Camus Wants Me to be a Slut

Really, I'm just putting off my take home midterm with a little reflection and wishing I had more Battlestar Galactica to watch on DVD.

Yes, I've become hooked on Battlestar Galactica. Don't judge- you do geeky things, too. Also, they canceled Firefly a long, long time ago, so what's a girl to do for her 'we-are-flawed-people-hurtling-through-space' fix?

Anyway, last night in grad class was Camus' The Myth of Sisyphus. And I have to say, now that we've temporarily taken a break from the uber-depressing views of Sartre (who I loved, don't get me wrong) and Kafka, there's really something to this Absurd (capital A) stuff. Our professor keeps saying "obviously we all don't feel like this, or we couldn't be here debating these ideas", which doesn't make any sense to me. Most of the philosophical pieces we're reading are nothing but debate. Kierkegaard and Sartre admit they don't know what they're talking about- I'm pretty sure with the Absurd you can't KNOW anything- they're just tossing ideas out there.

But Camus put the Absurd into exactly the words I was looking for:
"This world in itself is not reasonable, that is all that can be said. But what is absurd is the confrontation of this irrational and the wild longing for clarity whose call echoes in the human heart. The absurd depends as much on man as on the world."

So how can my professor dismiss the Absurd as something his students cannot possibly feel? Doesn't everyone feel this? Not constantly. That's what drives people to despair and suicide (two very uplifting class topics). And I'm full of things the Absurd isn't so about, like: hope, a desire for romance, a longing for wealth and material possessions. But we all feel the world doesn't make sense and have a strong desire to make it make sense. Almost everything we do in life- jobs, taxes, marriage- is an attempt to put order into our world. And then something happens- 9/11, Hurricane Katrina, the tsunami- to let us know that we have no control and there's no such thing as order.

Boo-yah, Professor Donaldson.

Anyway, what I really wanted to focus on in this blog was Camus' thoughts on Don Juan as an ideal man. Don Juan is a do-er, in all senses of the word. Heehee. Yes, he'll do you, too. The geeky students of the Absurd got a big kick out of that one. Don Juan loved a woman. Then he loved another woman. He didn't collect them. He never thought of the past women when he was with a new one. He lived in the moment and he constantly acted. This is the way to thrive in an Absurd universe. So says Camus.

Yup, lots of sex for all of us, as long as we aren't bogged down by regret or longing for the past or a desire for a deeper connection. And we can't lie to our partners. We can't make promises or say we love them or that they're the only one for us. This is what Sartre would call 'acting in bad faith'.

According to Camus, Don Juan is in the right, because "he loves [each woman] with the same passion and each time with his whole self that he must repeat his gift and his profound quest". The women are foolish because "each [one] hopes to give him what no one has ever given him. Each time they are utterly wrong." They want to teach him to love, but he does love. Everyone. One at a time.

"Why should it be essential to love rarely in order to love much?"

Also, I suspect Don Juan may have attended McDaniel College and been in the theater department.