Moral ambivalence

In this world, we must know how to climb the corporate ladder, even if it means stepping on someone else's neck

There is no doubt in my mind that I am full of doubts. Full of questions. Like how do we acquire self-consciousness? Are numbers real? I know there are trees in the forest even when I am not looking at them but are the trees just things-in-themselves (Kant’s ding an sich) which suddenly become identifiable as 1, 2, 3, and so on only when observed by an observer? What about negative numbers? What kind of matter is “dark matter”? What happens to my dream when I open my eyes — are the electro-chemical reactions and electrical impulses that cause my dreams to appear in my sleep get deactivated in one part of my brain and get reactivated in a different part of my brain — let’s say the prefrontal cortex? Is it all, to borrow from Shakespeare, much ado about nothing? By the way, what is nothing?

What about moral ambivalence? Imagine, for a moment, a world where good and evil become indistinguishable from each other, where people lose all sense of what is right and what is wrong. A world where the Golden Rule — “treat others like you want to be treated” — is no more than a dictum as antiquated and outdated as the Stone Age. A world where morality is reduced to a few stories we no longer tell our children — stories about saints and sires — men of honesty and integrity — men we never find in real life. A world where greed, for lack of a better word, is good, as proclaimed by Gordon Gekko played by Michael Douglas in Wall Street. A world consumed by a rat race at all levels — social, corporate, and beyond. A world that inspires us not just to compete but to outcompete each other. A world infatuated with consumerism — the consumption of goods and services. A world that is a shopping paradise. A world where good becomes evil and evil becomes good. But where is this world? Let’s open our eyes — it’s right in front of us, all around us. It is the world we live in.

And in this world, we must know how to climb the corporate ladder, even if it means stepping on the neck of someone else along the way. It’s better to be a manipulative CEO of a company than an honest clerk or a schoolteacher. It’s better to have leverage and to use it to get things done. Cronyism and nepotism are valuable assets. It pays to have deep pockets. Doing and receiving favours, giving and receiving bribes, these are tools of survival in this competitive world. To live a more prosperous life, we must hide our income and assets to avoid paying taxes. Heck, it’s even better to have a secret account in a Swiss bank especially if I’m so powerful no one can dare touch me. And no one should have the audacity to point a finger at our parliamentarians, judges, civil bureaucrats, and military generals who receive lavish perks and privileges even if it means a majority of families in our beloved nation have no access to quality healthcare and education.

Let’s examine moral ambiguity which is personified in Joseph Conrad’s Heart of Darkness in which Kurtz is worshipped and adored by the natives in Africa for his magical powers, yet his ambition to amass wealth betrays his personal charisma that acts as a magnet. In Hamlet by Shakespeare, the melancholic Hamlet seeks to avenge his father’s murder, however his vengeful actions result in the death of innocent people. When it comes to Joker, the clown in Batman: The Dark Knight, the line between what is moral and immoral blurs and disappears. We enter a world of moral nihilism. An enigmatic grin, scars on his cheeks, a sadistic mind, fatal pranks, and no remorse for his actions. This, in short, is Joker. In the movie, Joker explains how he got the scars. “Wanna know how I got these scars? My father was a drinker and a fiend. And one night he goes crazier than usual. Mommy gets the kitchen knife to defend herself. He doesn’t like that. Not one bit. So — me watching — he takes the knife to her, laughing while he does it. Then he turns to me, and he says, ‘Why so serious, son?’ He comes at me with the knife. ‘Why so serious?’ He sticks the blade in my mouth. ‘Let’s put a smile on that face.’”

We too like Joker are scarred and bruised as a society. The question is: are we plagued by moral ambivalence or moral nihilism?

Published in The Express Tribune, February 16^th, 2023.

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