The Hypocrisy of “Consideration”…

T

o understand why we are so blind to our own enslavement as adults, we need to understand how we are first enslaved as children.

As always, our enslavement begins with moral

hypocrisies inflicted upon us by those in authority.

Parents will always call us

“selfish” if we fail to act on the basis of

their

emotional preferences.

If your mother

wants to talk to you, and you do not want to talk to her, then you are “selfish” if you choose not to talk to her.

This is a mad moral

mythology which is utterly unraveled by a moment’s thought.

We are taught

“consideration” not as a mere

personal

preference on the part of our parents, but rather as an objective and absolute moral principle.

If

“consideration for the feelings of others” is thus such an axiomatic and universal moral value, then clearly it

must

at least apply equally to both parents and their adult children.

“

It is

good

to be sensitive to the feelings of others,” sayeth our parents. “It is

bad

to perform actions which cause unhappiness in others.”

We swallow this as a moral

absolute – and thus feel guilt whenever we violate this principle.

The Key to the Cell

Ah, but if “consideration” is in fact a universal principle, a moral absolute,

then it binds our parents as surely as it binds us

.

So…

If it is

bad

to cause discomfort in other people, and you feel discomfort when your mother calls, surely, when you tell her about your discomfort,

she should feel bad, and want to change her behaviour

.

If your mother

apologizes for her lack of consideration, asks you what would make you feel better, then you can rest assured that she did not inflict the moral principle of “consideration” in order to control and bully you, but rather because she genuinely wanted you to be good – and that she knew all about goodness, because she practised moral behaviour

herself

.

When you report your discomfort to your mother

, what do you think she will

really

do?

You already know the answer, because you have not told her the truth.

If your brother constantly lectures you about the need for financial responsibility – and mocks and berates you whenever you use a credit card or spend “too much” – how do you feel when he borrows money from you, and then avoids you when the time comes for repayment?

What is thus revealed about your brother’s use of the term

“responsibility“?

Did he inflict negative judgments on you because he genuinely understands the value of responsibility

through his own personal practice of it?

Or – did he inflict negative judgments on you because he is a self-righteous hypocrite who uses the word

“responsibility” to control and demean other people?

You know everything you need to know –

if you want to stop being a slave, you just need to stop avoiding your knowledge

.

Testable Hypocrisy?

Perhaps you disagree with me, though, and say that you do not know the answers to these questions.

No problem!

I think we can certainly agree that it is important to know the answer to the question, “Was ‘morality’ used to control and demean me?”

If you genuinely believe that you lack answers to these questions, the test is embarrassingly simple – and reveals everything we need to know about what we already in fact know.

If your mother tells you that you should pick up the phone because you are supposed to be “considerate,” and not create negative feelings in her, how do you think she will react when you tell her the truth about the negative feelings that

she

is creating in

you?

When you tell your mother

that you feel a strong desire to avoid her phone calls, will she apologize for her own lack of sensitivity towards your feelings?

Will she ask you to tell her more about how you feel, so that you can get to the root of the issue, so that you can end up with a better experience of your relationship

?

Will she ask you when you first experienced these emotions

towards her?

Will she patiently support you as you peel back layer after layer of negative experience, which resulted in your desire to avoid her calls?

There is absolutely no possibility that she will do that.

None whatsoever.

Not a shred of a chance.

It will never, ever happen.

It is functionally, logically and emotionally completely and totally impossible.

How can I be so confident?

Do I know your mother?

No, but I know

philosophy

.

This is why it is impossible.

The Impossibility of Adult Reciprocity

If your mother

were to take this course of action when you admitted your desire to avoid her calls – if she were to be truly curious about the root causes of your negative feelings – she would have a great challenge on her hands.

She would have an impossible time explaining one simple thing.

 

Why has she never known how you feel?

 

Since the roots of your desire to avoid your mother

go back many, many years, how is it possible that your mother has

no idea

that she was inflicting any kind of negative experience upon you?

There are really only two ways that this could have come about.

Your mother

knew

that you were not having any fun in the relationship – and utterly ignored that reality for the sake of her own needs – which scarcely supports the theory that she values “consideration for the feelings of others” as any sort of objective or universal value.

Alternatively, she can claim that she had

no idea

that you had not been enjoying your relationship with her for many, many years – which means that she took no real interest in your true feelings, or rejected you if and when you honestly told her how you felt in the past.

Naturally, since we do prefer to tell the truth to each other, she must also be able to explain why you felt it necessary to hide your negative experiences from her.

Now, if your mother took no interest in your true feelings throughout the history of your relationship, it becomes very hard for her to argue that “consideration for the feelings of others” is a great virtue, since we generally do not enjoy it when other people who claim to love us take no interest in our feelings – in fact, that is a

horrible

experience.

Furthermore, I can completely guarantee that if you take no interest in your mother

’s feelings, she will be very hurt and upset – and possibly attack you to boot!

Thus, if she claims that she had no idea that you were having any kind of negative experiences in relation to her, then clearly she was taking no interest in your feelings. Since that is behaviour that both angers and upsets

her

, she is openly revealed as a multi-decade complete and total hypocrite who used moral arguments to control, manipulate and subjugate you to satisfy her own narcissistic needs.

In other words, she was a total bitch and a contemptible hypocrite.

Sort of a deal-breaker for anyone with any self-esteem.

Now, if you did genuinely end up hiding your feelings from your mother

– which allows her to claim that she did not know what they were – there is only one reason

why

you would have done that.

You did that because your mother

rejected what you truly felt – and attacked you for your feelings as well.

It is very hard for someone to argue that you should be considerate towards other people’s feelings, while rejecting and attacking the feelings that you have if they are inconvenient or negative to that person.

It would be the same as me arguing that you should always pay back your debts, no matter what the hardship – and then, after borrowing money from you, criticizing you for being “cheap” when you had the temerity to ask me to repay the loan.

It would be a sickening, stomach-turning display of bottomless and manipulative hypocrisy

.

If your mother

were to admit any of these things, she would be revealed as a horrendous and destructive person who plied you with “moral” lies in order to exploit you for her own narcissistic needs

based on your very desire to be a good child and please her

.

Using false moral

arguments to exploit children based on their desire to be good is the very core of corruption and evil.

Following the Maternal Benefit

Let us “follow the benefit” in this case as well.

If your mother

is this type of person, then remaining obedient to her wishes is to be enslaved to corruption.

Clearly, identifying your mother

as corrupt and manipulative – if that is what she is – benefits

you

enormously.

Who, though, does it

not

benefit?

Why, your

mother

of course!

This is what I mean when I say that slavery is defined as

the avoidance of the knowledge that you are a slave

.

Slavery is also defined as the desire for passive revenge upon your masters.

And this is why we lie to them, and pretend to feel what we do not feel, and refuse to be honest about what we do feel.

Self-delusion is the lie that is always inflicted upon masters by their slaves

.

Freedom from slavery is nothing more – or less – then a commitment to honesty

, which is also a letting go of the desire for vengeance.