Quote of the Week: Metropolitan Jonah
All the sins against humanity, abortion, euthanasia, war, violence, and victimization of all kinds, are the results of depersonalization. Whether it is “the unwanted pregnancy”, or worse, “the fetus” rather than “my son” or “my daughter;” whether it is “the enemy” rather than Joe or Harry (maybe Ahmed or Mohammed), the same depersonalization allows us to fulfill our own selfishness against the obstacle to my will. How many of our elderly, our parents and grandparents, live forgotten in isolation and loneliness? How many Afghan, Iraqi, Palestinian and American youths will we sacrifice to agonizing injuries and deaths for the sake of our political will? They are called “soldiers,” or “enemy combatants” or “civilian casualties” or any variety of other euphemisms to deny their personhood. But ask their parents or children! Pro-war is NOT pro-life! God weeps for our callousness.
–Metropolitan Jonah, Archpastoral Message for Sanctity of Life Sunday 2009.
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If I call someone a “soldier” or a “combatant” I’m not denying their personhood. This is a good illustration of how the attempt to analogize abortion and war fails in an awkward fumble of words.
If I call someone a “fetus” I am not denying their personhood either, am I?
Pauli,
Did you click and read the whole letter? It’s not long. He points out what he means before he says that by saying, “This, however, is the great temptation: to deny our personhood, by the depersonalization of those around us, seeing them only as objects that are useful and give us pleasure, or are obstacles to be removed or overcome.”
That’s the point, the use of the word “soldier” or even “fetus” objectifies the person, and reduces them to the contents of that word, instead of the person who they are, a subject of their own right.
I would also point out, it is not an ANALOGY which is going on here. What is being pointed is an issue of principle. The problem with many is that the culture of death has got to so many, they will say one thing for one issue, and a contradictory response in another issue, and not see the contradiction.
Henry, I just went back and read the entire letter. I think most of it is good except for the paragraph you cite which falls into kind of a moral equivalence. As horrible as war is, it’s not contradictory to see a difference between a soldier killing another soldier on the battlefield and a woman killing an innocent child. Good soldiers are well-aware that it’s a person they are firing at who probably has a name and a family.
Phosphorious, please; call me phœtus anytime, but make sure to get the spelling correct.
Henry,
Good quote! As I’m sure you are well aware, we also see the same depersonalization in other terms such as “illegal alien,” or “handicapped” as opposed to persons with disability or the equivalent.
Pauli,
You claim, Good solidiers are well-aware that it’s a person they are firing at who probably has a name and a family
David Nickol recently wrote a
comment which pretty clearly shows that American armed forces work hard hard to make sure that is not the case.
Generally speaking for a human being to kill another human being he must momentarily forget that the other is a person and brother and see him at “it”, the “enemy”, etc.
While we can discuss the difference in guilt and degree of an abortion doctor versus a soldier, it is virtually undeniable that both require a de-personalization of the other.
JB
Right, any way we objectify the other, to excuse an action against them, is indeed, depersonalizing them as well. It’s quite clear, individualism encourages such a treatment of the other, and this presents to us why we are in a culture of death.
I came across the quote reading the newest issue of In Communion, so I should have given a HT to the Orthodox Peace Fellowship (http://incommunion.org/).
As I’m sure you are well aware, we also see the same depersonalization in other terms such as “illegal alien,” or “handicapped” as opposed to persons with disability or the equivalent.
JB, it’s well to remember that any language is an abstraction. Most handicapped persons don’t care whether they are being referred to with the shorthand “handicapped” or the equivalent “disabled” as long as they are treated as persons. For example, to SSA, they are a 9-digit number entitled to a certain amount of money each month regardless of the language in the form letter which gets sent out.
So I would propose the general rule of language and behavior be summed up as follows: “Call me whatever you like, but don’t call me late for dinner.”
The problem with adding the word persons after every shorthand adjective is that a person begins to sound like an academic person or some person of bromidic tendencies often heard on NPR. All we persons should take care not to objectify ourselves in this way, becoming objects of ridicule at our own hands.
It’s interesting how Pauli uses language to deny its very power.
I wonder if at some level depersonalization begins to deny the incarnation and humanity’s creation in the image and likeness of the Persons of the Holy Trinity.
Depersonalization and the euphemisms and anonymity that follow from it make it easier to ignore, deny or do violence to the other. It’s a two way street though – to depersonalize another also depersonalizes me.
Mike,
Right, depersonalization is tied to a poor theological anthropology, and ignoring how our personality is itself given to us as a gift because we are made in the image and likeness of God. To depersonalize someone is, in effect, to try to rub out an image of God in the world. And of course, because of the way personhood works, that one can’t be a person alone by oneself, what affects one affects all; and indeed, we end up destroying ourselves when we work to destroy others. It’s a fundamental which I don’t think has gotten out in our culture all that well.