Attempting to Comprehend How Jerks Tick
The jerk's lack of a conscience has been puzzling to me, because I cannot put myself into his shoes. But after a lot of thinking, I finally have come up with an analogy.
A meateater is for a vegetarian what a jerk is for a (non-jerkish) woman.
1. Subjectively, from my personal point of view, I despise and loathe jerks, while there is nothing wrong with being a meateater.
I am a meateater and not a vegetarian. I see a fundamental difference between animals and humans, as I already explained in the entries 22 and 58. Humans know, that they will die, animals do not.
I buy free range eggs, and I would also gladly pay a higher price for meat, if this would be for sparing sufferings to the livestock. An animal, that is kept with enough comfortable space, well fed and painlessly killed, has a better life than many animals in the wild, and it suffers less than many people living in miserable circumstances.
That means, in my personal value system, causing suffering to any living being, human or animal, is wrong. Eating an animal, that has not suffered, is not wrong.
The ethical vegetarian, whom I mean in this context, has animal rights as a part of his value system. He considers killing an animal as equally unacceptable as killing a human. Killing an animal is a serious moral transgression for the vegetarian, that would make him feel guilty.
2. Seen from a neutral point of view, the vegetarian experiences the meateater in a very similar way as the woman experiences the jerk.
2.1. An animal is to a meateater, what a woman is to a jerk. The meateater feel superior to the animal. The jerk feels superior to the woman.
2.2. The meateater's perceived superiority allows him to eat the animal, the jerk's perceived superiority allows him to dominate and use the woman.
2.3. The feeling of superiority justifies the behavior as morally acceptable. The meateater feels no guilt eating meat, the jerk feels no guilt hurting a woman.
2.4. For the vegetarian, eating an animal is a moral transgression, because he identifies with the animal as having equal rights. For the woman, being dominated and used is a moral transgression, because she identifies herself as having equal rights.
2.5. The meateater and the vegetarian have incompatible basic values concerning animals, just as the jerk and the woman have incompatible basic values about the meaning of commitment.
2.6. If a meateater refrains from eating meat, it is by extrinsic motivation as part of the deal in return for the benefits of being in a relationship. If a jerk refrains from doing hurtful things to a woman, it is by extrinsic motivation as part of the deal in return for the benefits of being in a relationship.
3. In several previous entries I have already explained my suspicion, that the individual's basic values and attitudes are a conscious representation of the innate relative strength of some instincts compared with others and with rationality.
Thus people do not to decide consciously, what to choose as basic values. This seems to include also the evaluation, who is equal, and who is inferior. The jerk could be driven especially by a strong hierarchy instinct. The vegetarian could be driven especially by sharing the procreation instinct with animals.
If this were reality, then ethical vegetarians would have more children then meateaters, and jerks would be mostly meateaters. Hypoanimalistic people would be driven by neither instinct, but mainly by rationality, and therefore they feel superior to animals, but equal with all humans. Unfortunately, these will stay speculations forever, as I have no way of finding any evidence.
4. I know, that as a meateater, I would not be suitable for the moral requirements of an ethical vegetarian. As much as I would be willing to please him by not eating meat in his presence, I would just not feel any intrinsic inhibitions to eat meat in his absence and without his knowledge. This would be a transgression in regard to his morals.
The jerk's lack of a conscience has been puzzling to me, because I cannot put myself into his shoes. But after a lot of thinking, I finally have come up with an analogy.
A meateater is for a vegetarian what a jerk is for a (non-jerkish) woman.
1. Subjectively, from my personal point of view, I despise and loathe jerks, while there is nothing wrong with being a meateater.
I am a meateater and not a vegetarian. I see a fundamental difference between animals and humans, as I already explained in the entries 22 and 58. Humans know, that they will die, animals do not.
I buy free range eggs, and I would also gladly pay a higher price for meat, if this would be for sparing sufferings to the livestock. An animal, that is kept with enough comfortable space, well fed and painlessly killed, has a better life than many animals in the wild, and it suffers less than many people living in miserable circumstances.
That means, in my personal value system, causing suffering to any living being, human or animal, is wrong. Eating an animal, that has not suffered, is not wrong.
The ethical vegetarian, whom I mean in this context, has animal rights as a part of his value system. He considers killing an animal as equally unacceptable as killing a human. Killing an animal is a serious moral transgression for the vegetarian, that would make him feel guilty.
2. Seen from a neutral point of view, the vegetarian experiences the meateater in a very similar way as the woman experiences the jerk.
2.1. An animal is to a meateater, what a woman is to a jerk. The meateater feel superior to the animal. The jerk feels superior to the woman.
2.2. The meateater's perceived superiority allows him to eat the animal, the jerk's perceived superiority allows him to dominate and use the woman.
2.3. The feeling of superiority justifies the behavior as morally acceptable. The meateater feels no guilt eating meat, the jerk feels no guilt hurting a woman.
2.4. For the vegetarian, eating an animal is a moral transgression, because he identifies with the animal as having equal rights. For the woman, being dominated and used is a moral transgression, because she identifies herself as having equal rights.
2.5. The meateater and the vegetarian have incompatible basic values concerning animals, just as the jerk and the woman have incompatible basic values about the meaning of commitment.
2.6. If a meateater refrains from eating meat, it is by extrinsic motivation as part of the deal in return for the benefits of being in a relationship. If a jerk refrains from doing hurtful things to a woman, it is by extrinsic motivation as part of the deal in return for the benefits of being in a relationship.
3. In several previous entries I have already explained my suspicion, that the individual's basic values and attitudes are a conscious representation of the innate relative strength of some instincts compared with others and with rationality.
Thus people do not to decide consciously, what to choose as basic values. This seems to include also the evaluation, who is equal, and who is inferior. The jerk could be driven especially by a strong hierarchy instinct. The vegetarian could be driven especially by sharing the procreation instinct with animals.
If this were reality, then ethical vegetarians would have more children then meateaters, and jerks would be mostly meateaters. Hypoanimalistic people would be driven by neither instinct, but mainly by rationality, and therefore they feel superior to animals, but equal with all humans. Unfortunately, these will stay speculations forever, as I have no way of finding any evidence.
4. I know, that as a meateater, I would not be suitable for the moral requirements of an ethical vegetarian. As much as I would be willing to please him by not eating meat in his presence, I would just not feel any intrinsic inhibitions to eat meat in his absence and without his knowledge. This would be a transgression in regard to his morals.
I usually know, what are transgressions in other people's attitude, even when they are not in my own. But a jerk does not even know, what are transgressions and that he is not suitable for a woman like me.
I have the double task to be aware of who is not suitable for me, and for whom I am not suitable. Jerks do not care, if they hurt a woman, so it is obvious that it is my own task to avoid them. But many men, who are no jerks, overlook incompatibility or have the concept, that when they are infatuated, then tolerance can cope with incompatibility. So I have to avoid them too.
I have the double task to be aware of who is not suitable for me, and for whom I am not suitable. Jerks do not care, if they hurt a woman, so it is obvious that it is my own task to avoid them. But many men, who are no jerks, overlook incompatibility or have the concept, that when they are infatuated, then tolerance can cope with incompatibility. So I have to avoid them too.
