, Mom called to tell me that Ann was gone. Just like that. Something weird with her lungs, her circulation, she couldn’t breath, and that was it. It’s fun to anthropomorphize health problems, talk about battling cancer or whatever, but let’s face it, sometimes you don’t die because you give up – you die because your brain doesn’t have any oxygen to work with, and shuts down, whether you like it or not.

Opiate of the masses indeed, sometimes you just want to put aside your problems and get high for a while – and in a world where it’s hard to look anywhere without seeing evidence of entropy, religion’s promise of an escape to the mortal prisons we’re born into sounds pretty nice. Strange to think how easily I slip into ‘dear god’ -type thoughts – prayers to an imaginary friend that I don’t even play with anymore. But death is horrible, and I guess if it makes people a little crazy, that’s understandable.

As much as I hate it, the mortality blog is going to see more entries like this before the last one – when I’ve gone the same way. I wonder who’ll write the last post? Will it be my brother? Some future children? A friend, or a lover? Will death come too suddenly for me to write down my passwords, so no one will ever breach the digital spaces where I’ve stored the bits of myself that I’d rather keep private for the time being?

Finally, earlier this year (or was it the last?) Ann had another hospital visit – her heart actually stopped for a while, but they got it going again. If ‘borrowed time’ existed, maybe she was living on it. I wonder what it was like, at the end?

Date: November 25th, 2010
Cate: dreams

dream: hardware store nightmare

shopping at some sort of hardware store with James, wandering around, trying to find one particular thing. we were also looking at possible Christmas presents for our family.

then once we found what were were looking for, we went up to the checkout area. suddenly things shifted a bit, and I was waiting in line with uncle Steve. I’d stripped off all my clothes at some point in the store, but was still carrying my pants slung over my shoulder. I was holding a bed sheet wrapped around myself.

So then I came up against a classic embaressing dream dilemna: I had to get my wallet out to pay the cashier, but I couldn’t do that and hold the sheet at the same time – everyone was going to catch a glimpse of me naked. I was fumbling to try anyway, when everything changed -

“Get down, get down, get down!” the bagger shouted, pointing at me – no, PAST me, I realized, as I spun around, and saw a decrepit old man slowly drawing a revolver with a long barrel out of the side pocket on his wheel chair.

“He’ll shoot you,” the guy continued, trying to warn the old man’s caretaker – the old man nonchalantly pulled the trigger, holding the gun off to one side, there was an explosion, and the bullet richocheted off the floor and out across the store.

We all backed away, shocked, and then I watched him slot in another bullet, then calmly point the gun at his caretaker and pull the trigger – then at the cashier, then the bagger, then me, then uncle steve. He shot at each of us, and we all fell – but he missed me. I curled up at the end of the checkout stand, out of sight for a moment, trying to play dead and at the same time fumble to pull out my phone and call 911…

I was half awake when those last shots were fired, the sound still echoing in my ears, and even though I already knew it was a dream, I still laid without breathing or moving for a few seconds before I could force my eyes open, to make sure that the blurry scene around me was really my darkened bedroom, and not the checkout line with the psychopathic old man.

Date: June 27th, 2008
Cate: matt's life

War and Death [best of from 2004]

10:38 PM 3/20/03

Me, now.

War on terrorism, war on Iraq. Yesterday war was officialy declared on the country of Iraq. George Bush decided that we had to go in and take over the country. Here’s some reasons that he did it…

-Weapons. He claims that the Iraqi governent/military has weapons of ‘mass destruction’, possibly chemical or biological weapons. Which dosn’t seem too horrible, ’cause it’s not like _we_ don’t have any weapons like that… in fact, we’ve probably got way better stuff then they do anyway, so… and anyway, if they ever tried to _use_ the weapons, they would die. It’s a fact. The retaliation would be instant, and deadly. They wouldn’t survive. I would hate that.

-Oppression. I think the whole war propoganda thing has made a mistake in not promoting the ‘freeing Iraq’s oppressed people’ angle. I would be more inclined to go to war over human rights violations, oppression, or persecution then over weapons or trade policies.

