Guilt and Remorse

 

     What I mainly don’t like about the widespread attempt to replace the serious exercise of religion with some vague ‘spirituality’ aimed at ‘peace and harmony’ is that it (narcissistically?) seems an attempt to ban conceptual space for guilt, remorse, sin – in a world that is full of it. It’s all around me in the very cultural air I breathe: that guilt, the painful, remorseful recognition that one has done someone wrong and that one has in a sense ceased to be the person one was and has now become something different, a wrong-doer of whatever kind (e.g. a betrayer) – that guilt implies a distortion at best, a kind of narcissism or masochism at worst. This drives me crazy as the opposite: the hyper-guilt some think I should feel because I am a ‘white’ man (I am not really ‘white’). Obviously, as with all responses of the heart, when guilt is filtered through the experience of a narcissistic or a masochistic psyche, the guilt will not reach its object. If I betrayed a friend or a spouse in some serious way, and my exclusive focus was on ME, my suffering, my ‘guilt’, that would imply that the person I betrayed hardly enters into the ‘guilt’, is not real in a way. But that is not guilt; that is the corruption of guilt. Sentimental guilt idealizes the person and the wrong in order to perversely elevate the self to a ‘tragic’ dimension – a shallow, self-gratifying or self-consoling response all the way down. But why should anyone believe that captures the essence of guilt? That guilt can only be experienced in this way? That this description fits all possible experiences of guilt, from Rodion Raskolnikov to Judas (Matthew 27) to the expression of remorse by a man about to be executed for murder - ‘I love ya’ll, ya’ll take care. I am so sorry.’ (William Kitchens, executed 9 May 2000) . . . . I could go on and on. Of course, even a man about to be executed may be sentimental, narcissistic, or masochistic, but must he necessarily be?

      Or this: the pain of guilt (remorse) is focused on the past deed; it does no positive good to the victim. It is a kind of self-punishing anger that will not make the deed undone and will only get in the way of positive contributions to healing one could make. The best philosophical attack on guilt and remorse comes from Nussbaum: the focus is on the future, making things right to the extent possible. Obviously, a remorse that did not make future relationship central would be corrupt, but then that relationship is what it is because of the past wrong. But whether an emotional response to a wrong done ‘does any good or not’ in some practical way is the only criterion for her. “If one retains the correct focus on the other, one may feel guilt and have a wish for one’s own suffering, but one will quickly realize the futility of that project and move toward the Transition [i.e. doing what can be done positively to help deal with the harm].” Anger at the self contributes nothing positive; thus we should leave it behind.  Again, I agree that the willingness to engage with the person one has wrong and do what one can is a necessary part of a lucid remorse – but not sufficient.

      Remorse is just the attunement of the self to the reality that has been brought about by the wrong; it is a form of understanding, an often pained, bewildered realization of the true meaning of what one has done (Gaita). ‘Oh my God, what I have done!’ Only through pain does the full significance get translated into one’s spiritual life: one feels (empathetically) the pain of the person wronged, a pain that the wrong-doer cannot be indifferent to since he caused it. Sharing the pain is a kind of solidarity, a refusal to distance one’s inner life from it – and this is part of any positive contribution to overcoming it. And anyone who understood the full meaning of what it is to betray another person – and the pain of the victim allows this full-understanding – would feel pain when forced to confront the fact: ‘I am now a betrayer; I betrayed my friend.’ This is on a different plane that any consequences or implications of the act, however important they are. Nussbaum represents the entire culture by denying the reality of this other plane.

      A man (‘Silvio’) a while back kidnapped to children 4 and 6 years old; he sexually assaulted and killed them. I have no idea whether the man is capable of lucid remorse. Of course, we can imagine with Nussbaum the man wallowing in narcissistic self-pity and self-abasement. But imagine for the sake of argument he was able to clearly understand what he did; that he could feel the whole terror of the children he sexually assaulted and murdered; that he could feel the full pain of grief of their friends, teachers, and families; that he understood that there is no bringing them back or undoing what he did – now whether it would ‘do any good’ at all, the idea that he could just ‘put it behind it’ and try to be reasonably happy and ‘decent’ for the rest of his life: something is missing from that picture of things: the meaning of the wrong done and the lives of the victims.

      Betrayals of wives, husbands, and friends do not reach that horrible depth, but there is still something wrong with the idea that the betrayer damages the life of one whose life was deeply intertwined with his and who trusted much of her life to him, and then that betrayer rides off into the sunset and lives happily ever after. Nussbaum is right: the victim’s wish for payback, however understandable, is self-destructive. And of course, the self-anger and self-loathing of the betrayer can also be out of tune with the meaning of the situation, and for this reason hinder one from doing what the situation calls for. Healing to the extent possible is the goal. But to judge guilt and remorse solely on the basis of pragmatic considerations of what needs to be done – as though the fact that ‘I betrayed her’ (and not someone else) and ‘I am a betrayer’ were incidental –  is like judging animals with categories appropriate to plant life. And there are asymmetries between the first and third person here: I agree with Gandalf: do not be too hasty to deal out condemnation to others. I have betrayed; I have been betrayed. As the victim, I do not desire But, say I betray a loving wife, and my response is ‘Oh well, I’m human after all, and I have a right to be happy! I’ll be a friend to her in the future, and is good.’ Nay. Such a response is a willful failure to understand, and a shallow rationalization; just as much a corruption as the narcissistic guilt trip.

       The guilt should probably not define us in this case (as opposed to the murderer of children), but it is part of who we are; it situates us relative to the person we wronged and as the person we have thus become. This culture, or one dominant strand in it, says ‘my personal happiness is the highest good; the only limit to this is the respect for other’s pursuit of personal happiness; and if I damage someone else’s pursuit of happiness, then I must also see that damage solely in terms of our mutual pursuit of happiness.’ Through this lens some things can be recognized about guilt and remorse, but not what goes deep in them. ‘Happiness’ and ‘flourishing’ (to take Martha Nussbaum’s preferred term) are not moral concepts.