Contradictions OK in finding your way

Classes are almost over. Girls are lying around campus half naked. It’s bright enough outside… Classes are almost over. Girls are lying around campus half naked. It’s bright enough outside that I can wear my sunglasses, and wearing sunglasses makes me feel cool. And feeling cool is nearly enough to lull me into writing something delightfully insipid to close out the semester.

I could celebrate the summer for providing us with the opportunity to catch butterflies and copulate in national parks all over this country. But that’s just not my style, and more importantly, I’d be selling out if I did.

Ah, there’s the rub. It’s the inevitability we all face when we dare to argue a point. We risk being called a sellout or a hypocrite. They’re not very nice names to call anyone. I know that because I looked them up in the dictionary. Well, the dictionary wasn’t too helpful, but the thesaurus was. My favorite synonyms for “hypocrite” are “bigot,” “knave,” “Judas” and the dreaded “humbug.”

While I doubt anyone would call me a knave if I wrote a column begging people to dedicate this summer to self-indulgence, it might seem a tad out of character. Though it’d hardly be hypocrisy. Even if I wrote such a column but failed to divide my summer between sex and science fiction soap operas or even slipped up and volunteered somewhere, I’d be a failure, not a hypocrite.

There is a line between urging everyone, including oneself, to act a certain way while being unable to do so and perpetually championing a cause you’ve no intention of trying to live by. The line exists, but I don’t find much comfort being on the saner side of it.

The saner side of hypocrisy still feels like selling out. I don’t agree with the way my taxes are spent, but I still file them and would pay the extra Uncle Sam wants if I had the money. I disagree with the business practices of the company I work for, but I’m still there because I need to pay, among other things, the money I owe the IRS. I despise the system that’s in place to protect our rights, and I’ve mocked those who try to “change things from the inside.” But I keep putting off studying the history or reading the USA PATRIOT Act because I’d rather watch another season of “24.”

OK, that last bit is more laziness than selling out, but it all concerns me.

I tell myself that compromises are necessary to get to the point at which I can have maximum impact. What concerns me is how vague a destination that is. I don’t know from which mount I’d like to deliver a sermon, and I have no clue if I’ll be in an “eye for an eye” or a “mankind would rather know than feel” mood. Without knowing precisely where I’m trying to go, how can I know if the compromises I have to make are reasonable?

Once that question’s asked, it’s easy to let my feelings contort my thoughts into “I’m not really making compromises, I’m unfailingly doing what society demands and I’m making all this noise just to nurse my need for an iconoclastic image.”

It all comes down to faith. I may not have enough faith to reconcile a loving God and Alzheimer’s, but I can manage to believe that each person who struggles to speak, act and think as though his life has meaning has already improved things.

So dare to argue the virtues of prohibition while sloshed. Wear leather pants while eating a tofu burger. Demand fewer taxes and free healthcare. Don’t be afraid to contradict yourself.

And don’t rob the rest of us of a passionately argued idea just because it’s not something you can live by.

Zak Sharif wants to start protests all over campus: E-mail him at rzs8@pitt.edu if you think that’d be hypocritical.