-Oil. Let’s face it, there’s a whole bunch of oil in the middle east, and we’re a nation that consumes more oil then could ever be good for us. Other countries have oil trade going on with Iraq, and those countries, consequently, arn’t supporting our dumb little war. France, for instance. Everyone’s getting mad at France.

More on that subject. War makes people a little crazy. Sean said something wise and worth remembering today, something that I agree with. “It’s not the war that I’m scared of, it’s the way people act while we’re at war.” Stupid, childish stuff, like renaming french fries and french toast to freedom fries and freedom toast. Stupidest thing I’ve ever heard of. The French are doing the right thing by distancing themselves from this conflict… it’s really just _our_ war, no the rest of the world’s. We’ve already got Great Britain aiding us with troops. We can’t just have everybody ganging up on Iraq…

So, it started out with some missiles being launched. Apparently, they thought they knew where Saddam Hussien was, and tried to take out the target of opportunity. Did it work? That’s a problem. Saddam has given several tv speeches since that bombing run, but it could be a look alike, or a pre-recorded message made for this purpose. Now, since then, there’s been several bombing runs by aircraft and Marines begining to invade. At several points they’ve been hindered by Iraqi retaliation, but it seems like most of the soldiers are just simply waiting to see our army so that they can surrender. British artillery is helping to cover the Marine ground troups on their way into Iraq. They’re moving towards Bahgdad.

While I certainly don’t support the war, now that it’s started, I can’t not be supportive of those fighting it. Now that they’re in the thick of it, or thin at this point, I guess, I really hope that we win. I hope that it’s over quickly, and there’s a bare minimum of casualties for both sides, military and civilian. Saddam certainly dosn’t deserve to die… just to be removed from power and from any influence he might have. Maybe put him in Alcatraz. I don’t know. Death isn’t a good thing, for any reason.

Well, the days are marching on. Spring break starts in two to four days, depending on how you count it… on saturday I’m going to a creative arts imposium with uncle steve, put on by the Portland Art Institute, where I’m thinking of attending college. I hope I get to. I really want to go to a good college for something I like to do and have fun getting my degree for whatever. Then, go on to get a job that I’ll be happy with. Make enough money to support myself, buy a cool house, get stuff, eat stuff, make stuff, sell music and a book, retire, and then just relax. Do what ever I want, and be able to because the working part of my life is over. Eventually, I’ll die.

…

That’s the thing I’m most scared about. Dying.

I can’t really even think about it too hard… it just scares me. I get all hung up on it, go over and over things in my head, keep thinking and thinking to that one moment where everything stops, and how it’s all temporary ’cause it’ll all end, and you don’t know when…

Death. Yuk. I hate it. Why would you die? It’s the whole law of nature thing. Of course, there’s stuff after death. My beliefs tell me that.

Heaven. Hell. One or the other, after you die. Sure, I belive that, but how does it work? Does your consiousness transfer to a different plane of existence? Are you still aware, able to think? Do you just get stuck in memories without any external input? I think that, at they end, when everyone’s being judged and thrown into Hell for eternity, I’m going to ask God to spare them. All of them. It’ll be over, he’ll have won. No point in damning all those people, they realize that you’re the winner. You’re the most powerfull. The creator. After death, everyone will realize what’s gonig on. Everyone will pay, or will be payed, for the things they did in life.

I could use assurance, I suppose, that everything’s going to be okay. Everything’s going to turn out alright. The war, I dont’ care about too much, it dosn’t directly effect me, at least not yet, not as far as I can tell. However, death does. God, I hope that no one dies. I won’t…

I was going to type that I won’t be able to take it, but I know I will. It’ll just be so hard… so weird… I hate thinking about this. No one should leave me.

Do you know how lucky you are, Matt? You’ve got a decent body, pretty good friends, a good school, top-notch parents who encourage and are good to you, live in a cool city, in a cool country, have enough money to be able to have fun mostly whenever you want to… You’ve got a lap top, a keyboard, a dreamcast… you’re taking two periods of computer classes with Mr. Farris. Matt, you’re having a great life. Don’t hesitate to take advantage of it.

11:05 PM 3/20/03