The word ‘desperation’ gets thrown around a lot. As a result, it has become little more than a mundane addition to the wealth of hyperbolic language with which people can aggrandize their own emotions and experiences. Hackneyed and misused, ‘desperation’ has lost much of its meaning. Gauging from its widespread use, one would think that it is a familiar condition to Westerners. Now, I can only speak from my own limited experience, but, as a Sri Lankan born American (I was five when my family returned to the States to stay), I have never known desperation. (Being desperate to get an A, or make the All-Star team does not count.) I grew up in a loving, affectionate, protective family, and never lacked for anything. I contend that this is the case – to one degree or another – for many, if not most, Westerners.
It is not uncommon to fall into a meandering conversation on morals and ethics. (I suppose that in a world riddled with so much corruption and deceit, these are logical preoccupations.) The classic hypothetical situations invariably come up: Would you steal food if your family was starving? Would you kill if it meant protecting the innocent? So on and so forth. I have heard many an American say that sound morals and ethics must be inviolate; that once you have compromised, there is no redemption… I honestly feel that not one of them has known true desperation. Hypothetical situations are all well and good. But to grasp the complexity, anguish, and conflict inherent in such situations, one must have first-hand experience. Unless you have looked starvation in its cadaverous visage, your body crippled by weakness, your internal organs slowly shutting down, your wife and children withering away before your eyes, you cannot possibly know what you would do to fend it off.
Desperation alone can teach us what we would do to survive. As a shadow slowly inching across a sun-lit floor, growing, expanding, imperceptibly and insidiously consuming the light, desperation can devour hope and overwhelm the last shards of light. Options are spent, food is scarce, hope is dwindling. The darkness is seemingly all-pervasive. What can you do to survive? What do you have to do in order to survive? There is nothing hypothetical about it. You do whatever you can.
I was standing on a beach in Negombo, a beach town 40 kilometers north of Colombo, admiring a spectacular sunset, when I was joined by two of my teammates, M and A (a married couple). Within minutes, a Sri Lankan mother and daughter walked by and struck up a conversation with us. The mother did all the talking. By all appearances, she was a friendly, sociable, sweet woman who had no agenda beyond hospitality. She invited us to her home just down the beach. After an initial hesitation, we decided that there was no harm in accepting her rather insistent (at the time misinterpreted as eager) offer. The woman’s home was nothing more than a shack. The walls were hastily built of coarse, flimsy wood; termite infested, the structure seemed on the verge of collapse, the corrugated metal roof contemplating its impending plunge into the living area. The woman sat us down and graciously provided drinks, though it was obvious she hardly afford the luxury of soft drinks. At this point the family’s story – the loss of her husband in the tsunami, her inability to meet rising costs for the education of her three children, and the scarcity of gainful employment – was put on agonizing display. Indeed, it was a story dripping with the acidic residue of desperation. Time and time again, the family had struggled to break the surface of the water and steal a breath, only to be crushingly, ruthlessly driven underneath the tumultuous waters of hunger and poverty. In a meek, unassuming way, the mother concluded the narrative by asking for a donation.
My immediate response was one of pity. But indignation was soon to follow; I felt that we had been pulled along in an elaborate ruse to get money. (I am now ashamed of this blind, knee-jerk reaction.) After three months in the country we have become somewhat mistrustful of people’s unwarranted kindness, as it has often spawned just this type of outcome. Our observations the following day confirmed our suspicion; we saw the same mother and daughter approaching and engaging other foreigners, walking them off the beach toward their home. Evidently, this was how they earned the pittance that put food on the table. Some might view this activity as dishonest, as a way of taking advantage of people. And, perhaps, it is. The hard-line moralist would probably say this is wrong. The realist would undoubtedly say this is a way to survive when there is a dearth of options. Plain and simple: this family was desperate and, when confronted with the glaring reality of their destitution, they have shown themselves to be resourceful. Is it pretty, neatly packaged, easy to rationalize and justify? No. But it doesn’t have to be. It is necessary, and that is all that matters. When the alternative is to fall further and deeper into the pitch blackness of poverty, there is no alternative.
None of this is to say that desperation is a license for amorality. (A man kills another because there is only food enough for the survival of one. This is unequivocally wrong in my mind.) As I talked over these events and thoughts with my two teammates, M brought up something A and I had not thought of. She believed that if A and I had been alone with the mother and daughter during the exchange, we would have been offered the daughter in return for a donation. (Human trafficking is rampant in this area of the country.) Let me reiterate that I cannot conceive of the inky depths of desperation. But, in some way, somehow, no matter what happens, is there not some moral distinction between right and wrong? No matter how desperate one becomes, is there not some ethical and moral standard to which humanity as a whole is beholden? I ask this as a question because, while I have my own beliefs, there is no clear-cut answer. Hypotheticals are utterly impotent when considering such concrete issues. There is no satisfying conclusion to this entry. As much as one is inclined to resoundingly condemn this mother, blame rests with many. There are innumerable social, cultural, political, and economic factors that have brought this family to the brink. Though desperation may brutally shatter the kneecaps of Morality, casting its very existence into doubt, I hope and pray that Morality is able crawl along and makes its voice heard.
