Oldal 112 [112]
No one can remain critical or indifferent. Orwell continues,
the horrible thing about the Two Minutes Hate was not that one was
obliged to act a part, but, on the contrary, that it was impossible to
avoid joining in. Within thirty seconds any pretence was always
unnecessary. A hideous ecstasy of fear and vindictiveness, a desire
to kill, to torture, to smash faces in with a sledge-hammer, seemed
to flow through the whole group of people like an electric current,
turning one even against one’s will into a grimacing, screaming
lunatic. And yet the rage that one felt was an abstract, undirected
emotion which could be switched from one object to another like the
flame of a blowlamp. (Orwell 2014. 1.1.)
According to Kierkegaard, hate is the panic of the lowbrow, panic
and anxiety to be themselves. (Kierkegaard 1983 pp.71., SKS 11.)
This is incredibly apt. They are desperate to be themselves. This
forms the basis of their feeling of inferiority. They are capable of
anything to disguise their despair and inferiority. Such people are
incredibly limited in their perspectives but hold their heads high
proudly when they see only like-minded people around themselves.
Otherwise, they would have to face the fact that there is nothing
“original” in them. They are failures. They lose their selves as
easily as people lose umbrellas, since their selves mean nothing
to them. They take no risks.
And yet, precisely by not venturing it is so terribly easy to lose what
would be hard to lose, however much one lost by risking, and in any
case never this way, so easily, so completely, as if it were nothing at
all—namely, oneself. (Ibid.p.73.)
Or later:
They use their capacities, amass money, carry on secular enterpri¬
ses, calculate shrewdly, etc., perhaps make a name in history, but
themselves they are not; spiritually speaking, they have no self, no