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About this author

Jean Ovide Bourdeau is a Canadian author and philosopher who has written several books on topics such as ethics, history, politics, culture, and existentialism. He is best known for his series “Politics of Despair” and “Politics of Integrity”, which explore the causes and consequences of human violence and terror. He challenges conventional wisdom and dogmatic morality, and advocates for a more compassionate and rational approach to life. 

He is also an artist whose production occasionally reflects his philosophical views. 

Comments from this author

 WAKING UP FROM A LONG SLUMBER - 1.

Several years after my early retirement from an average career in human resources, having refused to work evenings and weekends throughout my employment in order to live my life fully with greater freedom, intensity, and bliss, I began to reflect on the lessons learnt in the course of my life, blindly and stupidly thinking I would likely imagine a promising future for the generations following us all in spite of ongoing genocides and wars during our recorded human history, presumptuously reasoning that such barbaric historical and contemporary behavior, which as part of a brutal primeval dog-eat-dog stage imbedded into our biological response mechanism, were significantly diminishing with time. I had until then, due to my somewhat unconscious ignorance, broadly, blindly, and foolishly assumed that we, humans, were generally on an equally ascending curve of ethical development in tandem with scientific discoveries and the technologies these created in improving our everyday lives. After due reflection I eventually began to wake up from what, I realized, had been a self-inflicted intellectual somnolence, only to discover as I slowly started to write, and to my intense disappointment, that a great segment of us on this planet, much too large to ignore in the course of recorded history to this day along with the societies we formed along the way, were and still are far behind intellectually, politically, ethically, socially, and psychologically than both the sciences and technologies we created—and this by at least dozens of centuries in my estimate. So, instead of embarking on a pleasant description and lovely outlooks of a much improved if not a bucolic future, I eventually found myself writing instead about what I have now finally come to consider a worsening dystopian future. Not a pleasant discovery indeed. Despite this reality and awakening of mine I nevertheless undertook this thankless and sorrowful task for reasons I cannot yet assess properly.

WAKING UP FROM A LONG SLUMBER - 2.

Having read – almost uninterruptedly – an average of two books a week or so for the sheer pleasure of it, from age twelve throughout my life to this day, I, several years after my retirement, attempted on a quiet Sunday afternoon to sum up in the style of those popular Power Point presentations and on one page only, what I had learnt from all this reading, combined with those firsthand experiences of a lifetime. This original shortsighted attempt failed. After more than a two year-long period of personal introspections, multiple historical reviews, and numerous analyses and syntheses of past and present events, situations and issues, following my awkward but necessary awakening, I emerged with an entirely new vision away from the almost bucolic one I had in my short sightedness more or less envisaged before. I then slowly and gradually began to convert this ongoing reflection in the form of separate ad hoc thoughts, which accumulated from then on with endless clarifications, corrections, and seemingly unending additions to this original foolish attempt at a one-page Power Point presentation. An activity that evolved organically from then on to more than 7000 separate thoughts—many accompanied with questions and notes. This is the latest and last such update, since in my 88th orbit now in progress around our sun, my end is much closer than my beginning.

 NOT AN ACADEMICIAN.

All thoughts contained in both these “Politics of Despair” and “Politics of Integrity” series, were written ‘off-the-top-of-my-head’, so to speak, with occasional exceptions here and there and from the many crib notes to myself that had accumulated helter-skelter in a cardboard box over the years. The two reasons for this are quite simple. First, I am not an academician. Second, if I had chosen to mimic one, I would have failed, simply because I did not possess the disciplined training for such an undertaking; I never kept track of, nor recorded, the lessons taught to me throughout my lifelong reading habit; and did not chronicle most of the experiences taught to me by life. However, as a nineteen-year-old teenager I began to take short crib notes from time to time, and did this for about four decades, whenever faced with odd or outstanding psychological, social, intellectual, ethical, and political circumstances, conditions, issues, and topics among other things – assuming I would one day reflect on these in my old age, should I get there. So, I just went on with, and blindly enjoyed, my privileged adult life here in Canada. In some way I suppose that the thoughts constituting these two series of essays accumulated chaotically in the course of my existence from those crib notes, which I never looked at until they were loosely assembled, reviewed, and studied in the winter of it, … as I began to write. Look! I am a mere amateur. What one would presumably call; “Just an average guy, who loves life”. Happy to get up in the morning, to live my day, and go to sleep at night—reasonably expecting the same privileged opportunity the next day—yet doing so as if each was the first, and the last one in my existence, with a conscious appreciation of the present moment at all times and the many privileges available to me.

