Survival of Atrocities

The Philosophy of Horror

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Survival of Atrocities

Emmanuel Levinas writes that horror does not derive itself from Presence, but rather from the negation of Presence: "Horror is the event of being which returns in the heart of this negation, as though nothing had happened." (The Levinas Reader, P.33) You face a marvel or an atrocity. Are you a conservative when Kepler and Newton eliminated the notion of uniform circular motion? Then you have faced a marvel that is revolutionary in thought; a marvel that will change both you and the rest of the world forever. The earth, and therefore you, no longer exists in the center of creation. The notion of God drifts an additional step outside of your increasingly tiny planet. Human beings begin to believe in certain inalienable rights, in a certain, unlocked human potential to manipulate, categorize, and determine the visible world: the Enlightenment. Colonies rebel against the empires. Peasants revolt. Religious dynasties splinter. The universal sentiment of a power realignment is everywhere, but what happens in the twentieth century? The marvel has become the atrocity; cataclysmic wars and genocide set new architypal symbols for the destructive force of the human race.

Is this horror? Levinas says no. World War I happened. The Holocaust happened. Two unimaginable atrocities happened and yet we live. This is horror. To survive something that is not survivable, to experience something like death without dying. Can a holocaust survivor comprehend the destruction of his entire hometown and also comprehend his own survival? "Horror is the event of being which returns in the heart of this negation, as though nothing had happened." In Heart of Darkness, Joseph Conrad delves into the new, evolving belief in the power of human action and thought, and uncovers horror. Erich Maria Remarque uncovers the horrific, surreal existence of living a single night in a trench in All Quiet on the Western Front. And Primo Levi confronts the horror of existence in itself in Survival in Auschwitz. And so you ask the question of whether hope can live. Are the products of an enlightened, modern consciousness the very concepts that lead to atrocities? Levinas believes that the heart of the problem is that survival in the face of death creates a refutation of faith; and that refutation is the true definition of horror.

The Heart of Darkness is a story of any man's primal exploration of the world and the mind. Kurtz is the mad genius who tears away the limitations of society and creates his own mystery, a man of vision and also of sickness. But Conrad does not create the story about Kurtz, but more importantly about Marlow's journey toward Kurtz and away from "civilized society". Marlow becomes increasingly anxious to hear Kurtz, to understand what it is that he had discovered. "The point was in his being a gifted creature, and that all of his gifts the one that stood out preeminently, that carried with it a sense of real presence, was his ability to talk, his words...the pulsating stream of light, or the deceitful flow from the heart of impenetrable darkness." (Conrad, P.119-120) What is really drawing Marlow along the darkening river? Every outpost he reaches marks off new zones of unchartered reason, everything behind fogs into confusion. At the birth of the Enlightenment, the simple concept of reason inspired fresh frontiers, yet as Marlow approaches Kurtz on his river barge the world grows darker and darker. Why? Is Marlow afraid? As he narrates his story, Marlow speaks and speaks, making it difficult sort out the true Marlow. Marlow is filled with contempt, for the world around him, for the "savages", especially, it would appear, for himself. When he finally meets Kurtz, Marlow displays contempt for his feeble appearance, and for his occasionally childlike discourse. Yet Kurtz has made himself king. His voice makes Marlow shiver. The fact is, Kurtz has delved into the power of the mind and spirit, and has discovered a primal being that is both the opposite of a god-fearing, humble man and the result of a brilliant brain. Marlow is drawn to the primal being, but is too afraid to touch it. He lies to Kurtz's "beloved"; he cannot tell her Kurtz's final words: "The horror...the horror." I believe that Conrad creates Marlow to demonstrate the doom of reason, the primal power of Kurtz. Kurtz understands horror, but is certainly not his own death that he alludes to in his final words. He kills. He marks spikes with human heads because his ability to face that kind of brutality infuses him with power. That capability is horror, while the action is merely force. Look what we can do, says Conrad. This is the power of the human being. Look closely. This is what we can do.

