We oftentimes assume that some people are purely good, and even ask, why do bad things happen to good people. That being an innocent victim of a crime or even being the oppressed or downtrodden means being moral. It’s almost as if going through pain inflicted by external forces means you are virtuous, with no blemish.
But what if a majority of people that are good are only seen as such because they have never been in a position to do harm. What if their shadows have simply never had the space to emerge and fully manifest.
Carl Jung called the shadow the part of ourselves we refuse to see. The dark desires, the fears and impulses that we hide deep inside to appear moral. Always running away from them, never facing them to deal with them. Yet the more we repress the shadow, the more it leaks through our thoughts and actions.
What does it mean when the shadow leaks? Let’s look at Piggy from Lord of the Flies. Piggy is the butt of many jokes and the easy target for bullies. Well, the fact that his name is never given in the book shows that he is resigned to being Piggy, the asthmatic fat boy with glasses. Even the guy he looks to as his protector cannot pass up on an opportunity to ridicule him.
Piggy is no fool however. He is the voice of reason among the savages, the logical man who always has a plan that if followed well, could eventually lead to the boys being rescued.
Compared to Jack and Roger, Piggy is a saint.
But his shadow leaks. There are two instances that show that Piggy has the potential for evil.
The first instance is after Simon’s death. Ralph is distraught thinking about what they have done. He knows it’s evil. Piggy however starts to make excuses. As an intellectual, he doesn’t go the superstitious route like Jack and the hunters and say Simon was the beast disguised. He uses logical arguments. It was dark, it was an accident. We were not even the ones beating him, we were just watching. He tries to use any reason to avoid facing up to the fact that the beast is not outside deep in the forest, but inside him.
The second moment is when he compares the boys to a pack of painted niggers during a fight. He again goes back to reason. No self-respecting British boy would behave like that. That savagery belongs to the blacks. Now, it isn’t implied that Piggy is some sort of overt racist who keeps up with the writings of David Duke. The question this incident raises is how he would treat black kids on the island. As things stand, he is at the bottom of the food chain and the easy target. But given a chance to punch down, would he do it? Would he be open to ridiculing boys of other races that the society he comes from deems inferior.
These two incidents point to the fact that the shadow is not hidden as deep as people want it to be. The powerless, even in their disenfranchisement, will still show signs of evil. Back in the day, it might have been easier to hide that dark side of you. In this day and age however, we have been given platforms to show our true selves, let the dark side thrive, a faceless persona bullying kids on the internet, dehumanizing your fellow human under the guise of intellectual honesty.
What happens when we ignore the shadow? Well, the supposed innocents will get their time in power. Every dog has its day, and more likely than not, there will be a lot more biting than barking. You don’t have to be the one actively beating Simon or leading a racist organization. But your lack of willingness to deal with your implicit biases is a repression of the shadow. Your mental gymnastics to absolve yourself from blame is a suppression of the shadow.
It’s your cavalier attitude to the suffering of others by the hands of an institution, organization or nation that you support in one way or the other.
I’m a huge fan of this radio station even though they constantly refer to the Tutsi as cockroaches. I mean, I’m not the one doing the killing, I sit on the sidelines. But I’ll continue listening, their playlist is just too good.
Until one is able to deal with their shadow, they remain an oppressor-in-waiting.
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