A few hours ago, a 15 year old boy was hit by a train a block from the local high school. The body was still on the tracks when my daughter and her mother passed through. Of course, such catastrophes in their thousand permutations will be repeated every few seconds on this planet. I mention this fact not to minimize the horror of this particular incident, but to heighten the reader's awareness of the universality of tragedy both in essence, and in the concomitant reverberations that will assuredly fan out and engulf those who love and care. Even now I await with dread the release of the child's name for fear that I knew him, or that my daughter knew him. But why should that matter? I know for a fact that for several people today, the sun has fallen from the sky, and may never return. That is enough, and too much.
To the parents and others with close emotional ties, I'm sorry. I wish I could make it better, but I can't. The best I can offer is my belief that he is now at peace. He's returned to where he came from, as all of us do, eventually. It may seem that his life was unfairly cut short; but remember, that's only from our perspective. For the child, all worry, all fear and pain have ceased to exist. He sleeps the most pleasant of all sleeps, untroubled by bad dreams, schedules, and anxiety about the future. His peace is pure, and will last forever.
Rest in peace, young man. I hope your short sojourn here was relatively pleasant.
15 comments:
Poor fellow, may he rest in peace. My condolence to your daughters, especially if he was a friend of theirs. I was working in R'side yesterday. Death is never far away.
I'm glad he didn't end up crippled/braindamaged
is it sad that i've visited this blog 100+ times in the last month or so?
Not to me; although maybe I need to update more frequently so you don't get bored!
My prime of youth is but a frost of cares,
My feast of joy is but a dish of pain,
My crop of corn is but a field of tares,
And all my good is but vain hope of gain;
The day is past, and yet I saw no sun,
And now I live, and now my life is done.
(Tichborne's elegy)
"For the child, all worry, all fear and pain have ceased to exist."
Shouldn't you apply the same logic on the other hand? He no longer experiences pleasure, hope, comfort either.
Anonymous:
My position hinges on the experiential deprivation of happiness. While a 'non-existent lifeform' may indeed be deprived of happiness, this is not a state which is actually experienced. Applying the inherent rhetorical logic of your question, it seems that we are also forced to mourn the lack of positive experiences of the infinitude of potential lifeforms which never existed.
I have a question, would anyone be interested in joining or contributing to an open wiki forum regarding antinatalism? I will organize it. I just wanted to see if antinatalism's biggest online consitutents were going to participate, to even bother making one. Would love to hear some feedback. If there are enough people that would want to participate, I will create it.
Hello? Anyone want to comment one way or another regarding the wikipage idea?
Antinatalism:
Sorry for the lack of reply; my plate's sort of full these days. Could you fill me in on what would be different between a wiki page and a regular blog? I've never been involved with one before.
I think a forum is a good idea, antinatalism. It could give us something to do while Jim works on his book and other things.
Ok, sorry I took so long. Here is the antinatalism wiki page: http://antinatalismforum.wikispaces.com/
Please please please edit participate and add to it as much as possible. We can use the discussion tab to coordinate the design and content. Bring as much material you want to the page and shape it however you wish. Everyone is invited to participate.
Metamorphhh,
There doesn't need to be an opening post in the antinatalistfourm wikispace. You can design it however you'd like. There is a line feature you can use to separate sections of the page. However, the best thing to do i think is have internal links. Wikis are good for allowing multiple pages within one wiki. But what do you think is the best way to utilize the wiki, and what should our ultimate goal be. I would like to use it as a way to attract more people to the cause. I invite you to change it around as you see fit. Play with it and see what happens. On that note, does anyone have good SEO skills. In other words, are there people here skilled at getting people to notice our sites? Can we link with bigger websites? Post in forums with our link on the bottom? There needs to be some way to get on google searches, and to get noticed by the broader public.
ok people, I tried to engage a broader public regarding antinatalism, so I went to yahoo answers. They posed some interesting rebuttals. I would any of the more philosophically inclined to go to this link and give me some suggestions on how to overcome these objections to my argument.
http://antinatalismforum.wikispaces.com/Overcoming+Objections
Please go here and press the edit tab and put your objections to their responses in the appropriate section after whichever response you are objecting to. Thank you! I hope this wiki idea works out!
Okay I know this is old, and I'm not trying to open old wounds. This particular incident came up for me weirdly this week though, twice. First my middle kid and I were talking and he told me about a conversation he had with the sister of the boy who passed it went to the affect of
Girl "Don't you hate it when people change how they talk about someone after they die?'
Son #2 "You mean like Michael Jackson?"
Then he said he realised who he was talking to, and just wanted to take the words back, but I said, why? Everyone is probably very kid gloves around her, you were just, I dunno, normal.
Tonight was back to school night, on the white board in one of the classrooms was tomorrow's schedule. There will be a train safety presentation tommorow.
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