Walk Away if you Don't Like Scapegoating

Walk Away if You Don't Like Scapegoating

In the spirit of Omelas, we could have a lottery
where one of you gets selected (or else voted)
to be the F-Receiver, and then every one else
gets “A’s”—F-receiver standing for the scape
goat that carries away the burdens of all our
academic sins. 

An attractive notion: scapegoating.
 
Would that be fair? Just?  Or, in the same sense,
out of high principle and particular goodness,
we could heed the Call of God and burn Korans
as an act of righteousness --no matter the
consequences: a “good” deed.:
 
               **********
Happiness is what IT is all about, yes? The
greatest amount for the greatest number of
people? 
 
“Happiness is based on a just discrimination
of what is necessary,what is neither necessary
nor destructive, and what is destructive.” 
Ursula Le Guin  "The Ones Who Walked Away
from Omelas."
 
In between our shared sense of what  is necessary
on the one hand and our shared sense of what is
destructive on the other hand,  we could have a
good time: no one complaining,  crusading,
irritated to the point of proposing legislation.  
 
Assuming we could agree on what’s necessary
and what’s destructive.
 
The truth is: agreement is an impossibility.  We couldn’t
even agree that agreement is an impossibility. If we could,
we could make some progress.  
 
I call this “The Impossibility Pre-Requisite.” Possibility can
emerge as an emerging phenomenon, only if the parties
concerned can agree that it’s impossible.
 
But that, of course, is impossible. Do we agree? Then
possibilities arise once we agree they are impossible—
beyond our measurable aims and purposeful goals. .  
 
“The trouble is, that we have a bad habit
encouraged by pedants and sophisticates
of considering happiness as something
rather stupid. Only pain is intellectual.
Only evil is interesting.”
 
As pedant, if not sophisticate, I  agree with Ursula: pain
& evil are intellectually interesting seeing as they obscure
hap hap-ening hap-ily aka happiness which is always
“the given”: take  it or  leave it & I’m likely  to leave it
if it don’t suit my terms-of-desire and so un-happy is the
dominant paradigm.

This makes pain & evil & the impossibility of their annihilation
interesting to the intellectual. Academic.

Pray for a smoke free campus.
A pure, uncontaminated environment.

Best, Sam