2013 AP LANGUAGE AND COMPOSITION ARGUMENTATIVE ESSAY

Ownership is a many faceted and generally misunderstood concept that has been elucidated by dozens of thinkers throughout western history. These thinkers tend to define ownership in relation to a sense of self that is even less understood than the ownership that supposedly proceeds it. In the following, the reader will see a western interpretation of ownership and its inherently meaningless inclusion with a sense of self.

            The average individual in the western world has been reared in a society that induces massive consumerism in all ages from toddlers to the aged. In the years that divide these two age groups the western citizen is coerced through societal pressure to have as much as possible. From this having of object foreign to the body does the idea of self emanates. Westerners tend, in general, to derive their sense of self from the objects around them. What they fail to realize is that the objects that are being bought are the ideas of someone else. The products, ranging from cars to toys, are the designs of some other person. While a person might own something in the legal sense of own a product, to derive self-worth or a sense of self from this item would be detrimental to the individual. It is detrimental in the idea that said person is merely owning a single copy of the item, rather than owning the concept of the item itself. The original designer would “own” the item in its most total sense and would, would more capably, derive a sense of self from that item. Even in this derivation of self-worth there remain problems.

            As Sartre points out in his ideas regarding his waiter in the café, the sense of self that one derives from items or occupations is dependent on how the individual interprets said items to reflect on their idea of self. Here it is the individual’s interpretation that creates a sense of self rather than the item itself. While this is certainly a more nuanced view of the problem, it does not solve the problem of things outside the self reflecting an actuality of the self. In Sartre’s view the human will to create a sense of self in dependent on the individual, as it should be. Where he digresses is in the acquiescence to outside forces forming a persons will. A western citizen, cultured and grown in a world dedicated to materialism and consumerism, has little choice in their concept of self. The outside forces are, at least according to Sartre’s line of thought, so burdensome that the individual in some sense relinquishes their own created individual for the image that a society drapes upon them. People, in general, feel content to fulfill the roles that are cast upon them. This therefore is not the way to define self and is implausible due to several factors.

            Chief among these factors is the willingness to let things outside the body define the body itself. If one holds a non-metaphysical understanding of the world and the things in it, (ie, that one rejects the dualistic nature of platonic forms and other such ‘informers’ of the world) then one must ask why something that is foreign to a body has the capability to define that body itself. The body, and hence the self as a product of said body, can only be defined by what is within. People would rather define themselves by what they are not, ie anything outside the body. This however is just as detrimental to the understanding of self. Definition of self through negation, ie what is outside the body, does not define what self is but rather what self it not. For example, the idea of self is contingent upon the body. If it is contingent upon the body for its primary existence then it should derive its existential meaning from the thing it is derivative of, in this case the body itself. This is much the case with many things. Take for instance the idea of a tree. When lumber is harvested from a tree the original idea, existential meaning, of the lumber was to sustain the tree. It has simply been repurposed. The repurposing of the tree into lumber does not nullify its primary existential meaning of supporting its original body. Therefore we can still define lumber as something that was in existence to support the tree it originally come from. The same can be said of the self. Its original purpose is to support the body in which it resides, almost as a soul. However, unlike a soul its existence is completely contingent on the body. As it is contingent on the body for both its creation and continued existence, the body must, by necessity provide the self its primary meaning.

Therefore, the sense of self that one cultivates can not be derived from anything external to the body. These externalities include but a certainly not limited to, the products and creations of a modern world, the ideas that one creates with external input rather that a priori. Sense of self is predicated on the body and therefore must be derivative of the body and the body alone.   

Sartre on Bad Faith (Paper)

 In Being and Nothingness, Jean-Paul Sartre introduces a concept termed bad faith. In the following brief analysis of the term the reader will view the origins and definitions of the term bad faith, their relation to the existential, as well as the use of bad faith in Sartre's other works. In total, the reader will find a compelling reason why the term bad faith can be applied to humans.

To lie to one's self. To be a deceiver of the soul. To understand and recognize and then to ignore. These are the traits that are indicative of someone who is in bad faith. "We shall willingly grant that bad faith is a lie to oneself, on condition that we distinguish the lie to oneself from lying in general." (Sartre, Being and Nothingness p. 87) Sartre paints a literary picture in his work, Being and Nothingness, that portrays exactly what is at stake for a person who acts according to bad faith. According to Sartre the person who acts in bad faith is essentially performing an act of self-negation. While anyone is capable of telling a lie the person who tells a lie must also be in possession of the truth. (Sartre, Being and Nothingness p. 87). To be in bad faith that person knows the truth of their beliefs, actions, etc, but refuses to acknowledge these truths. The being that they have is therefore based on negating this very being. This self-lying is different from the lying that one might do to others. IN lying to others "The liar intends to deceive and he does not hide this intention from himself..." (Sartre, Being and Nothingness p. 88). In order for a man to truly be in bad faith he must be in possession of a truth and unwilling to recognize that truth. Once informed of the idea of bad faith the reader should see how bad faith is portrayed in other works by Sartre.

