I had an interesting dinner conversation, and thought that I might share it with all of you. It was fun to discuss, hopefully it will be fun to read. Maybe you can shed some light on the subject.
Kyle
So let me process your words slowly, so that none of your stupidity slips through the neurological cracks. You are staying faithful in the face of temptation? A sculpted Adonis is knocking at your door and you treat him like a Jehovah’s Withess with swine flu?
Victoria
I’m in a committed relationship. What can I do? Two years ago I got drunk and kissed a boy at a party, and I called Samuel up the next morning and told him everything. It was horrible. I felt horrible. I’ll never do anything like that again.
Kyle
Why did you feel horrible? Was the source of your grief truly that you caused your adolescent boyfriend pain? Or was it that you felt ill toward yourself?
Victoria
It’s true. I felt like such a slut; like a really poor specimen of human being. I knew that what I was doing was wrong, and I did it anyway. I was actively immoral.
Kyle
Let me ask you something. If I were to, say, kill that waitress that spilled your tea, would that be wrong?
Victoria (laughing)
Maybe not terribly wrong.
Kyle
But in the conceivable universe, what is the absolute worst thing that I could possibly do? Let’s say I became the ruler of a country, threw the world into war, and launched a campaign of genocide that would kill 100 million people. That would be pretty bad. It’s hard to imagine myself ever obtaining that kind of influence, but it isn’t in the realm of pure fantasy. After all, there are always despots. Someone has to fulfill the role. Why not me?
Victoria
Okay, so let’s say you become like Stalin or Hitler or Mao. I get it, cheating isn’t as bad as that but…
Kyle
DON’T rush me. So I rise to power, and kill millions. So what?
Victoria
So what?
Kyle
Let’s go back to the waitress. I kill her. Maybe I get caught, maybe I don’t. The world keeps on spinning, and no one will remember either of us within a decade or two. Fifty years tops. In a very short period of time, relatively speaking, it will be as though nothing ever happened. In fact, there were probably millions of murdered waitresses, all documented and witnessed, over the last century that no one will think of ever again.
Victoria,
So basically you’re saying that something really bad like killing that woman won’t matter in the near future.
Kyle
In a way. Let’s go back to Kyle the Tyrant. I reign, I terrorize, I die of cancer or coup de’etat. Let me ask you something. Have you ever heard of Hong Xiuquan?
Victoria
No, who is Hong Xiuquan?
Kyle
The leader of the Taiping Rebellion in China, one hundred and fifty years ago. Twenty-five million people died violent, horrible deaths at the hands of this man, who thought that he was Jesus’ younger brother.
Victoria,
You’ve gotta be kidding me.
Kyle
I absolutely am not. And it wasn’t all that long ago. One hundred and fifty years. It was around that time Los Angeles was established as a city. Twenty-five million deaths, and the entire fiasco is nearly completely erased. The Chinese don’t teach it in their textbooks. We don’t teach it in our textbooks. In another hundred years there will be 200 academics worldwide who will even recognize the name.
Victoria
I had no idea! Jesus’s younger brother?
Kyle
Yeah, long story. But wartime bloodshed is boring. Let’s look at something more fun. Human sacrifice. We don’t do it as much anymore. Although in Northern India it’s estimated that four children are sacrificed per year. Usually they’re tied down and boiling oil is poured over their bodies. But you’ve never heard of that. Neither had I, until I actively wanted to know if anyone was being re-gifted back to the gods these days.
But not too long ago, about 500 years, after Columbus had already landed, the Aztecs sacrificed 18,000 people in one ceremony. They would march the victims to the top of the pyramid, hold them down, cut out their heart, and hold it in the air while it was still beating.
And when we think back on that gruesome, bloody day, do we exclaim “Oh no! They killed Xitalli! Not Xitalli! He was history’s best bartender!” We have ZERO emotional attachment to ANY of those people.
And 500 years from now, ZERO people will have ANY emotional connection to us. To anything we said, did, or thought. And if by some miracle one of us turns out to be the next Mozart or Kandinski, all one needs to do is extend the timeline! Extend that timeline enough and no one is safe. Not you, or I, or Mozart, or Kandinsky, or even Shakespeare. There will come a time when either no one will remember Shakespeare, or there will be no one left to remember Shakespeare.
So if there is some small, insignificant action that will make YOU happy, then sink your teeth into it. If this new guy who you can’t stop drooling over will give you sixty orgasms by the end of the semester, don’t make too big of a sacrifice to some nebulous, subjective moral imperative that doesn’t care about you. Think of morality as a neglectful parent.
And don’t worry so much about causing pain to your insignificant other back in Oklahoma. If he never knows, it can’t hurt him. And if it doesn’t hurt you, he’ll never know. And after you have turned to dust, no one will think any better or any worse of you based on your treatment of your first boyfriend.
Victoria
I’m still not going to do it.
Kyle
Yeah, it would be a bitchy thing to do.
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