o far, along the fairly uneventful path to my ultimate end, I’ve found that most beings I’ve met have
mastered the subtle—or sometimes not so subtle—art of classification
. People have boldly asserted to me or others that I’m an atheist, a
cynic, a misanthrope, a pessimist, a humanist, a communist, a conservative, a pantheist, a liberal, a philosopher, a dreamer, a Buddhist, a nihilist,
a feminist, a Canadian, an artist, a lumberjack, a surfer, a westerner, and so on and so on. The list would go on forever—or at least until there
weren’t any words left to describe me. But when I reflect on my seemingly multi-faceted persona, I become completely aware that these labels do not
define me at all, and to arrive at a conclusion of “what I am” would be utterly impossible.
The very concept of the label—some sort of name tag that identifies or defines who I am, as if I was a product of some assembly line, or some
abstract idea—is absolutely absurd. The Aristotelean logic involved in deciding whether I am either this or that, either A or B or either A or not
A, is completely ridiculous. How does one decide what he is when he’s varying degrees of all things? I am both A and B. I am both A and not A. I am
not white or black, but varying degrees of both and many colors. I am not man or animal, but varying degrees of both. I am not hot or cold, but
somewhere in between. I am everything.
I have to chuckle when someone declares: “this is what I am!” like he’s ready to become a martyr and die for a flag, a mere classification. He
would die for an idea
, a fleeting thought, simply because he has the sheer arrogance to believe he is
this classification. An American
will call himself an American because he resides within the boarders of America. He will give up his entire being and kill other beings to protect
those boarders, those lines someone once drew on a map. An atheist will get in heated battles defending the completely intangible atheist banner, even
if he shares some of the values that christians and muslims do. We are immodest and stupid to believe our own fundamental lie: “this is what I
I understand that classification has its utility. It enables others to turn you into something less abstract and chaotic for the purposes of their own
understanding. They vivisect your personality and label all of the pieces. Then they sew you back together into some frankenstein of your former self.
You become something fragmented to them, something not real; and with your labels you are bestowed all of the baggage they come with, as if you were
guilty by association.
If you make the mistake of believing these identifiers, or worse yet you become your own label, immediately stop and reflect. You aren’t your
labels, you are an unclassifiable ambiguity to which no one has the right to distinguish—not even yourself.
Are you a defender of your labels?
edit on 25-5-2012 by LesMisanthrope because: (no reason given)