You three eat your breakfast, and gaze at the wonderment of the infinity. Why are you here? What's the purpose of your existing, you know? You don't say this audibly, but the thought is there, ensconced in your small head. The two women besides you are eating, in a silence broken by the occasional small-talk. Amanda is reading the newspaper. Carolyn's blush has yet to fade. She turns to you.
"Jake," she says, "do you know what an Audience Surrogate is?"
"No mom. I'm not into literary theory much," replied the Surrogate between mouthfuls of little hash-browns.
"It's when a character in a book is a stand-in for the audience. One who responds as the author expects the audience to, or one the audience is supposed to see themselves as. They can be used in breaking the fourth wall, for instance."
"Jake, do you also know what objectification of women is?"
"Of course I do. I'm like, almost 18, mom."
"I wonder if this is moral."
"If what's moral, mom?" Amanda said.
"There are a lot of people in the world. They are rather old, people. I mean like civilization is old. Though, the world is much older. People reproduce other people, and each generation replaces the last, who eventually die. Every generation eventually dies. This is why we need to reproduce; it adds time to the countdown. You might say we're racing against it.
But why? What's the point? Why does life want to create more life? The want of reproduction, after all, is one of the basic motives. It exists in all species. Why?
If you subscribe to nihilism or absurdism, there's really no reason for it. Rather, it is not inherently good to reproduce. I'm talking about morality.There's really no reason there should be any more life. Few people, of course, practice these beliefs, even though the non-existence of morality and ethics is true. Nothing inherently has value. Values and morals are just social constructs; rational people realize this. Yet we still follow them. Why? Well, because we're simply built to follow them. We're built to want to reproduce, and we cannot ignore our own inherent drives. Why? Why can't we ignore them? Are we simply also built to be unable to completely resist our animalistic desires? If so, then why? But the real fundamental question, of course, concerns why animals have the desire to reproduce. Why it is necessary to make more animals, essentially. Who knows?
But sex is at the basis of it. It is the mechanism by which animals reproduce. We have it too, Jake!
Why is it taboo in so many cultures? This question I cannot answer. But I believe I am right, at least, in saying that sex is taboo in American culture. This story, then, is completely taboo as well. It is also morally degenerate. Erotic fiction like this is a bit pitiful, don't you think? Guys immersing themselves in an impossible story (as is the case, after all, with paraphilias,) via surrogate, having sexual experiences with, among others, their own immediate family? This violates, I think, several codes. Firstly it concerns impossible situations - obviously, that you're less than an inch tall. This is what our audience/author finds rather conducive to sexual exploits; such is their paraphilia. This is an impossible situation which violates the current state of nature. If sex is to reproduce in real life, what's the point of impossible situations? And so it is wrong, or at least, inconsistent with what even the concept of sex implies. Microphilia is, I think, A Priori absurd!
The second and also rather obvious problem with it is that it involves incest. This is a more cultural grievance, however, though it is based on, again, the concept and purpose of sex. Incest is seen as completely abhorrent in most cultures. Sex is for reproduction, and according to natural selection, the best outcome for sex is a better creature. As is well-known, reproducing with your close family produces severely debilitated people. This is a bad outcome, and is completely against the point of sex, so it shouldn't happen. Innate knowledge of this may well guide the universal(ish) taboo of incest. Or not. (Is it wrong in such cultures, e.g., to have sex with person you didn't know was your long-lost sister/brother/mother/father/etc.? Perhaps the nature of the relationship you form with your immediate family prevents you from fucking them, as is I think the outlook on relationships with close friends.) But incest is taboo, and so there you have it. Society views these stories, on the whole, as wrong.
But according to Utilitarianism, this does not matter! As long as it brings more people happiness than it brings pain, it is morally just! What pain could the existence of these stories bring to the dissenters? They are not obligated to read them, yes? Why not simply live and let live?
...Self-improvement is widely considered to be a social commandment - this is why we condemn chronic couch-slobs, despite their non-harming nature. "They don't contribute to society!!!" We say. But is not society large enough and full of enough people that this fellow's idleness isn't harming us even indirectly? I should think so. What we are really condemning is his lack of self-improvement. He fulfills all the basic needs of life, yes, he survives, but not well, and it is doubtless that he shall procreate. (I think we are speaking of a non-depressed chronic couch-slob.) There is also the objection from the Categorical Imperative of Kant's ethics, which says that his action is inconsistent because if everyone did what he did then society itself would collapse, making his idleness contradictory, as it is the existence of a luxurious society in the first place that allows him to be idle at all!
How are you being self-improving by reading these stories? By wanking off to impossible situations? You are not.
