I think every artist contains a huge helping of Everyman. In my book, that's how it must be. I believe one is born a tabula rasa, freshly washed and ready for other people to write on. If each of us is unique, then it is because each of us has adopted different fragments of the people we interact with or combined these borrowings in new never before seen ways.
Interestingly, this causes me to question the culpability of anyone who does something bad. I mean, ain't their fault; It's just what life has taught them. THat's why I'm against capital punishment and feel that everyone deserves humane treatment. Yes, a person might be dangerous to society, but society is culpable. I'm not saying that morality is relative. I'm just saying that the world's evil tends to pool up in certain individuals. These individuals should not be punished for the mistakes the world has made causing them to be that way. Instead, when a person has to be locked up because it's not safe to have him in 'free society", well then we should all feel some remorse for our sins of omission and commission that have likely harmed others, perhaps setting them on the path to a criminal life. Really, does it do the world any good to point at some poor slob and say..."He is bad. I know that because I am good and he is not like me. Let's punish the motherfucker!" Hell, I think that kind of thinking is at the basis of what's the matter with the world today.
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