Part III: The decline of meaningful quality
This is part III of ‘The decline of meaningful quality.’ Please read part I and part II for a full understanding of the topic being discussed. Again, this isn’t an entire representation of the topic but should rather be perceived as mixing pot of points and ideas that fit into it. The intention is not to disparage anyone or anything through this but perhaps is a form of self-reflection and awareness of where we might be at as a society and the mindsets we’re cultivating. All of this is subject to discussion and my intention is not in trying to be dogmatic with my perspective.
From my previous 2 posts, my heavy criticism was towards the machine, but this was misdirected. It was actually towards the process. The process is the becoming entirely dependent on the machine, and thats where the issue lies.
Humans should be completely involved in the creation process from start to finish, even if that sacrifices efficiency, conveniency and profit. This isn’t about the objects, or the machines themselves. All this really boils down to is a re-evaluation of who we are, which is done through the process of creation. Once we’ve fully taken that away there is little room for reflection and understanding, if all we really are is consuming. It’s about the condition of our hearts. Our internal environment. We’ve distanced ourselves from the very things that make us human, with Chat GTP now writing essays for us and thinking of ideas for our projects. Creating, listening, writing, thinking. All these things are aspects of our humanity, and allow us to reflect, evaluate and understand the world around us and our place in it. This entire reliance on machined goods will be detrimental to our society. We’re losing touch with the creation process and therefore with ourselves; isolating our nature and sufforcating it with constant pleasure. When we create, build, fail and try, we’re entering a process beyond the physical world, we’re making decisions, choices, involing aspects ourselves within the process and learning about ourselves as we go along. When we don’t create, when we don’t make these decisions, how then can we determine what kind person we are? How can we progress as individuals and participate wholly within society? We’ve been creating for our entire existence, it’s within our DNA, and now we’re offloading it to a soulless object that isn’t able to even conceptualise a relationship between a craftsman and a customer.
Harking back to the Arts & Crafts movement, it was never about the Arts or the Crafts, the items or the objects they made. It was about the process, which was a reflection of your internal morality. They rebuked the heavy tilt towards mechanisation of products entirely. Michael Haslam even stating “..the Arts & Crafts movement had more to do with the creation of the Art Object than with the Art Object itself…Arts & Crafts objects even bear evidence of their concern with the process of manufacture.” The byproduct is high-quality goods because of the stability of their own personal morals. The motto of the movement clearly encapsulates the whole concept of the movement, “Head, Hand & Heart.” The ‘Head’ representing creativity and imagination, ‘Hand’ for skill and craft, ‘Heart’ for honesty and love. The whole motto for the Arts & Crafts movement cannot physically be applied to the mechanised process of manufacture, as a machine does not have (arguably) a head or a hand, and it definitely doesn’t have a heart. It could be argued that the machine is just a tool doing it’s job, which it is, and the person is directing it, therefore the hand, head and heart are involved, yet from an abstracted position. But, this disjointed relationship adds a barrier between the creator and the creation, a third party, which completely interfers with the process in and of itself. How can we reflect who we are internally through our process and creation if we not the ones actually making it.
Perhaps, this could even be taken further as the decline in quality of our products, and truly, in the state of society, is only a symptom of our illness. Mankind is stuck at one level of thinking within our morality, as CS Lewis explores in ‘Mere Christianity,’ thus we’re facing the same issues over and over again because we’re not actually moving past the rules on paper. “What is the good of drawing up, on paper, rules for social behaviour if we know that our greed, cowardice, ill-temper, and self-conceit are going to prevent us from keeping them? I do not mean for a moment that we are not to think, and to think hard, about improvements in our social and economic systems. What I do mean is that all that thinking will be mere moonshine unless we realise that nothing but courage and unselfishness of individuals is going to make any system work propery.” CS Lewis perfectly encapsulates our current predictament, that is to say, we’re need to look at our ‘ships,’ what conditions are we in as individuals, not as social relations. Our society concerns itself entirely with fair play and harmonising between individuals, as the general consensus is, “it does not matter what his ship is like inside provided that he does not run into the next ship.” This type of thinking, CS Lewis describes, has led us down a dangerous route , causing us to be where we are now. Unsatisfied and discontent. Unless we understand that “nothing but courage and unselfishness of individuals is going to make any system work properly” then we are destined to repeat the same cycles.We are stuck on one level of morality, that is fair play and harmonising with others, and this is represented through how we process and create our items. The need to meet every single demand has meant we’ve had to rely on mechanising the process more and more.
Both of these points bring together the conclusive element that is at the center of all it. Process is inherent to nature. Everything must go through a process. This we all know. But it’s the how that matters, it’s how the process happens that makes all the difference. We can’t skip to the end page of the book and then think we know what the book is about. It’s not about the ending, or how quickly you get there. It’s about the transformation on the way, within yourself, the object, and the relationship between the two. Are we going too fast for our own good?
Typed & Created by a Human
