Pessimists, Cynics & Misanthropes

Pessimists, Cynics & Misanthropes

In his irrationality he inflicts his blind scorn upon the entire race of which he is an instance, and thereby becomes what he himself hates—a turncoat, a sell-out, a resigner, a betrayer. How can one trust a man who betrays his kind? And worse, how can one trust a man who betrays himself? Seeking an answer, the misanthrope fails to reason—refuses to reason—finds solace in his hatred as would any addict in his addiction, and banishes himself from the race of which he is still physically, psychologically and naturally an instance. He is a shell, a hypocrite without a taste for the world, too weak to find or even create what he longs for, which still lies hidden in the very reason he chooses to continue living.

Reality teaches that it is all too easy to become a cynic in this world where around every corner lies another disappointment, another lie, or at least, another failure. But to the ignorance of the cynic, the lens of cynicism and misanthropy distorts when it is contemplated through, and leads one to not account for the chaos and uncertainty of the world, where one will still find the seemingly trace amount of documented instances through which humanity cannot be hated. Of course, this is noise to the cynic—noise that for some reason is not heard, even ignored. No; the microscopic fraction of people stepping outside of their own desires to help another achieve their own—a rarity indeed, yet which can be found in all races, all creeds and in all parts of the globe—are too insignificant in number to affect the conviction of our malicious friend the cynic, who through his blanketing contempt despises even them, those who cannot be rationally despised, and even himself as the tasteless despiser. There has yet to be a better example of someone offending himself in such a strange orbit of self-contempt.

Of course, in time, his contempt leads him to further folly and perhaps even harm. With his sweeping generalizations he risks betraying himself, the worse kind of betrayal, maybe becoming drastic enough to find even suicide a way out from this self-inflicted, self-induced pain. What stupidity! What folly! And a damned shame. Instead, this sort of pessimism is just as foul as that overly-sweetened and deadly optimism, the seductive “everything is for the best” of Voltaire’s Pangloss—all in vain, and all vanity.

Oh and how the misanthrope despises vanity, ironically because it offends his own. He is a parody and caricature of someone with intelligence, but nothing other than an example of a man offending himself, who, in his very culture, has produced an image of himself that does more harm than good, one cultivated in unbeknownst and abstract error.

Error exists only in hindsight and is as fleeting as a distant flock of birds. But there is no error in what we are becoming, is there? Each success and failure contribute to what we are; and there can be no error in what we are, for nature is never mistaken. Only when the cynic reasons this to himself, finds the beauty in every misstep and stumble along the path that every human walks, and sees the necessity of his own folly, his own vanity, his own desires, his own irony, his own evil, will he cease to be the cynic any longer, curse lifted. If the misanthrope survives his misanthropy, and instead goes beyond it rather than entrapped by it, folly becomes success, and misanthropy and pessimism and cynicism become mountains one has scaled.

reply to post by Aphorism


...You should write my biography. You have the poetic talents to accurately cast my character in literary format.

The understanding and acceptance of the nature of humans, good and bad, is an important step forward into letting go of all that gunk and balancing oneself. It is then that the glass is both half empty and half full.

reply to post by InTheLight


Given that every molecule in and of the glass is 99% empty space, it can be argued that the glass is an illusion, thereby rendering half full and half empty two different ways of looking at the same lie. I guess the tie-breaker is what you choose to do with the glass and its contents.

reply to post by AfterInfinity

...You should write my biography. You have the poetic talents to accurately cast my character in literary format.

However, for sh*ts and giggles, I'd probably not portray you so accurately.

reply to post by InTheLight

The understanding and acceptance of the nature of humans, good and bad, is an important step forward into letting go of all that gunk and balancing oneself. It is then that the glass is both half empty and half full.

I'm just grateful to have a vessel in which to place things.

Aphorism
reply to post by InTheLight

 

The understanding and acceptance of the nature of humans, good and bad, is an important step forward into letting go of all that gunk and balancing oneself. It is then that the glass is both half empty and half full.

I'm just grateful to have a vessel in which to place things.

Ah, to be able to count one's blessings is a great beginning to living a positive and successful life.

Imaginary or not, from an engineering stand point the glass was twice the size needed to begin with. OP, Very well written, I enjoyed it and found it interesting.