One of my guilty pleasures is a film called Mystery Men. It is about a group of misfits trying to be superheroes. I could bend words and views and try to find some deep philosophical reasons for it but there really isn’t one, it is just fun. Any movie that has a man dressed in his mothers drapes throwing silverware at bad guys limits itself greatly on the philosophical front. With that said it does offer an unintended truth about society in its subtext. The group goes to a pacifist weapons expert for help. He shows them his storehouse of non violent weapons and one of the most powerful is the Blame Thrower. It causes people to uncontrollably blame others for everything that goes wrong rather than accept responsibility for there own faults. It was a brilliant idea that focused everyone on others and away from themselves eventually causing nothing but fighting and worthless bickering.
Blame is a vile and contemptible beast that we let into our homes on a regular basis. We feed it and groom it to try and make it healthy and remove the stench but no matter how hard we try, it festers and spreads rot through anything it touches. It is utterly useless and yet we bring it out so often it becomes our go to tool. It becomes easier and easier the more we use it. It is the weapon of choice yet proves the one who yields it is missing the very thing needed to hold a weapon, discipline.
We blame the government for the condition of the country and yet don’t actively interact with our political leaders or even vote for real change. We blame the church for the evils it has done for trying to control and contain our lives rather than actually understanding the truth it offers and deciding if we want to be part of it. We blame religious leaders for the hypocrisy in their lives without addressing the hypocrisy in our own. We blame our parents for not giving us what we needed rather than looking at what we need as really what we want. We blame ourselves for what we see rather than accepting ourselves for who we are and changing what we don’t like. We use blame as a four letter word. We need change, not blame.
The desire is to create a false equality in ability so we can effectively blame another for not doing it our way. This is the beginning of the problem. I do not like everything Obama does. I can guarantee that if I were given all the information he has I would not answer the exact same way he does because I am a different person. But I don’t have all the information he does so claiming my answers are right and his wrong is ludicrous. I do not agree with everything the Pope says. I do think my background and training are enough to argue my points against his. I am pretty sure though that he has done a lot of work and study to reach his conclusions so discounting them and blaming him for the current condition of the Church is disrespectful and hubris unless I am able to interact with him and sway him to my view. This is hard work though and most blamers will no want to put the time in to do that because it is easier to sit on the sidelines and complain. Sitting on the fence is the best place to throw rocks at both sides but in order to balance, it does require a fence plank be lodged in a very uncomfortable place.
Truth is not an abstract concept that changes. It can not, if it did, it would no longer be true. It is not malleable and formed by perspective. It is not yours for your view and mine for mine. It is the standard that all things are judged by. No matter how much this is distasteful at times, it is still fact. It can be concealed however. If we do not recognize that, we will be left with false comparisons and false dichotomies. No matter how eloquent we speak, without knowledge equal to another persons on a given subject, we can not speak in the same light as them and if we have that knowledge, we should still only speak with love and respect. Blame never reaches those areas.
If our desire is to merely stir the pot and cause more problems, blame is a real good tool. If we really care however and want to help fix the problems, blaming people merely makes us a tool. It is certainly easier to say no one has a handle on truth, religion is wrong, things change, so just sit back and relax. We can blame everyone who disagrees and brand them haters and intolerant. That is the surest way however to find destruction. Each person has value from where they come from. Missing that because we are too busy to look is a fast way to a bad end.
Blame is a worthless endeavor and better off forgotten. I hold to the old Japanese proverb. Fix the problem, not the blame.
the christian philosopher 