In the play No Exit, Sartre is able to display the way that bad faith would mold individuals into what they are. The one act play in which bad faith becomes evident, No Exit is about three people who have died and are now stuck in hell together. Hell in this instance is a drawing room decorated in Second Empire Style. The play was written in 1944 in France and could have been meant as a commentary on the German occupation of Paris. The three people that are kept in this drawing room are: a mother who cheated on her husband and then threw her illegitimate daughter, new-born, off a balcony, a man who joined the army but deserted before killing anyone, and a lady who seduced her cousin's wife while she was living with them. The room that they are stuck in has no mirrors, therefore the people trapped there could not see themselves as they want to see themselves but can only see themselves through the others in the room. The lack of a mirror can be representative of the lack of reflection on their actions that the people are capable of. The reflections are not corporeal with out a mirror. Instead they are forced to look inside themselves to understand who they are.

Estelle is the one looking for a mirror. With her dependency on mirrors the reader can clearly see the Narcissism inherent in her being. Because she refuses to see herself as she really is and relies instead upon her reflection in a mirror she is the character that is in bad faith the most. She is torturing herself by refusing to know herself as she is. With her torturing herself she inflicts torture on the other occupants, namely Garcin. (Sartre, No Exit )

Garcin is the cowardly soldier. He desperately wants reassurance that he is in fact not a coward. His desire is for peace and quiet more than the other characters. He had ambitions while alive to create a pacifist newspaper but never does. He runs from his actions and then seeks to rewrite them in his memory. (Sartre, No Exit )

Inez wants to be with Garcin, sexually. She works as the mirror for Estelle, to Estelle’s terror. When Inez describes what she sees in Estelle, she makes Estelle afraid/terrorized. She is the only one in the room who is able to see herself for what she is. She also attempts to make Garcin see himself as what he is. At one point she says, "So carry on, Mr. Garcin, and try to be honest with yourself-- for once." (Sartre, No Exit p. 38) This is at the point that she attempts to make Garcin realize that all the justifications that he has fabricated for running away from the army are just fabrications meant to enable him to live with his choices. Inez believes that Garcin understands that he is a coward but denies the truth to himself.

The play revolves around the idea of bad faith. Estelle is the one that is most clearly in bad faith. Garcin is much more ambiguous. He comes across as very indecisive. Inez is the only one who understands why she is placed int he drawing room. She is the only one who does not have bad faith. She understands that her person is defined by her actions. In her case she is defined by the terrible actions that she willingly did. She is the one who attempts to lead, unwittingly, the others to realize why there are in Hell. Hell is other people. There are problems with this way of thinking. In recognizing the negative forces that effect us one must also suppose that these negatives assure the existence of positives. While Garcin wants to focus solely on the negative he does so at the expense of the positive. The negation implies the possibility of the truth. (Sartre, No Exit )

The act of being requires an affirmation of the self by the individual. In addressing bad faith Sartre tries to identify why some people see themselves differently than they actually are. By being what you are and knowing what you are the individual is not living in bad faith. But if the individual acknowledges that they are being in one sense and deny that they are being in that one sense then they are, in essence, living by negation. They refuse to live positively and instead they live through denial. They deny who they are and, by doing so, they deny that they are, in fact, being. They are in a backwards fashion. (Sartre, No Exit )

It is my belief that Sartre portrays the human condition in a convincing fashion. In Being and Nothingness he portrays humanity as existing in a sort of equilibrium. Humans are capable of realizing who they are but shy away from doing so. Sartre uses the example of the waiter who is not a waiter. The waiter knows that he is not 'being' a waiter but is rather being a person who is playing at being a waiter. Sartre states that the waiter is merely a role in which the person playing at waiter is. (Sartre, Being and Nothingness p. 102). The man, acting as a waiter, knows that through such actions he is thereby given rights that pertain to such actions. (Sartre, Being and Nothingness p. 102). "I am a waiter in the mode of being what I am not" (Sartre, Being and Nothingness p.103). By saying this Sartre is affirming that in the first degree he is a man that has being and in the second degree is a man that chooses to act as a waiter, but he is never in the mode of being a waiter.

Through many different mediums Sartre assaults the way that most humans cope with their choices. In his work Being and Nothingness he describes in theoretical detail the way that many people suppress their true being in favor of something that they would rather think themselves being. In No Exit he supplies his reader with visceral evidence of people engaging in the act of self-denial. This evidence, coupled with his theory on being, drives the reader to be moved into accepting his bad faith as a legitimate explanation for understanding the self denial that humans visit upon themselves.

Bibliography

Sartre, Jean. No exit, and three other plays. Vintage International ed. New York: Vintage International, 1989. Print.

Sartre, Jean, and Hazel Estella Barnes. Being and nothingness. New York [etc.: Washington Square Press, 1992. Print.