Just Another Victim

Just Another Victim is ... a single ... by someone. This interests me insignificantly. The word 'victim' does interest me, though. It is a forceful word. It automatically assigns blame (another one of those morality-laden words) away from the person to whom it is given, and towards some other person. Language is more than just the expression of what is - a lot of the time it is the covert expression of a point-of-view, an angle, a worldview. This is most evident in journalism. Read two different papers about one single event and one might be forgiven for imagining that this one single event were two completely different events. This is obvious, but noteworthy. The most foceful use of this language-forcefulness is in the arena of insults. To call a person some derogatory name is to label that person - to (if one is going to take language literally - which is, I think, the idea) metamorphose that person into whatever one has labelled them as. 'You terrible cur!' one exclaims (or doesn't, if one is inhabiting the 21st Century), dehumanising one's language-brawl-opponant. And, if they refrain from reciprocally magicking one into something else, that they remain - while one sneers down at them from one's lofty pinnacle of humanity. Of course, this sort of insult could (in literal terms - and do let's be literal) could be interpreted simply as an error. 'You terrible cur!' one exclaims. 'Are you quite sure? Perhaps it's the light...' the cur replies, smugly safe in the knowledge that within the realm of the literal theur assailant is simply mistaken or mad. Of course, such literalism is generally considered to be mistaken or mad in itself... Unfortunately, alternatives along the lines of 'I really don't like you at all, you know...' lack punch. 'I hate you!' sounds simply childish, unless whispered beneath floods of tears while wearing a very beautiful dress and tear-smudged mascara in moonlight... And even then... Language is, as Wittgenstein was well aware, terribly terribly flawed. And yet (she typed, dramatically) - what else is there? Language is what we throw at each other when we want to get across the abyss between us - The Problem of Others. Unfortunately it all gets lost in trabslation from brain to brain until all it really sounds like is a screamed request PLEASE LIKE ME or PLEASE LEAVE ME ALONE or all of the suchlike variations on those themes, sometimes, perhaps, a little blurred into each other. I don't imagine for a moment that anyone reading any of this will experience it in any way particularly similar to the way in which I am experiencing it. Let's face it - we are all UTTERLY alone. And we must, each of us, get used to it. If this sounds bleak, it isn't meant to - I adore people, particularly some particular people - of course I do. What I mean is - we can only experience each other up to a point. Beyond that is simple (and rather sweet) delusion. Words words words. Like looking at paintings through dark glasses, through a glass darkly... These are tools blunted at the edges with being thrown at people and blunted. As soon, of course, as one says any of this, it sounds rather - intense. Much better to use the correct tags for the correct things and pretend that everything is perfectly perfectly clear ... no? That is pragmatic, certainly - but it certainly isn't true - and truth is beauty, and all that. That is why, perhaps, we want preciseness. The preciseness of non-stage poetry and suchlike. Becuase we really do want to jump across that abyss, even if it is neccesarily suicide to do so, even if it is neccesarily impossible. Which is rather sweet of us, don't you think?