2 Things
Here are two things I don’t believe in, as I just told Ben:
1. That the phrase “the right thing” in the sense of “doing the right thing” means anything, or isn’t completely empty. I do believe this: that there is no such thing as “the right thing” that one can do.
2. That anything ever happens to anyone according to the strict adherence to the rules of some system. More specifically, the concept of “merit” in the sense of “meritocracy” is either also empty, or its true nature is deceptive. You will never get anything or anywhere by “playing by the rules” and “doing things the right way.” I don’t simply mean that you’ll just end up “ok,” “satisfactory” or in some good but not extraordinary position; I don’t mean that you have to “go the extra mile” in order to be “really, really” (as opposed to “plain-old”) successful. I mean that if you don’t play the shadow-game that each set of rules attempts to conceal but always carries with it, you’ll get exactly nowhere at all, not even to plain-old mediocre ok. There is a subtext, hidden clauses, spectral rules and regs–often visible on the surface only as traces, and made the clearest only through given processes by which we are initiated into the “secret knowledge” of a given system by the conscious and purposive intent of others–to everything we do, every system we insert ourselves into, every game we play. This goes for everything from collecting unemployment to getting into a PhD program to love to being the president of the world. There are no exceptions to the fact that the seemingly exterior non-rules that attend all formal or informal systems are anywhere from equally important to more important than the official line. This is what is meant by “playing the game,” and “the game,” unlike “the right thing” is absolutely real.