The gravity of perversity

Perversity --> Deliberately (and obstinately) deviating from what is good (courtesy Webster) ; being perversely wicked

We are liable to confuse it with a relatively more known word -perversion.

Perversion --> 1. An aberrant sexual practice that is preferred to normal intercourse
2. The action of perverting something (turning it to a wrong use)
for instance - "it was a perversion of justice" (courtesy Webster)

I recognize that what I am going to say can not be said in prose without making the whole water turbid. Also, it can hardly be defended by arguments or substantiated by ready evidence. The thought is very subtle and its understanding presumes an observant, sensitive and sympathetic mind. Ideally this thought should have been expressed in verse. Only poetry could have carried its butterfly-like fragility with safety and dignity. Only poetry is capable to stir a pond without making the water turbid. But I am not a poet.

I am going to dive in the sea of thought in hope of some gems. Lets see what I come out with. We start with a question.

Have you ever thought of a duel in which the harder you hit, the harder you hurt yourself; the deeper you slash other's breast, the more copious your own heart bleeds?

I am sure all of us have. It can happen when you respect your opponent(whom you wound), when you consider him not exactly separate from yourself, when the distinction between him and yourself is deceptive, unreal and situational; when you can not slay him like 'the other' and sleep peacefully. Our literature is full of such complex conflicts. Remember Mahabharat.

It can happen only when you begin to get a sort of pleasure in pain. This pleasure is black in colour and sinister in nature. It breeds an array of repentant nights. We call it perverse pleasure. It contains the elements of sadomasochism, as a psychologist would perhaps like to say.

But then why would someone indulge in this ghastly business unless he/she is insane? Right, but we see that all of us have insane moments in the age of tired days and restless nights. And so much confusion around us. In those dark, destructive, insane moments we do lash our swords and cut the throats of our own friends. Later we lament over their dead bodies. Oh the futility of sleepless nights and moist pillows!

But we can do better, something less helpless. This post is an attempt to stimulate questions that prompt us to identify a pattern, a pattern of circumstances that are liable to trigger perverse behaviour in a normal person. It is a attempt committed to decode the mechanism and demystify the overpowering power of these insane moments. To defeat your enemy, you must know him.

I have seen this enemy more than once in my life. And I remember some of his prominent features that will help us draw his rough sketch. Whenever you sense his minotory proximity, run away. Or shoot him.

1. Perverse mood - When you secretly *long* for a situation that give you a chance to unleash your unenviable stock of words that sting infernally, you sense that you are in a perverse mood.

Often we actually prepare ourselves for the decisive battle, especially when something irritates us to the limit of our tolerance. Not appals or repels, just irritates. Like a buzz of a gadfly in your ear. Like dripping of water from your bathroom tap. Like bad breath or body odor. You just can not stand it. Nor can you justify the magnitude of your frustration by means of reason. Most of the relationships break not due to differences of opinions on India's foreign policy but due to an incorrigible and irritating habit, for instance, sending those nerve-wrecking forwards that threaten a doom if you don't forward them to your friends! As silly and as unreasonable(for some) as that!

But how you say something is often more important than what you say, especially in personal matters. We must watch our manner. A perverse mood makes us absolutely incapable of keeping any pleasant or even agreeable atmosphere around us. It's sort of mental acidity due to indigestion of some disturbing thoughts. So, when in a perverse mood, the golden rule is - save yourself from conversations and dont let discussions bother you. In short, postpone all the programmes of socialization. Cancel all dates. There are so many things to be done in isolation. When others are in that mode, waiting for an opportunity to trample on your nerves, again do the same. This is time-tested recipe. My experience substitutes for any further rationalization you might ask for.

Also, this mood is contagious in nature. And I have seen that a mistake has its own momentum, and has a snowball effect. It's hard to stop it. Once you are in the game, it's difficult to get out of it. It has a gravity that sucks you within it. Escape is not easy.

