Comments on: On Courage

By: anon

anon — Wed, 17 Nov 2010 04:24:59 +0000

The urge for destruction is also a creative urge – Michael Bakunin

Whose to say burning the work would not have been an artistic act in itself?

Would it not “ultimately reflect a profound truth about the ephemeral nature of ideas” in the face of humanity’s more destructive natural “elements”?

It is precisely the act of destruction that forms the key to the liberation of the human spirit from passivity…

The beauty of the carnevalesque is that, for a brief period of time, our socially constructed ideologies about power, property, and even “art”, are challenged and overthrown…

By: Anonymous

Anonymous — Wed, 06 Oct 2010 19:27:31 +0000

I can think of an instance when I did not speak up, and the person most affected was me—I lost respect for myself. A friend whom I admired very much invited me to join him and some of his friends for dinner in Montreal. We drove up together and sometime during the evening, they began telling really horrid, racist jokes, which they appeared to find hilarious. The jokes were mean, and even if no one else heard them, I think they were damaging, just by their existence.

I was miserable. I hated these people; I was stuck with them until I got home. But, I said nothing. I did not ask them to stop; I did not pull my friend aside and tell him how offensive it was. I just endured.

I never told him how I felt. I just quit associating with him. So, I lost the opportunity to demonstrate integrity and perhaps to educate others. I’ve asked myself why I was so uncourageous. I hope I would do things differently now.

By: Tim

Tim — Tue, 05 Oct 2010 17:05:05 +0000

This is a great post, thanks. Bravery can obviously happen in dramatic, public situations like the one described here. But as important are the small acts of courage that take place every day, in the ways we treat each other, and the standards we set: call them acts of private integrity. If we decide that we want to live in a community that’s built on mutual respect, we are required not only to provide that respect ourselves, but also to make it clear to others when we feel they are not doing so. The good news is that, usually, you don’t even have to raise your voice. But you do need to make sure they hear what you have to say.