"Astra Taylor: How do you behave ethically if there's no ultimate meaning?



Avital Ronell: Precisely where there isn't guaranteed or palpable meaning, you have to do a lot of work and you have to be mega-ethical, 'cause it's much easier to live life and know that well, that you shouldn't do, and this you should do, because someone said so.

If we're not anxious, if we're okay with things, we're not trying to explore or figure anything out.

So anxiety is the mood, par excellence, of ethicity, I think, you know.
Now, I'm not prescribing anxiety disorder for anyone.

However, could you imagine Mr. Bush, who doesn't give a shit when he sends everyone to the gas chamber or the electric chair? He expresses no anxiety. And they're very proud of this. They don't lose a wink of sleep. They express no anxiety.

This is something that Derrida has taught. If you feel that you've acquitted yourself honorably, then you're not so ethical. If you have a good conscience, then you're kind of worthless.
Like, if you think- "Oh, I gave this homeless person five bucks. I'm great"- then you're irresponsible.

The responsible being is one who thinks they've never been responsible enough. They've never taken care enough of the Other. The Other is so in excess of anything you can understand or grasp or reduce.

This in itself creates an ethical relatedness-a relation without relation, 'cause you don't know-
You can't presume to know or grasp the Other.
The minute you think you know the Other, you're ready to kill them.
You think,
"Oh, they're doing this or this. They're the axis of evil. Let's drop some bombs."
But if you don't know, you don't understand this alterity, it's so Other that you can't violate it with your sense of understanding, then you have to let it live, in a sense."

Z filmu Examined Life, reżyserii Astry Taylor.