It is not uncommon to fall into a meandering conversation on morals and ethics. (I suppose that in a world riddled with so much corruption and deceit, these are logical preoccupations.) The classic hypothetical situations invariably come up: Would you steal food if your family was starving? Would you kill if it meant protecting the innocent? So on and so forth. I have heard many an American say that sound morals and ethics must be inviolate; that once you have compromised, there is no redemption… I honestly feel that not one of them has known true desperation. Hypothetical situations are all well and good. But to grasp the complexity, anguish, and conflict inherent in such situations, one must have first-hand experience. Unless you have looked starvation in its cadaverous visage, your body crippled by weakness, your internal organs slowly shutting down, your wife and children withering away before your eyes, you cannot possibly know what you would do to fend it off.
Desperation alone can teach us what we would do to survive. As a shadow slowly inching across a sun-lit floor, growing, expanding, imperceptibly and insidiously consuming the light, desperation can devour hope and overwhelm the last shards of light. Options are spent, food is scarce, hope is dwindling. The darkness is seemingly all-pervasive. What can you do to survive? What do you have to do in order to survive? There is nothing hypothetical about it. You do whatever you can.
I was standing on a beach in Negombo, a beach town 40 kilometers north of Colombo, admiring a spectacular sunset, when I was joined by two of my teammates, M and A (a married couple). Within minutes, a Sri Lankan mother and daughter walked by and struck up a conversation with us. The mother did all the talking. By all appearances, she was a friendly, sociable, sweet woman who had no agenda beyond hospitality. She invited us to her home just down the beach. After an initial hesitation, we decided that there was no harm in accepting her rather insistent (at the time misinterpreted as eager) offer. The woman’s home was nothing more than a shack. The walls were hastily built of coarse, flimsy wood; termite infested, the structure seemed on the verge of collapse, the corrugated metal roof contemplating its impending plunge into the living area. The woman sat us down and graciously provided drinks, though it was obvious she hardly afford the luxury of soft drinks. At this point the family’s story – the loss of her husband in the tsunami, her inability to meet rising costs for the education of her three children, and the scarcity of gainful employment – was put on agonizing display. Indeed, it was a story dripping with the acidic residue of desperation. Time and time again, the family had struggled to break the surface of the water and steal a breath, only to be crushingly, ruthlessly driven underneath the tumultuous waters of hunger and poverty. In a meek, unassuming way, the mother concluded the narrative by asking for a donation.
My immediate response was one of pity. But indignation was soon to follow; I felt that we had been pulled along in an elaborate ruse to get money. (I am now ashamed of this blind, knee-jerk reaction.) After three months in the country we have become somewhat mistrustful of people’s unwarranted kindness, as it has often spawned just this type of outcome. Our observations the following day confirmed our suspicion; we saw the same mother and daughter approaching and engaging other foreigners, walking them off the beach toward their home. Evidently, this was how they earned the pittance that put food on the table. Some might view this activity as dishonest, as a way of taking advantage of people. And, perhaps, it is. The hard-line moralist would probably say this is wrong. The realist would undoubtedly say this is a way to survive when there is a dearth of options. Plain and simple: this family was desperate and, when confronted with the glaring reality of their destitution, they have shown themselves to be resourceful. Is it pretty, neatly packaged, easy to rationalize and justify? No. But it doesn’t have to be. It is necessary, and that is all that matters. When the alternative is to fall further and deeper into the pitch blackness of poverty, there is no alternative.
None of this is to say that desperation is a license for amorality. (A man kills another because there is only food enough for the survival of one. This is unequivocally wrong in my mind.) As I talked over these events and thoughts with my two teammates, M brought up something A and I had not thought of. She believed that if A and I had been alone with the mother and daughter during the exchange, we would have been offered the daughter in return for a donation. (Human trafficking is rampant in this area of the country.) Let me reiterate that I cannot conceive of the inky depths of desperation. But, in some way, somehow, no matter what happens, is there not some moral distinction between right and wrong? No matter how desperate one becomes, is there not some ethical and moral standard to which humanity as a whole is beholden? I ask this as a question because, while I have my own beliefs, there is no clear-cut answer. Hypotheticals are utterly impotent when considering such concrete issues. There is no satisfying conclusion to this entry. As much as one is inclined to resoundingly condemn this mother, blame rests with many. There are innumerable social, cultural, political, and economic factors that have brought this family to the brink. Though desperation may brutally shatter the kneecaps of Morality, casting its very existence into doubt, I hope and pray that Morality is able crawl along and makes its voice heard.
posted by Tucker R. at 6:42 AM
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