Blog #4 - Subjectivity

After reading this chapter, I saw myself grow a bit annoyed only to become completely convinced with what this entire reading was about. Though I do not full believe with the idea that no human being is unique at all, for people have the special ability to surpise you at any moment, I do share the idea that we are, for the most part, subjects rather than true selfs in our lives. I always used to laugh at those types that were always yelling proudly that they were the "different" people and they were not going to conform to anybodies rules or expectations. I never understood why I thought these people were funny, I guess I just thought they were tools. But after reading this chapter I now better understand what was funny. They were all conforming to NOT conforming, and as this chapter points out by not allowing yourself to be dictated by the laws of everyone else, you are unknowingly still be influenced by something, thus still conforming. I guess there are no true rebels out there, and I guess I was right... those people were tools.

The story at the end is an interesting one in that it can be looked at in a few different ways. I am going to go with the one that I first thought of after reading it, and I think it is the one that stands out the most. The countryman seems to be the subject as he not only is having his life dictated by the doorman, but also the law. Though the law is effecting his life indirectly, he does not have to stay there, the countryman feels that he must. And with that belief in the law he then gives into the doorman's request and sits there until his death. The doors are even wide open before him and he is even told of the consequences for his entry, and he still does nothing other than what he is told. The countryman is never a unique self and his whole life has been determined by this current moment in his life. This is what Kafka was talking about, and one of the points that upsetted me the most in this chapter. The thought of a true self is a delusion, there is no such thing as being completely out with your society to the point that you are a total unique person.

So to Kafka we are all passengers in the car that has been guiding all of humans since the beginning. We have no control over who or what in life that is going to be the dictators in our life. There has to be a driver though, right? I mean humans have created and given meaning to everything that we know, so in a way we have shapped and paved our own roads. Not "our own" roads in the sense that it was actually you or me, but "our own" as in the human race. That being the case, I believe at any moment, during any era, we could change, and pave a new road for us to be the passengers in.