The Gentle Art of Hypocrisy

With a general election looming, my thoughts turn to those of hypocrisy. This sounds like a neat way to burst into social commentary, but as I’m sure you are aware I am woefully under-qualified to make even such a broad political statement. My own political views are a sloppy amalgam of laissez-faire liberality and socialist tendencies, mixed with a cynical view of humanity I got from reading too much Hemingway. Nope, in predictably solipsistic fashion it is my own hypocrisy I’m going to be talking about.

I have been struggling of late to resolve two different concepts in my mind. They have been dredged up by my own actions (which, as always, have been less than spotless recently) and the fact that I just read through all my old Preacher comics again and found the protagonist struggling with similar issues.

I like to consider myself a feminist. Whether I actually am or not is probably a matter for someone else to decide, but I give it a jolly good try. It comes naturally to my thinking that people should be treated equally, and in situations where contextual evidence suggests otherwise, allowances should be made. We live in a society with the ability to level the playing field of achievement in the majority of cases. We don’t use that ability often enough, but it is there. Therefore, the idea that someone might find their ability to achieve and be fulfilled limited by something as non-specific as their gender strikes me as ludicrous.

But, gentlemen walk on the outside of the pavement. My granddad always used to say that (R.I.P. mate), and I do it without really thinking. When I’m walking with female friends I walk on the outside so if someone gets hit by a bus it’ll be me. I go out of my way to help ladies in distress, even at the times (admittedly few and far between) when I’m not trying to get into their knickers.

Are general ideas of chivalry incompatible with a true understanding of the feminist movement? Am I being misguided and a little patronising? This question gave me pause. I was perturbed to realise that I might be being hypocritical and condescending even when trying to do a good thing for other people (even when I WAS trying to get into their knickers).

It is upsetting to realise how far this double-think extends into your everyday life. I say ‘yours’ meaning, of course, ‘mine;’ I am sure you lot are paragons of clean-living consistency. As far as I am concerned, I seem to be operating under several contradictory operating parameters at pretty much all times. My attitude to meat is one: love burgers, but consider myself an environmentalist. My attitude to narcotics is another: generally disapproving of the effect they have on social units (families etc), and won’t specify my own usage in case my Gran is reading this (since when do you use the internet, Nanny?).

For someone with a pretty high opinion of themselves (admit it, I AM pretty amazing), all this was a severe prod to the old ego-balloon. Can you still be a good person if you say one thing and do another? Are you being ridiculous if you persist in holding beliefs that you know to be contradictory to other beliefs you actually hold? I spent a solid five minutes feeling like a bit of a ballbag, I can tell you.

Luckily I came to a few conclusions that made me feel a bit better. When I sat down and thought about it, I was perhaps jumping the gun in condemning myself (either than, or my ability to rationalise my own failures has increased to monumental proportions, and I’ll never be self-reflective again).

Firstly, well, at least I’m practising, rather than preaching. I consider myself a relatively amiable dude, and I’m definitely not going to push my choices onto anyone else. If I say I think one way and then act another than it may be something I have to work on, but I’m not telling anyone else how to think or act. True hypocrisy occurs when you demand of others what you fail to deliver yourself (there’s a political comment in here too, but I sure as hell can’t find it).

Secondly, and most importantly, things are always more complicated than you imagine. My chivalrous intentions are not limited to the lay-deez. I make an attempt to do nice things for everyone, but the realisation of these attempts takes different forms. If I got out of my car and ran round to hold the door for a male friend, they might look at me strangely. The attempt at chivalry would backfire in awkwardness. If society were a little different, maybe I MIGHT do it. I think, or at least, I hope, that my attempts at chivalry are not made because they are what woman need or deserve but are what they will accept, and I’d like to do as much for everyone as I can. Most men wouldn’t mind me holding a closing door for them, and so I do that for everyone.

So perhaps I can consider myself a feminist and still help people with their shopping, and perhaps I’m still a hypocrite, but I’ve put a fair bit of thought into it. The alternatives? Either live a life of extreme consistency (apparently impossible for me) or ignore it, and risk being caught out and justly judged by others. Neither of these is particularly gratifying to me.

So I’m a hypocrite, as there are surely examples of incongruous thinking that I’ve yet to realise or deal with. But I feel a little better knowing that in areas where my own actions wander out into moral and societal grey areas, I’ve at least had a good think about why I act the way I do. If I come across something too inconsistent to rationalise then I need to do something about it.

In the meantime, I shall continue to walk on the outside of the pavement, I’ll just do it for the dudes I like as well.

“A purpose, an intention, a design, strikes everywhere the careless, the most stupid thinker”

This is not my first blog. It is, however, the first without a really concrete purpose. The last one was a travelogue, in which I detailed my adventures on the counterweight continent, and then up into Malaysia where I was working as a scuba diver. It was largely to keep my friends and family informed of my movements, and to let them know that I was still alive and that the weather was nicer where I was than where they were. I had a lot of fun writing it.

This blog's purpose is more fluid; I have a few ideas about what I want from it but they are likely to change over time. My inspiration in starting it came from an old friend, Tom Nash. He is an exceptionally talented individual whose acquaintance I am proud to have made, and you can find some of his scribblings here. He is also one half of the dynamic creative super force at 'What Fresh Hell Is This?,' a webcomic that is merciless in its hilarity (and decidedly unsafe for work, whatever that means).

In his blog, Tom mentions the book he is in the process of finishing. A book, with pages and words and themes and the whole literary shebang. This is, of course, a sound achievement on its tod, but what warms my heart and stirs my loins is that if I know Tom Nash, it'll be damn good. It'll be witty, and considered, and in all respects better than the dire scrawlings which fill the bestseller lists, penned by the cynical to divert the lazy.

Now, Tom's writing style is something I'd dearly like to emulate, but am probably unable. (He's funnier than I am, see.) Not only that, but he has a clear grasp of a writer's tools- grammar, formatting and stylistic understanding of structure. I envy him so much I'd like to light him on fire, but there are lessons to be learned from this. I want to write a book, and I plan to start at the end of this coming summer. With Tom Nash as a stimulus, I shall be using this blog simply to write, in the hopes of perfecting my own writing style. The posts will be about what I tupping well choose, and will almost certainly be marred by my attempts at humour.

This blog is also a statement of intent. I want to write a book, and am worried that I won't be able to. I may lack talent, or determination, or I may let my own anxiety sabotage my creative impulses. It has happened to me before, and will in all likelihood do so again. But the thing is, I really want to write this book. And so this blog is, in part, a challenge to myself. If nothing else, what I have written here may embarrass me past future creative hurdles (and if not, I shall dismantle it quietly, in the dead of night). I won't start telling people about it until it is a little more established, and will be keeping it relatively schtum until I start work on the book.

That's everything for now, I think. If you have travelled into the archives to read this, and there are more words above these ones, then hurrah for me!