By Paul Weiser
It's often said that modern society - or just modernity in general - manifests a death wish. This is surely true at some level, if only poetically; the question is, to what degree is the wish real?
On the surface, modernity seems to assume or demand eternal life, not death. This shows in the way spoiled moderns insist that anything threatening their continued existence, be it AIDS, cancer, salmonella or their SUVs turning over when they corner too fast, must be someone's fault or negligence... never one of the thousand mortal stings to which all flesh is heir, and surely not a foreseeable consequence of their own hazardous behavior. To admit death is inevitable - that all the vaccines, doctoring, and lawsuits can't ultimately prevent it - exposes the void of nihilism over which modernity is built, this gaudy bridge with no destination.
Much of modernity - abortion, contraception, welfare, Social Security and the like - actively seeks to evade responsibility. But responsibility is life, is the consequence of living and, more significantly, its goal. To have purpose is to have goals for the achievement of which you are responsible, be they successful children, unforced charity, dignified retirement or death with courage. None of these can be achieved without taking responsibility.
To evade responsibility, then, is to evade life - but is this evasion the actual pursuit of death? It is surely the pursuit of non-life (the mere semblance of life, its sensations and glamors rather than life itself). But perhaps the whole content of modernity is meant to deal with its great discovery, the void after God, by means of this imitation of life: a third way beyond life and death. If so, the attempt must - despite its glitter and ingenuity - be judged a failure... suicide, it's true, but suicide by derangement rather than intent.
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