And yet I do not think this is wrong. I think we are allowed some wastefulness in the above "luxurious societies." We are allowed to apply Utilitarianism in self-centric way, if only to some extent. According to the nihilists/absurdists, though, nothing matters anyway, so who cares? Do what you want! Who cares about the moral dubitability of it all!"
"Jake," she says, "do you know what an Audience Surrogate is?"
"No mom. I'm not into literary theory much," replied the Surrogate between mouthfuls of little hash-browns.
"It's when a character in a book is a stand-in for the audience. One who responds as the author expects the audience to, or one the audience is supposed to see themselves as. They can be used in breaking the fourth wall, for instance."
"Jake, do you also know what objectification of women is?"
"Of course I do. I'm like, almost 18, mom."
"I wonder if this is moral."
"If what's moral, mom?" Amanda said.
"There are a lot of people in the world. They are rather old, people. I mean like civilization is old. Though, the world is much older. People reproduce other people, and each generation replaces the last, who eventually die. Every generation eventually dies. This is why we need to reproduce; it adds time to the countdown. You might say we're racing against it.
But why? What's the point? Why does life want to create more life? The want of reproduction, after all, is one of the basic motives. It exists in all species. Why?
If you subscribe to nihilism or absurdism, there's really no reason for it. Rather, it is not inherently good to reproduce. I'm talking about morality.There's really no reason there should be any more life. Few people, of course, practice these beliefs, even though the non-existence of morality and ethics is true. Nothing inherently has value. Values and morals are just social constructs; rational people realize this. Yet we still follow them. Why? Well, because we're simply built to follow them. We're built to want to reproduce, and we cannot ignore our own inherent drives. Why? Why can't we ignore them? Are we simply also built to be unable to completely resist our animalistic desires? If so, then why? But the real fundamental question, of course, concerns why animals have the desire to reproduce. Why it is necessary to make more animals, essentially. Who knows?
But sex is at the basis of it. It is the mechanism by which animals reproduce. We have it too, Jake!
Why is it taboo in so many cultures? This question I cannot answer. But I believe I am right, at least, in saying that sex is taboo in American culture. This story, then, is completely taboo as well. It is also morally degenerate. Erotic fiction like this is a bit pitiful, don't you think? Guys immersing themselves in an impossible story (as is the case, after all, with paraphilias,) via surrogate, having sexual experiences with, among others, their own immediate family? This violates, I think, several codes. Firstly it concerns impossible situations - obviously, that you're less than an inch tall. This is what our audience/author finds rather conducive to sexual exploits; such is their paraphilia. This is an impossible situation which violates the current state of nature. If sex is to reproduce in real life, what's the point of impossible situations? And so it is wrong, or at least, inconsistent with what even the concept of sex implies. Microphilia is, I think, A Priori absurd!
The second and also rather obvious problem with it is that it involves incest. This is a more cultural grievance, however, though it is based on, again, the concept and purpose of sex. Incest is seen as completely abhorrent in most cultures. Sex is for reproduction, and according to natural selection, the best outcome for sex is a better creature. As is well-known, reproducing with your close family produces severely debilitated people. This is a bad outcome, and is completely against the point of sex, so it shouldn't happen. Innate knowledge of this may well guide the universal(ish) taboo of incest. Or not. (Is it wrong in such cultures, e.g., to have sex with person you didn't know was your long-lost sister/brother/mother/father/etc.? Perhaps the nature of the relationship you form with your immediate family prevents you from fucking them, as is I think the outlook on relationships with close friends.) But incest is taboo, and so there you have it. Society views these stories, on the whole, as wrong.
But according to Utilitarianism, this does not matter! As long as it brings more people happiness than it brings pain, it is morally just! What pain could the existence of these stories bring to the dissenters? They are not obligated to read them, yes? Why not simply live and let live?
...Self-improvement is widely considered to be a social commandment - this is why we condemn chronic couch-slobs, despite their non-harming nature. "They don't contribute to society!!!" We say. But is not society large enough and full of enough people that this fellow's idleness isn't harming us even indirectly? I should think so. What we are really condemning is his lack of self-improvement. He fulfills all the basic needs of life, yes, he survives, but not well, and it is doubtless that he shall procreate. (I think we are speaking of a non-depressed chronic couch-slob.) There is also the objection from the Categorical Imperative of Kant's ethics, which says that his action is inconsistent because if everyone did what he did then society itself would collapse, making his idleness contradictory, as it is the existence of a luxurious society in the first place that allows him to be idle at all!
How are you being self-improving by reading these stories? By wanking off to impossible situations? You are not.
And yet I do not think this is wrong. I think we are allowed some wastefulness in the above "luxurious societies." We are allowed to apply Utilitarianism in self-centric way, if only to some extent. According to the nihilists/absurdists, though, nothing matters anyway, so who cares? Do what you want! Who cares about the moral dubitability of it all!"
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May 12, 2023
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