Disrepair

“The beauty of things and of people is enhanced by the necessity of their disintegration and death” (Spelman,106)

     Death has held a fascination in human nature since the dawn of time because of its unknown element. Writers and famous artists have been known to, in extreme cases, take their own lives in order to create an aura of mystery around their work and draw the public in through the fascination with the unresolved. Elizabeth Spelman touches on this obsession in her closing chapter of Repair, through the discussion of ruins. Ruins are pieces of the structures that formed pillars in the society they were created in that have been left behind as a reminder of what that era held for the future generations. She discusses how their allure comes from their degeneration, because:

“…ruins are ‘important not for helping us reconstruct past civilization but for assuring us there will always be something bigger than that’ ” (Spelman,105).

Ruins are pieces of culture that are not meant for repair, which in some ways counteracts her earlier points on the need for repair. She explores a new depth in this chapter that she merely touched upon before: the idea of repair as detrimental. Earlier in the novel, she discusses Louise, Elizabeth, and Irene, the women who touch up artwork without leaving any trace of their work in the original piece. The work they perform is similar to the concept of detrimental repair, however the repair they do is still necessary for retaining the beauty of the piece. Ruins cannot be “touched up without a trace”, or restored in any way because their very decay is what enthralls humanity.

     The theory that sometimes things should not be repaired and must be left to be ruined does not just pertain to physical things; it can also relate to interpersonal relationships. A relationship is fragile, and when it is not meant to withstand long periods of time, the beauty of human connection can lose its appeal and the bond will sour. Those involved will be left with distaste for the other and the original spark will be lost in bad memories. For instance, I had a friend whom I was very close with, and our friendship was always tumultuous. We constantly argued, but there was a certain quality that kept me coming back to mend the friendship. The first few times it held an appeal to me; however, I began to grow tired of constantly losing myself in the drama and whirlwind of it. The difference between our relationship and Spelman’s ideology that something ruined can be beautiful in its very disrepair is that the disrepair of it made it unworthy of my attention. I became exasperated with sacrificing my own life and the things I needed to do in order to feel true to myself to maintain a friendship, and so I engaged in one last confrontation and left the entire affair in shambles. However, instead of looking back on it and thinking about it with fascination as you would with the Colosseum and its rich history within the ruins, I look back with aversion because of the emotional instability. Ruins can be both beautiful and tragic in physical form, however in emotional form they are generally better left in the past.

The Art of Forgiveness

     The criminal justice system in our country by very nature is one based on expediency, which does not allow the human capacity to forgive to come into play. In Chapter 4 of Repair, Elizabeth Spelman states,

 “What’s wrong, says the proponents of restorative justice, is that the criminal justice system fails to identify important harms-to locate all the places where repair work needs to be done-and doesn’t know how to fix the harms it does identify. Yes, it is important to shore up people’s confidence in a set of rules by which they are to be governed and protected. Laws are felt to exist only to the extent to which they are enforced when broken. And yes surely the person who breaks them ought to be called upon to repair the breach. But the existing criminal justice system pays almost no attention-or, the wrong kind of attention-to the victims, pays only lip service to the damage done to the community, and has abandoned any thought of punishment as reparative for the offender-in fact it tends to treat offenders as unsalvageable and not worth repair.” (Spelman, 54) 

     Spelman is discussing the lack of restoring each aspect of those wronged and perpetrating the wrongdoing in the retributive justice system. While it is essential for someone committing a crime against his or her community to come to the realization that they were wrong, simply punishing them by isolation from those around them and brushing the issue under the rug only makes the entire matter a rip in the fabric of those involved’s lives. This method only serves to leave the victim with a variety of resentment, perhaps towards the justice system itself for not allowing the voice of the wronged to be heard in prosecution, and the community with a loss and festering wound that breeds more disrepair in the long run.

     This issue is one I have dealt with in my life, because of my uncle. He is schizophrenic, and his mental illness causes him to regard his community and family members with suspicion. When I was younger, he took a blank check and forged my aunt’s signature in order to attain some quick cash. If she had reported it to the authorities, the retributive justice system we utilize would have jailed him and furthered his innate distrust of those around him by refusing to hear his voice and side of the story. It would have also left our small familial community in disrepair, because one of our own had stolen from us and we never took the time to understand why and forgive. This would have festered distrust among more members of the family, sides would have been taken, and in worst case, we would have ruined relationships with each other and our bond would have been inconceivably damaged. Instead of reporting him, my aunt decided to allow our family to come together and decide how to help him understand why what he did was wrong, and allow each of us to discuss with him how his actions hurt us. Our minuscule display of the restorative justice system was one that I did not realize occurred until the reading of this chapter. We utilized the aspect of “public shaming”, or having him look his loved ones in the eye and witness their disappointment in his actions. He eventually began to share with us the hardship of living with this disability, and how it made him feel as though he did not belong and we were ashamed of him. He told us that his employer had fired him for his differences, because he felt he could not perform the job properly, which frustrated him to no end because his schizophrenia was not something he could control. He had to pay his rent, and he perpetrated his crime because he looked upon my aunt and uncle as in a better situation in life than him, and his jealousy had overtaken his voice of reason. This admission, and his willingness to cooperate with our demands of him finding a new job and repaying the money he had stolen repaired his bond with my aunt and uncle and allowed our family to come closer together in the acceptance of his disease and how we could help him. The way we dealt with his misdemeanor had mended our family’s distrust of him for his disease, and allowed him to realize that we were willing to work with him rather than against him.

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“If central to domestic masculinity is the repair of material objects and the passing down of lessons abut such repair central to domestic femininity is the repair of persons and relationships…”

     This passage piqued my interest because it corroborated the stereotype that women are more emotional and in tune with the metaphysical, whereas men are all brute strength and can only see in black and white. Women are considered too weak and emotional to do what is deemed a “man’s work”, for example: being a mechanic and working with their hands. Their capacity to repair is limited to what they are taken for as their only advantage: how in tune they are with their emotions. This is dividing and too general, because there are many men that are perhaps more in tune with their emotions than an individual woman, and many woman who may have more physical strength and inability to see beyond the immediate.

     These gender standards are what have forced men and women to repress their innate selves to conform to the cultural standards. It has created a society tethered to the restrictions of their “gender norms”. For instance, a man who has more of a connection to housework and taking care of the children is deemed to be devoid of masculinity and seen as less than a man who is the breadwinner for his family. The same goes for a woman; if she wants to have the strenuous job and spend less time in a domestic setting with her children than her husband, she is regarded as lacking femininity. By nature, humans prefer clearly defined lines as opposed to allowing for the fluidity of life to run its course. This rigidity of thought regarding gender is something almost innate to the character of people, the idea of clear divide between all aspects of the two genders, but Spelman notes the undeniable grievances with these stark stereotypes. She discusses how they not only hold us back but create an air of anxiety and secrecy throughout those of us who break the molds of gender ideology.

     The concept of repair is one that should not divide, but bring together the segregation of stereotypes. My personal belief is that repair, and the nature of repair, shifts according the individual and their unique capabilities. Dividing the abilities and aggregating them into two groups is akin to fraying something or breaking it, which in itself would call for repair. Men and women are not two separate general groups, but a mixture of many smaller different beliefs that can be shared by both gender. There is innate power in combining forced rather than dissolving unions of genders.

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