All Quiet on the Western Front shows a different side to the new human engine. There has always been war. But World War I represents something beyond the wars of the past. First, there was new technology: each side relied increasingly on artillery; and there was also mustard gas to flood out the trenches that had become necessary to sustain a long-term war. More importantly, however, was the abundance of death. Europe drained itself into the war; by the end, everything was gone. A whole generation of young men were killed during the long years of warfare. Each country seemed to accidentally find themselves involved. Russia lacked the capability to fight a modern war. They had been beaten soundly in the Crimean and Russo-Japanese wars, and with a powerful Germany on the rise, Russia began to mobilize their over-large territories. Germany was eager to expand, with their well-equipped armies and developing railroad system. The unstable arrangement of power resulting from the dissolving Hapsburg empire lit the fuse, and all the nations found themselves part of a war far larger than anyone had imagined. So the governments pushed propaganda through families and schools, driving patriotism into fervor, and young men everywhere were expected to join in the battle for their countries. Remarque shows how the young, patriotic Paul Baumer and his friends are persuaded to enter a war that they think they understand. In the trenches they lose that knowledge. Paul loses his friends one by one. There is only one thing in the trenches, and that is fear. He explains to a new boy that "Many's the man before you has had his pants full after the first bombardment...." (Remarque, P.62) Patriotism is gone. "If your own father came over with them you would not hesitate to fling a bomb at him." (Remarque, P.114) On leave, he finds himself unable to face his family, his neighbors, himself when he is alone. In this way the war has killed an entire generation, and perhaps more. In some places on the front, one of two men die. Even those who survive have been damaged. Paul cannot live a civilian life. Though he dies, there were those who lived, and the consciousness that they brought back from the war is the sustained hopelessness that is horror. Their friends were killed before their eyes, and they have killed with their own hands. Yet they live. It is incomprehensible. Europe as a whole could never be the same.

"Everything is in the hands of God but the fear of God." It is a traditional, Jewish adage. It is only in man's power to fear God, it says, the rest is up to the Creator. That fear Primo Levi does not even choose to confront in Survival in Auschwitz. It is the fear of other men that makes you wash yourself while carrying all clothes between your knees, or eating a daily ration in a half-minute to pre-emptively protect against theft. It is one thing, and if not that, then another. It is the cold of winter; and then it is the hunger; and then it is the work. Only when they have a certain, “quiet” moment in Ka-Be or when their cook has managed to put his hands on an extra ration of soup that the prisoners become capable of having the fears of a human being: what is happening to me? What has happened to my wife and sisters and mothers? The manner that their lives lead at Buna, at Auschwitz is the paradox of existence that is horror. They move unconsciously through a daily cycle that includes waking, a piece of bread, work, soup, more work, beatings, the refuse bucket late in the night. Moments when they remember they are men are rare: "...I know that Henri is living today. I would give much to know his life as a free man, but I do not want to see him again. . . and it is rare to think questions like, am I a man? Do I live?" (Levi, P.100)

For those of us who learn about the Holocaust from books or movies, or perhaps from a conversation with a survivor, it is a somewhat awkward subject. It is clearly an atrocity. Six million and more Jews were killed in the camps alone. The casualties for World War II are much higher. At best we cannot comprehend a number like six million, and it worst, we cannot understand the subtle ways which the Holocaust affects our lives today. But it is only the fact that we live, that the world survives and functions after Hitler and his madmen have been arrested, killed, or have vanished. It seems impossible that a world could survive it. But we live the same as always. Levi explains this blind living in the camps: moving without a brain. And we are similar without the confrontation with immediate atrocity. We do not think about the holocaust everyday. In his opening poem, Levi warns us to "repeat them to your children..." Do not forget, do not ignore. Again, this is the horror of existence, when existence should be impossible. We are the products of this horror, and somehow we must find a way to shed our unconscious manner of survival. Paradoxically, there is no other way that we can survive.

