The 'Death of God'
Posted by Erin on November 05, 1997 at 21:55:57:
In response to Parry***without all the italics, written by Cassia on November 05, 1997 at 18:33:27
Hil: (snip) Passion isn't really dead, is it?
Cassia: (snip) Passion isn't so easily pigeonholed. Nor is passion love, or work or anything we dare compare it with. It is its own thing and it is overwhelming.
Which is mostly the reason it is so terrifying. The great fear anymore seems to be the fear of losing control. We don't want to know that life can push us around and make us dance to a tune we haven't called. We have grown so determinst that the notion an emotion or illnes or even death is not at our beck and call nearly paralyzes the Western psyche. What is the use of something that once set in motion you cannot control? What is the use of something you cannot buy and sell or make turn a profit? Passion cannot be labeled good or bad. Passion can build and destroy in the same instant. Passion simply is. Like a lurker outside the house it waits but if truly not wanted it will not enter but it doesn't guarantee not to touch before leaving. The touch can tear the soul to shreds. The only guarantee passion makes is that you will feel.
Your statements, Cassia, reminded me of that infamous phrase of Nietzsche's from Thus Spoke Zarathustra (itself a prophetic critique of modernity). He's not referring to the actual death of a higher being. Instead he's pointing to the demise of the 'idea' of God as a starting point, an absolute ground of morality, meaning and significance for society. The end results in a vacuum of meaning, a relativism where things have little or no value.
In this way, the lack of (or sentimentalizing of) passion is indicative of a certain nihilism, where 'care' (a fundamental feature of passion) is negated. Our ethical (ie., what we value) climate does not provide for it. We are too safe. But, in spite of all the Prozac we take, we cannot hide from that which is fundamental to us, to our nature. It will manifest itself in one way or another.
I apologize for taking this post out of the context of the discussion of Possession. I wish my current circumstances had permitted me to read along. But I've been following it in bits and pieces --all of you are conducting this wonderfully.
Erin
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