It is a complicated time to be alive; here in South Africa, the structures of political power are in a state of extreme flux. Our former president, Jacob Zuma recently stepped down from office to be replaced by Cyril Ramaphosa, a man renowned for his entrepreneurial success and his skill as a negotiator.
Many South Africans see Ramaphosa's appointment as a step in the right direction, something which may steer the nation away from a gradual decline into tribalism and chaos. However, being the natural cynic that I am, I have yet to feel a surge of patriotic joy. The African National Congress remains top dog and as far as I'm aware, its aims and policies (many of which are the cause of the gradual decline I mentioned) have not changed.
Further afield in the land of red white and blue, Donald Trump continues to contend with his position as leader of the free world in his brash and bombastic style. Love Trump or loathe him, it's no understatement to say that he is perhaps the most divisive leader in modern American history. His election (in my opinion, at least) was a direct result of ordinary Americans constantly being told by the likes of Hillary Clinton and scores of the Hollywood elite that their very existence is racist, oppressive, patriarchal and any of an ever-growing list of buzzwords that ends in "phobic".
In the wake of such a monumental shift, you'd think the acolytes of social justice would have paused to take a breath and consider how it all came to this. Quite the contrary though, their constant virtue signalling has only become more intense. We've now reached a point where celebrities spark witch-hunts against their own under the guise of social media movements like #MeToo. In criticising this, I am not trying to defend or excuse rape or sexual assault, but it seems to me that all hashtag campaigns like this actually do is compromise the value of due process and fair trials in favour of a loud and vicious mob, desperate to see blood in the streets.
Being a wheelchair-bound quadriplegic, my life has been marked by isolation and solitude, which has in a sense, given me an almost monastic existence. (That is, if monks were allowed to binge-watch Netflix and entertain deeply inappropriate fantasies about Elvira, Mistress of the Dark.)
This has given me a lot of time to ponder the human condition and just what the point of it all might be. I was raised as what could be called a "cultural Christian" and except for a rebellious atheist phase in my early teens, I do believe that there is a greater force than us in the universe. Having reached the ripe old age of 27 though, I've come to doubt the rigid traditional concepts of heaven and hell. They seem overly materialistic somehow, too human to be convincing.
The question, then, is this:
How does one derive purpose or meaning from a life beset by struggle and suffering?
The answer, as far as I can currently see is that we should try to live in a way that's beneficial not only to ourselves, but to those around us and our communities at large. This realisation is in stark opposition to the vapid, self-congratulatory spirit that currently holds sway and I didn't reach it alone.
Search the mainstream media for information about Canadian psychologist, Dr Jordan B. Peterson and you'll see him labelled anything from a paranoid conspiracy theorist to a far-right extremist. In truth, he is a profound and thoughtful professor with decades of clinical and academic experience in the study of the human psyche. Some time ago, Peterson saw how rabid political correctness had begun to encroach upon individual freedom and resolved to speak out against it. This choice brought him international fame (or infamy, depending on who you ask). Peterson is knowledgeable on a wide array of subjects, but the core of his teachings suggest that instead of searching for happiness, which so many of us have been told is life's ultimate goal, we should conceive of the highest possible good and then shoot for it.
In striving toward a useful ideal, real meaning can be found.
