Connection: Immorality and... Respect?

Because sometimes they go together, but they shouldn't.

Marlow in Heart of Darkness has a molotov cocktail of emotions regarding Kurtz, but the two that I had the most trouble connecting were hatred and respect. He seemed disgusted by those callous, business-obsessed characters like the Manager, yet even as he condemns Kurtz's life he assures us that he was "a remarkable man", speaking with a sense of awe and reverence. Why does he link these two ideas that, for all intents and purposes, should be kept seperate?

I think Marlow has been duped by progress. The horror of Kurtz is so blatent that the fact he wasn't trying to hide it is almost impressive. Kurtz might have been able to get respect for being bold, but Marlow also can't help but be impressed by what Kurtz had accomplished, and our culture supports those who get things done. These two combined created an unbelievable man whose myths strived to live up to the real guy.

The settling of Africa was viewed as a general improvement, with some 'sacrifices'. Sacrifices? Repressing thousands of people and killing thousands of others is not a minimal issue. It got me thinking- how much are we willing to overlook in our opinion of a person? Can we truly respect someone who goes against everything we stand for? I'm not sure. I think that our respect for those who are successful is more of an enchantment than a genuine conviction that the person is someone worth admiring. We manage to fool ourselves into thinking its respect.

Respect has a meaning of a role model or someone you look up to. How could the African natives be so enthralled with Kurtz even as he enslaved them, took their lifestyles and freedom away, and killed to set examples? I don't believe their admiration can be considered respect, more of a terror they had convinced themselves was mere shame at being so 'low' compared to him. The fact that his partners were also willing to overlook this, even those with a higher moral conscience such as Marlow, is a key into the way our minds work. We truly are a world blinded by dazzling gems and strong personalities.

Connection: Intentions and Actions

"The conquest of the earth... is not a pretty thing when you look into it too much" (Conrad 7).

The intention of one people to civilize another is something I look at with suspicion. Inevitably, the power that the conquering leaders attain is too great to give up, and these forces have trouble letting go of their prey, however civilized they manage to become. While occasionally one might go in with good intentions, authority proves to be a powerful drug. The reason behind its potency is the fact that even the best people consider themselves above corruption until they are actually in a seat of power.

I found the official mission of King Leopold's forays into Africa similar to the inevitable corruption of communism, which we learned about in history as well as in Sophie's World. If we assume that the European countries' outward goal (civilizing and bettering natives/ their society) was in fact the primary reason for going to Africa, then they seem to have the same positive end result that communism offered. However, we know that the results of both were quite different from their original objectives.

Communism is an ideal that would have provided a better life, in theory, to the working/peasant classes in Europe in the 1900's. However, once put into action, the government style crumbled under those who gained power in the new regime. It was easier to say everyone deserves bread than to actually scale down your own feast to provide for others. If everyone else lives in a shack, it counts as shelter, so who cares if your 'shack' happens to be a three story mansion? The equality balance was quickly thrown off by those who found new opportunities to cheat the system.

The Europeans who were sent to Africa also took advantage of the power they asserted over the natives. If their goal was to bring civilization to Africa, were they really leading the Africans to establish their own developed communities, or were they trying to assure that the Africans would be the machines and slaves behind a European culture? That this trend can be found in so many other instances in history worries me.

The lure of power and prestige is certainly not a new idea. The fact that it is present in many different places in the world, and the fact that the rise of one human being now means the suppression or failure of another, is something we need to fix. We need to make sure that the aims of an endeavor are meant to improve people's lives, not just materially satisfy some C.E.O. sitting in an office in New York.

It's so essential that we give credit to actions, rather than assume the typed-up press statement a company sends out will be honored. As we learned in Heart of Darkness, the 'honorable' mission King Leopold was commissioning was not what the European citizens were proud of and admiring. The true mission was a monetary scheme covered up by an appeal to human nature. When we learn to separate the good ideas that will work day-to-day from the ones that only work on the surface, we will become a better functioning society.