DON’T GET ME WRONG!

In spite of the depressing, dismal, bleak, and pessimistic subjects treated in the first and second essays, I am not a dissatisfied customer. On the contrary, I have enjoyed myself probably more than the average guy, and every day I continue to feel most privileged to have lived and to continue to live as a healthy, intelligent, free, and happy human being in the midst of a peaceful territory: Canada. Extraordinarily lucky in fact to have been born in a free nation governed democratically with a reasonable application of Inalienable Individual Rights and away from those routine centers of intense lethal confrontations, extreme poverty, and raw injustice outside our present and temporarily safe North American oasis. So, do not get me wrong! I am not bitter! Far from it! I simply share with you, against my expectations, a late assessment of our human situation at the end of what has been a pleasant life for me.

SPEAKING FOR MYSELF AND ON YOUR BEHALF.

The general use of the pronouns “I” and ‘we” more or less throughout this long text is purposeful, as I imagined, that the more awake among us are, at least from time to time, wondering about similar subjects, especially when it comes to the mission and objectives of one’s sanity, self-actualization, ethics, reason, science, and the purpose of one’s existence particularly, along with that of the human species in general. So, put yourself in that same place in all four themes (contained in four separate books and additional afterthoughts in a fifth one), whenever I begin with “I” or” we”, in the course of the difficult task at hand.

Jean Ovide Bourdeau, September 17, 2024

Warning

This again is NOT for the weak nor the narrow minded. This is directed only at those able, mature enough, and with the courage to set aside their indoctrinated, adapted, and self-created biases and prejudices. 

A most difficult undertaking indeed meant for the ethically and intellectually brave.

 Context

BLASPHEMOUS, SACRILEGIOUS, AND FORBIDDEN

These essays are intended to brutally wake us out of our traditional somnambulist attitude, foggy philosophical thinking, and robotized behavior, which is why they aggressively affront our patrimonial capital. They are nonetheless audaciously delivered as an act of “tough” love for the survival of our democracies when not our species, on behalf of self-aware, freedom-loving, knowledge-seeking, globally conscious, kindness-oriented, and happiness-dedicated people. And so, regrettably, be prepared to face many unpleasant realities with this text, which is likely to offend you, often at times, in addition to its occasionally coarse and sporadically reiterated presentations.

The first two of four themes forming this long text particularly will most likely be considered by many as BLASPHEMOUS, SACRILEGIOUS and FORBIDDEN undertakings, which they indeed are.

This is an intellectually brutal and frontal assault on dogmas and dogmatic belief systems such as those sponsored and managed by secular and or religious dictatorships, among others. It is meant to discredit such institutions and is a repudiation of such modus operande delivered as an act of ‘tough love’ for humanity in an attempt to wake us out of our culturally preprogrammed and socially administered intellectual somnambulism and ethical apathy.

So, be courageous enough to question, if not challenge outright, socially blasphemous, sacrilegious, and forbidden thoughts concerning prohibited subjects and existential geopolitical issues—including other existential topics normally much ridiculed, if you dare approach them, with many prohibited in liberal cultures and nations, although regularly banned outright elsewhere under pain of violent reprisals if not death. Remembering that it takes courage to question ‘The Unquestionable’.

