Peter Emmerson

You died at 44 – it is difficult to see any fairness or justice in that.  Now, 54 years later, I look around and hear people talking loudly and passionately about fairness and justice, but see little evidence for such commitment.  Who are these people so fervently debating issues of fairness and justice?  They are idealists, pedlars in linguistic sleight of hand such as monarchs, presidents, politicians, employers and others with influence, who pay priests, philosophers and mathematicians to concoct and supply fallacious notions of which fairness and justice are but two.  Why is this so important to them?  Ideals have at least two functions.  Firstly, they offer certainty and a comforting capacity for control over our fears and anxieties, equipping us to feel safe and able to sleep at night, immunized from a world that is cold, brutal and unconcerned.  Secondly, ideals can be associated with more insidious goings on, by enticing us, under banners proclaiming justice, freedom etc., to put aside our feelings of empathy and compassion, to authenticate and sanction terrible acts of violence against those with whom we disagree: killing people who are unquestionably wrong is easier to justify.

Experience tells me that there are in fact no certainties, no truths, just contingencies; mundane, day to day involvements that are always comparatively uncertain.  Nevertheless, these ordinary little experiences, these momentary happenings can make an unpredictable, insecure living feel worthwhile.  One of these is joy.  Once when I was a boy, I watched Dad dance to an Artie Shaw recording of Begin the Beguine and shared his joy in music.  Tragically, in his dying, he also introduced me to another, more difficult form of joy.  This is a joy that comes from having engaged with, and seen off feelings of grievous loss and self-pity, without resort to idealistic comforts.  I have learned to live unhappily and still feel joy.  It has been a long, lonely, sleep deprived journey, since those days of his dying, that at times has tested me sorely.  Would I live through it all again? – yes, I would, because it has made me, me.  Crippled though I am, I am still prepared to be joyfully empathetic and compassionate, and still willing to engage deceivers.  Part of that joy finds me contemptuous of ideals such as fairness, justice, equality, freedom etc., and those who profit from them.