Guilt

Marianne Faithfull, a singer I love for reasons that have to do little with her singing, has a great song called "Guilt".  The lyrics go something like this:

I feel guilt, I feel guilt,

Though I know I've done no wrong I feel guilt.

I never lied to my lover,

But if I did I would admit it.

If I could get away with murder

I'd take my gun and I'd commit it.

I think the song goes straight to one of the most important things about guilt: that often the wrong people feel guilty for the wrong things.

A few days ago I came across a blog that put very simply what I have been thinking for a while: the younger generations (say, under 40, but more like, under 30, or even more to the point, under 20) are going to decide quite soon they can't stand the guts of the Baby Boomers. They were the guys that had the party, and their children the ones that will pay the tab. The Baby Boomers, as a rule, think they've done great. One Baby Boomer's comment to the post was: "OK I shouldn’t have bought a house with a yard you could play in, or paid for endless lessons for music and sports which you now don’t give a crap about but couldn’t live without. I shouldn’t have taken you to Disney World or the beach or skiing in Colorado, or put a TV, phone, stereo, CD player, iPod, etc. in your room or paid for every dime of your now worthless college education, including graduate school." Obviously, he isn't thinking about how many of those things were part of the problem, rather than part of the solution. You bet this father would have felt horribly guilty if he wasn't giving his kids all the fruits of consumerism, and his kids will probably hate him exactly for that very same reason.

On another note, my ex has just pleaded not guilty to the charges. The poor bastard was terribly confused because the defence solicitors had not bothered to tell him that he could plead not guilty to the charge but guilty to a lesser one. Luckily, it was all made clear when the question was asked in court. 

It would be great if this same distinction was done for ordinary people when they consider their ethical dilemmas: OK, you may not want to accept you're guilty of an awful mistake, what about a simply terrible one? How bad is bad exactly? People need a scale to measure themselves against, like the scale of how many planets would be needed if everybody was to live their lifestyle. It would be great if there weren't huge divergences among calculators. And it would also help if it was made clear why it's next to impossible to get it down to one planet. Nobody wants to play a game you can only lose. Guilt can be a powerful motivation, but only when there is hope for redemption.