THE INTELLECTUAL DISEASE OF SELF-RIGHTEOUSNESS

These four infuriatingly, exasperatingly, and gallingly provoking essays, presented as four separate themes, explore the phenomenon of self-righteousness found throughout human history to this day, and which this author describes as the Intellectual Disease of Self-Righteousness and defines as follows:

THE INTELLECTUAL DISEASE OF BELIEVING ONESELF TO BE MORALLY SUPERIOR TO OTHERS AND THEREBY ENTITLED TO COMPULSIVELY IMPOSE ONE'S VIEWS ON EVERYONE AT ALL COSTS NECESSARY.

This author argues that self-righteousness is the major source of conflict and intolerance in the world, and that it prevents people from engaging in rational dialogue and learning from different perspectives. He also proposes a way of thinking that is beyond orthodoxy and political correctness, based on openness, kindness, curiosity, and humility. He further criticizes the dystopian role of religious and secular ideologies in shaping our moral judgments and actions. And he continually challenges readers to question their own assumptions and prejudices, and to confront those thoughts so far forbidden from being questioned by many of our most cherished dogmas … whether they be those from our most ancient history or those promoted by today’s superpowers … urging us all along to wake up from a long intellectual slumber and moral apathy.

NOT FROM THE NORMS OF OUR PRIVILEGED LIVES

These essays deal with our planetary situation, which demands because of its scope, that we never consider our earthly situation strictly from the norms of our privileged lives if such is the case—particularly those of us in the cultural and geographical safety of the eye of the ongoing barbaric storm at the moment. We must instead make the extraordinary and most difficult effort of observing the real world as is, and most certainly as a denizen of this planet. Look! This text is written from North America by a North American and as such demands of those from this geographical  territory to go beyond our Western North American culture in view of the advantages we are generally blessed with, particularly with our planetary location here in North America. We must above all else then pay attention to planetary geopolitical, social, ethical, and psychological situations elsewhere, although such existential issues exist as well but to a lesser extent, within our midst in which our privileged life takes place, which strongly suggest that:

If indeed we do not adopt a planetary long-range geopolitical view and take appropriate, effective, and efficient actions, we then purposely blind ourselves to the evolving dystopian factors now in progress, thereby ensuring that our children and their children and their children be part of a globally developing dystopian existence.

A dreadful fact at the moment regrettably for billions of people already. We indeed must adopt an outlook from the perspective of all those unethically victimized, while they are demoted as valid human beings, and those regularly dispensed with in various barbaric ways due to the continuing and accelerating centralization of power, resources, and authorities. This long text will challenge your patience and perhaps entice you to quit. So, be brave! It will take strong resolve on your part to get through. Be courageous if you truly wish to confront humanity’s intellectual, psychological, and social biases and prejudices. If somehow unable or unwilling to do so, do not start! Just go back to your rabbit hole.

THAT LONG TEXT DIVIDED INTO FOUR THEMES

Here are thousands of pieces of an infinite multidimensional puzzle in the form of separate thoughts centered on four gigantic and incomplete puzzles: our four themes as follows:

 Theme (1) PREDICAMENT What you DO NOT want to hear but must existentially be aware of.

This theme lays out the existential predicament into which the human species has lodged itself in the course of human history, especially with its generalized adoption of what we termed the ‘Intellectual Disease of Self-Righteousness’. This is presented as a separate essay titled “FORBIDDEN THOUGHTS: On the Intellectual Disease of Self-Righteousness”.

Theme (2) DESTINATION The emerging dystopian world due to our intellectual laziness.

This theme indicates where the destination this ‘Intellectual Disease of Self-Righteousness’ is leading us to, summed up in the notion of a planetary centralization of power and authorities symbolically addressed with concepts among others such as ‘New World Order’, ‘Most Special Groups’, and ‘Communities of Interests and Benefits.’ This is presented as a separate essay titled “DYSTOPIAN THOUGHTS: On the Planetary Centralization of Power and Authorities”.

