Tuesday, May 10, 2011

Goodwill not enough

Tue Jan 29, 2002 9:49 pm

The strong conviction you sense about my ideal is mostly applicable to my world view and how I perceive it ought to be (that is the easy part).

On a personal level, I retain all the awkwardness, hesitation and uncertainty in dealing with life itself -- as it should be if I were to remain real and human. When interacting personally, tolerance and compassion should
be prime consideration. I just find it hard to extrapolate into an effective legislative function. Until the quality of our nature elevates to relatively uniform ideals, the tie that bonds a society can only be based on the lowest
common self-interest.

Ironically, if once we all achieve that high level of altruism, the need for law for order shall naturally diminish. Anyone who accepts that we need rules of conduct in a society is also admitting to the fact that in the gathering of men goodwill alone is not enough.

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