What will it take to overcome the horror? I think about the failed revolutions of the sixties. I think of the collapse of the communist party. I think about years of attending Sunday school and public school. Perhaps there is only the one thing, the remembering. It is my belief that the horror stems directly from the Enlightenment, the power of reason, if only because reason contradicts the surreal existence of these genocides and wars. It is not enough to say man is bad. It is not enough to say there is no God. It could never be enough because our power of self and of reason will not allow these atrocities to stand on their own. We did it, and now we feel the horror of our own existence. In some grim way, the only avenue of hope I see is to maintain the memory of war and of killing. It was they who killed, but it was also us. It cannot be denied. "Mediate that this came about..." Confront the horror and move beyond it. We cannot move beyond our own atrocities.

Copyright ©2004, ©2005, ©2006 Joshua Suchman. All rights reserved.
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Great article on Horror and Atrocity!!!

My experience and education in this area has taught me a few things about horror, atrocity and especially disaster. I kind of put them all together because to me, they are about the same thing.

Disaster is a situation whose distructive power taxes the local infrastructure beyond its ability to mitigate or prepare for, as well as effectively respond to. A Tsunami is not a disaster in itself. If the waves crashed in against a deserted island, or uninhabited stretch of continental coast, it may be distructive to the sand, the trees and the underbrush, but it would not reach the status of "disaster" unless it destroyed that swath of earth's ability to grow trees and underbrush. Even then, most of us wouldn't consider it a disaster because, well if the trees fell and there was nothing and no one to hear it, would it make a sound??? right?

Horror, would be the same type of situation as disaster, except the assets and infrastructure in question would be of a personal nature. This is different for everyone, depending on personal constitution, experience and expectation. No matter how horrific (or innocuous) an event may seem to some of us, it would have the opposite effect on others. For example, for most people, no matter how much protective gear they wore, they would never be able to get themselves to run into a burning building. However, for the fire fighter, it not only isn't a problem, it is something to which they look forward. Watch almost any firefighter (especially younger ones) when they get a little smoke in their nose. There is almost an intoxicating affect.

Attrocity would be a person (or group of people) inflicting horror on another person (or group). Again, the defining aspect would be taking the person beyond their ability to deal with. Torture, rape, and murder would be examples of inflicting horror upon individuals; while Slavery, Holocaust and Genocide would be examples of generalized, or institutionalized horror. In either case what seperates the attrocity from the horror is one refers to the perpetrator, while the other refers to the victims.

Most people will never truly experience horror on a first hand basis. We are taken through the process as a 3rd party observer, feeling the requisite Denial, Anger, Bargaining, Depression and Acceptance by proxy for those whose faces fill space on newspapers and websites, TV screens and radio airwaves. Of course, a well written book or well produced film can take us for the same ride, and in the minds of most people, the emotions are equally easy to shake off when the images are no longer in view.

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Ted,

You get it. Thanks for reading this long thing, by the way.

I would suggest one more aspect to the concept of horror, though. Like you said, atrocity is taking a person or persons beyond his/her/their ability to understand or deal. The horror is not experienced by the dead, though, and like you also said, most people confront this concept on a 3rd party perspective.

On an individual level, a person experiences horror by living when he/she feels like the world should have died. The continuity of living seems impossible, immoral, disgusting, beyond belief; yet life does continue. There is no other explanation for the feeling that rises in reponse. It is horror.

But on a cultural level, the 3rd party perspective dominates. Certain individuals within a culture have survived atrocities, but society as a whole experienced such disturbances as muffled reports. We know that the tsunami destruction is terrible. We know that all of the Iraqis dying is terrible. We know that the destruction of the Twin Towers is terrible. But our distance from the occurrence of these disasters creates an odd sensation. How terrible is it? I mean, today is Monday. Tomorrow is Tuesday. The days of the week are the same. It's still winter. But the more we as a society witness these things through news shows or web reports, or occasionally from a friend of a friend, the more our society takes on this collective sense of horror.

The collective sense of horror: who are we? what the hell is wrong with our world? The first, obvious response is to feel like our country (usa for me) must be great, that we are so removed from chaos. But there is another response, I think, that we all feel, americans, too, that we don't like to talk about. That feeling is this resonating response to the sadness and terror and futility of the chaos of our world, all of it, and that resonance is horror. Did this really happen? How could it really happen, if we continue to live, almost, but not quite, unaffected?

TBT

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