There’s no profit in impartiality, so there is none. If Republicans cheat, only Democrats complain—since they are partisan, they are not believed. If a football team cheats, only their opponents complain—they are partisan, and again, for that reason, not believed. Cheating does not have to hide. Since every wrong has only partial opposition, every wrong triumphs. We all walk about, consciously, helplessly, hopelessly deceived.
When you love someone, and they love you, dare to tell them they cannot love another. You can’t. Your claims to ownership will chase them away. But claims or not, you cannot make them stay. In the middle of the greatest intimacy possible, the subjective—another’s, not your own—has sway.
Objectivity—in which the simple truth of the matter is seen—belongs not to us. We call intelligence and science that which comes closest to objective truth, even as its very agents are lost in mazes of subjectivity. Agreement of many is no proof of objectivity; it only increases belief that a certain degree of objectivity may have been achieved.
But just when we feel that subjectivity is all—and in the young and game-worthy it is all—it makes perfect sense to allow that what is objective is not only true in its objectivity (reality exists as all, for all, for all time) but true in every clue it leaves subjectively—impartiality does exist, then, and its feeble or partial manifestation is no proof against it. Indeed, the partial and the feeble belong to subjectivity, which, in our despair, or our ignorance, takes on an exaggerated importance. When, instead of being wary of the partial, we celebrate it, we fall prey to that subjective state which thrives on intoxication, ignorance, hostility, and fear. Protecting ourselves, we ignore a great deal—this is natural, but we mustn’t let our protection become an ignorant prison.
The partisan position, a kind of subjective shortcut to a certain kind of objectivity, is a social phenomenon, an alliance based mostly on feelings and arbitrary ties; it defies the impartial and the objective, and yet seeks to join with others, that it might gain an advantage either for itself or its group, a group symbolic of itself, and so finally, subjective. If one identifies with the oppressed, as far as that identity goes, one is oppressed—for otherwise the identity were impossible—so all partisanship is selfish, no matter how unselfish the cause itself might be.
The subjective, then, is simply what we travel through to reach objective truth; the subjective is the navigating vessel—to revel in the subjective is to lose our way. The subjective, in fact, is an illusion, it really just being partial truth, which we mistake for ourselves. True, we are partial. The subjective is our condition—but not ourselves. The soul of each one of us is that which travels through the condition of partiality, but is not that partiality itself, but rather the whole to which we—in our present, subjective state—aspire.
But why should we “aspire” to the “whole?” Isn’t this just a bunch of absolutist poppycock? What’s wrong with reveling in the subjective? Isn’t this finally more honest? More pleasurable?
The “whole” refers to what is outside the prison, to the wider view, to whatever leads to greater impartiality and selflessness. The subjective is merely the impediment to the wider vision; the subjective has no existence in terms of ourselves. To “revel” in subjectivity is merely akin to intoxication, that pleasure which comes from dehydrating brain cells, closing down the senses, a defensive and temporary posture against worldly pain.
Those who believe the subjective is real are those who believe in those nooks and crannies to which the confused soul may find respite and escape: hiding places, dreams, addictions, clandestine movements, pedantic obscurity, quirks and quibbles, cult obedience, excessive behavior, insanity, obsessions, the fiendish or the forbidden.
The direction of science and art since Descartes has been towards faith in subjectivity (the person of sense) and away from objectivity (universal law).
Reality, however, is the final arbitrator. To examine the partial clues of the greater whole is useful, and the modern method is yet in service to the impartial, the objective, and the universal, just as to embrace the absolute, the universal, and the objective with both arms is to hold what falls apart, what dissolves, putting the lover in despair, who boldly searches for love—love which contains the secrets of love—forever.
