Follower of Jan Massys: Two Peasants Looking at a Mirror (c. 1550)

"I will be investigating this notion between now and just before Christmas."

We insist that we are decent people, charitable to a fault. We rail against indecency as if it were the obscenity it always was. Yet we engage in the occasional absolutely indecent activity. We're currently, under the direction of our administration, which, thankfully, cannot administer anything, deporting people without due process. They're initiating, in our good name, a raft of initiatives Decency prohibits. Yet they're still proclaiming from every pulpit just how deep down Decent they are, and we remain.

Maybe Decency is something other than what we've always assumed it was. Perhaps it has nothing to do with high-minded intentions or results. Maybe it can be whatever anybody insists it is, deportations included. No, most of us know better than that. We might not know with much precision, taken to a dozen significant digits, but we understand deep in our guts. We recognize it when we see it and usually even acknowledge when we notice the opposite. Decency doesn't rely upon scale to prove its importance. It might be best exercised at the smaller end of any measurement. Most of the Decency in this universe occurs at such a small scale that most people can't notice it, but then Decency was never intended to be a spectator sport.

The most decent seems to occur at only the tiniest possible scales. Person to person, with no story to tell beyond, other than a silent nod of acknowledgement. A micro event, misleadingly minor. Those attempting to perform Decency at scale usually fail. They produce some spectacle instead, within which genuine acts perhaps prevail, but none of these seem to satisfy the hurdle demanded by those attempting to perform at scale. The quiet little decent movie might not even draw enough box office to repay the cost of producing it, but it changed most of the individuals who saw it, and the universe was a better place as a result.

The obscenity presently in office deals almost exclusively in massive productions, large but vacuous. Their attempted grandeur shows their hollow interior. Their content, intended as spectacle, proves less than memorable. Shocking revelations hold the shelf life of an electrical shock, less than a second. They alarm and alert the senses without producing anything beyond alarm. Nobody's a lick wiser for witnessing such productions. They produce nothing very lasting, which explains why they'll feel compelled to stage another one tomorrow. Audiences accustomed to sugar plums may feel hungry as they exit the theater and might need to return for more pseudo nourishment tomorrow.

Those whom Decency inspires seem capable of making their own way in this world. They do not require continuous direction or reinforcement like evil does. They find opportunities to be the blessing they desire without aspiring to be in any way acknowledged or publicly recognized for it. A healthy economy is not comprised of libertarians, but egalitarians, ones seeking fair trades rather than personal dominion. Likewise, a healthy society never demands solidarity. It can encourage criticism and dissent without fear of undermining anybody’s overly delicate sensibilities. A large part of treating others decently involves expecting others to treat me decently, too. I do not need to co-opt any imagined obscenity if I believe that others are also looking out for me.

Decency might be no more than a deep-seated belief. Its utility cannot be calculated in hopes of gaining some market position. It pays no immediate dividends and despises such accounting. It engages for its own sake, just because it's decent, not because it aspires to gain anything. It's tenaciously egalitarian.

As you can see, I'm feeling my way into this new series. I have chosen to celebrate this long-awaited autumn by investigating this essential if strange proclivity most of us maintain. The headlines and even the footnotes have lately been dominated by cruelty. One might rightfully wonder what happened to Decency. It had seemed to be present before it simply wasn't anymore. The current administration, which has no intention of administering anything, has been waging a war on Decency since its earliest seconds. One might understandably believe that Decency has become an endangered species, but I'm considering that conclusion might be wrong or at least hasty. I see plenty of Decency still around me, if only because I tenaciously cling to its utter necessity in my own life. I reject the permission our present administration, which has no intention of administering anything, daily imparts to me and my fellow citizens, that it's okay to be cruel and petty. My Decency and I insist that it's never been okay and never will be. I will be investigating this notion between now and just before Christmas. Welcome!

©2025 by David A. Schmaltz - all rights reserved

Tags: #Decency, #PureSchmaltz