Theme (3) RESOLUTION Moving out of the lethal mess we find ourselves in.

This theme provides a firm resolution to solve both our present worsening predicament and accelerated destination through the application of acts of personalized sanity, ethics, and self-actualization in our everyday routine existence. This is presented as a separate essay titled “AUDACIOUS THOUGHTS: On Sanity, Ethics, and Self-actualization”.

Theme (4) SPECULATIONS On the universal yearning to understand our purpose.

This theme guesses and surmises, at times with hyperbolic speculations, on our situation within the Cosmos as well as address the life and self-awareness gifted to each of us for reasons completely unknown to us all to this day. This is presented as a separate essay (book) titled “UNBOUNDED THOUGHTS: On Our Compulsive Urge to Fuse with The Infinite and Eternal”.

Afterthoughts 1: SACRILEGIOUS THOUGHTS Our Murdering Species

These afterthoughts to the above themes provides a conclusion of our present human devolution with the thought that the Western Tradition civilizations, if they wake up on time, will come out victorious again, this time with the acquiescence and participation of many former enemies, while leaving behind “The Unfits”, “The Incompetents”, and “The Malicious” within its milieu, and eliminate once and for all the hold barbarism has had on the human species since time immemorial to this day. This is presented as a separate essay titled “SACRILEGIOUS THOUGHTS: Our Murdering Species”.

 CRITICAL COMMENTS

  Beyond Orthodoxy and Political Correctitude

We have evolved as conscious beings in the course of our brief history into a variety of patriarchies at all levels of societies generally headed by one or more male-managed oligarchies and associations of these to their self-accommodating interests and benefits. These are the ones we refer throughout our essays as ‘The Most Special Group’ in each political ‘Community of Interests and Benefits’ on our planet. Groups that have gradually and forcefully imposed outright political programs as well as self-regulating censure algorithms of thinking and behavior originally through religious observances and dictates and eventually through one form of secular political correctitude or another added to and reinforcing the religious ones in place or in replacement of those, where religious observance efficiency and effectiveness as a belief system diminished considerably or disappeared completely.

That being the case, each society as a whole has more or less accepted in one form or another and one type or another a variety of intellectual, psychological, social, and physical contractual arrangements for various forms of slavery to the interests and benefits of those in charge. And this whether one was born into one or more of these communities or was automatically or forcibly or willingly enrolled into them.

As the 21st century unfolds we are finally realizing that we must get out of this self-destructive type of societies because this approach can only lead to totalitarianism in the end, whether this takes place within our own society or eventually be part of Kafkaesque planetary scenarios at least, if not simply our destruction as a species. We must therefore and as soon as possible rid ourselves, wherever we are and whoever we are, of all oligarchies whether these are (in alphabetical order) in the form of anocracy, aristocracy, capitalist, ergatocracy, gerontocracy, kakistocracy, kleptocracy, kritarchy, meritocracy, plutocracy, stratocracy, synarchy, technocracy, theocracy, and timocracy or any others or in combination. That is why:  

We must absolutely go beyond present-day orthodoxy and avoid the self-censure imposed and demanded by political correctitude, and this as soon as possible and as much as possible, otherwise dystopian societies will rule us all.

WAKING UP TO ELIMINATE OUR PRECARIOUS EXISTENTIAL POSITION.

The urgent message throughout demands of us that we veer away from the unfolding Barbaric movement before us and now the Kafkaesque scenario of centralization of all resources, power, and authorities that grew out of it, including an enforced management of target populations across the board on our planet including the whole female gender as one of its crucial elements and conditions. This reality intellectually and morally demands of us the awaking from the past, present, and likely future pernicious curse of ‘self-righteousness’ affecting us all. A curse dominating all dogmatic belief systems into which our thoughts and forms of behavior are subjected to since time immemorial. And now the privilege of finding solutions to our conundrum as we attempt to slow down and redirect ourselves away from a dystopian future.

 Jean Ovide Bourdeau, March 24, 2024