2. Shrinkage of egoes - The fission of we into you and I takes place sooner than we come to realize thanks to the perverse discussion. And then their egoes abandon themselves in a wild strife of meaningless recriminations (alternatively ominously invulnerable silence) and knowingly injure each other's precious pride with insensitive cruelty. Followed by vulgar mudwrestling and disgraceful wallowing in the each other's blood. The sad thing is - all this more due to inertia typical of perversity than any resentment!

Result-a wall is created between you and I. Time heals but the wall gets cemented by the pasaage of time. Why? Here come some simple but interesting observations.

a. Guilt: One who feels the pangs of a guilty conscience is more(!) likely to resent the thought of reconciliation. Saying 'sorry' sometime disturbs the political balance inherently and tacitly established in a relationship. Apology is a luxury that can be afforded only by those who are in a position to assume moral superiority. A guilt-ridden person is more prone to blindly recidivate to the easy refuge of biting bitterness and vicious cruelty. It delivers him of the uneasy situation where he has to act what he can not, for long. So he screams 'Let me be!' and flees to the place he belongs to. No one wants to come face to face with his inferiority complex. That requires a big, very big heart.

A sense of guilt rocks the base of one's moral position and clouds the ability to choose the right direction. It's like being left on a strange land without a map. It engenders chaos and panic in a conscientious mind. And then that god damned Murphy's law. Overwhelmed by an unsettling scruple, in order to get rid of the immediate cause of shame and torment, a man does wrong after wrong and each blunder presses him to commit the next. Someone who places an inordinately high value on virginity is very likely to go berserk if somehow stripped of it. Try to understand this point. Puritans think in terms of binary opposites and that's why very hard to handle.

"There are two kinds of men and only two. And that young man is one kind. He is high-minded. He is pure. He's the kind of man the world pretends to look up to, and in fact despises. He is the kind of man who breeds unhappiness, particularly in women. Do you understand?

I think you do. There's another kind. Not high-minded, not pure, but alive. Now, that your tastes at this time should incline towards the juvenile is understandable; but for you to marry that boy would be a disaster. Because there are two kinds of women. There are two kinds of women and you, as we well know, are not the first kind. You, my dear, are a slut." - Komarovski (Doctor Zhivago)

A cruel man is often a pitiably confused man.

b. Pride: I am beginning to realize that maintaining a relationship is an art. It comes naturally to some. Others learn. You must know when and where to stop. You must not forget the inviolable sanctity of territorial boundaries. It is crutial.

There are times when you and I forgive each other in our hearts but do not say so. Why? Because of their egoes. In order to save their faces. Here I assume that our understanding of the concept of 'face' is sound enough. So unless one has something to save his face, he wouldnt come forward to patch up. Even when he comes to you and apologises, you might not be in a position to forgive and make up. Because though it is possible to live alone with bad memories, it is difficult to live together with them. It is embarassing to let the other fellow know that you can live with something that bad too. The fear of his taking you for granted in future precludes the possibilities of restoration of erstwhile chemistry. This is, I think, why girls tend to conceal their true feelings and hesitate to express themselves, in order not to look easy. It's all about the weight of your character, the perception of your social image and its management. It's about face-saving. And the social contract expects us to allow this bit of hypocrisy. But sometimes we deny every possible face-saving excuse, we consciously block every returning road in the heat of conflict. And most of the times we regret it, since many times the moments are insane not the man.

So we see that the perverse behaviour leads to shrinkage and creation of a wall between two individuals. Besides, it leads to a reversal to nature stereotypical to their surroundings. This process is deliberate, obstinate and essentially in reaction to something. Whatever is common is discarded. The bridges that join are blasted off. This is a way to distance oneself from the other and feel (and sometimes flaunt) a freshness of freedom. This pseudo-freedom is also perverse in nature. What is freedom when you are too much aware of it!

This is a complicated subject and offering a solution here would be too ambitious a task for me. So I would refrain from that. This post is by no means meant to be a conclusive article. Rather it is just a beginning to explore the deeper layers of human psychology and to understand our own behaviour in trying circumstances. The whole idea of this exercise is to identify that there is a bottomless abyss called perversity and there are certain signboards around it. Remember these signs to avoid a fall. Keeping this in mind becomes our point of departure.