Detective Martin Hart:
Do you wonder ever if you’re a bad man?
Detective Rustin Cohle:
No. I don’t wonder, Marty. World needs bad men. We keep the other bad men from the door.
The scene and the written dialog above is from Season 1 of True Detective. It’s one those inconvenient truths that when we are resting in our most idealized selves, we don’t want to believe. We don’t want to believe that the amazing freedoms that we have in our lives were sometimes hard won by people who were capable of doing things that we, ourselves, might not have it in us to do. It often comes down to the question, do the ends justify the means? And that’s a squirmy question.
I come from a family that has a lot of military veterans. So does my husband. I am proud of how much military service is in the history of my family. I remember, many years ago, getting into a heated discussion about something related to peace and war, during a book club meeting with another club member. Her background was that of a long history of academics and professors. I respected this member quite a bit. I considered her to be a friend and an interesting, thoughtful, intelligent woman. And I believe that she felt the same way about me. After making the whole book club feel immensely uncomfortable, we quieted down and we agreed to go out to eat together, and to talk about our different viewpoints further, with just each other. It was a nice dinner. It was civil. Nothing stands out about the conversation to me. Neither of us changed each other’s mind. But the friendship lasted. The mutual respect lasted. There were a lot of viewpoints that we completely agreed on, in different matters that we read about, in other books. We still exchange Christmas cards to this day.
I admittedly sometimes get into my woo-woo/yogi girl states of being, and I belt out John Lennon’s “Imagine All the People” at the top of my lungs, and I fervently wish that I could manifest this state of peace instantly for all of us. I don’t believe that there are many people in this world who don’t wish for peace and abundance for all. However sometimes, my romanticized, utopian view of the way things Should Be sometimes clouds my vision for truly seeing the way things are right now. And yes, I believe that we all can do our individual parts to “be the change that we want to see in the world”. (attributed to Gandhi and Joseph Ranseth) That’s really the best that any of us can do. And this “being the change” often looks like different things and different roles for different people.
We creative types love nuance. We love to see things in a different way and bring these “different ways” into fruition with our art and in our general ways of being. But sometimes we forget that looking at things “different ways” for other people, in other, more rigid, mechanical fields, other than that of the creative arts, can often be about having to make difficult, snap decisions between the lesser of two awful evils.
Perhaps instead of condemning others for their “stupidity” and their “war mongering”, we might be able to find some level of gratefulness for “the “bad” men who keep the other “bad” men from the door”, so that we are able to do our art, and our protests, and our comfortable day-dreaming about a utopian world where “bad men” don’t exist at all.
“The older I get, the less I know. By that I mean the less I am sure of. I view people with strong opinions on the big stuff with distrust. I don’t think we should have certain certainties on faith and politics; I think we should be open-minded.” _ Pam Ferris
Are you passing on love or are you passing on pain? Heal your pain and pass on love.
