A friend made me laugh recently by arguing, or pretending to argue, that old age is not really that bad. Decreased sexual desire, for example, had simplified life considerably, and he was grateful for that. On the other hand, he wished that he could sleep through the night without having to get up and pee.
Actually, I think he said that a few years ago, which shows how decrepit we must be. I only thought of it again recently because of all the news about men, middle-aged and beyond, acting like thoroughgoing whore-dogs. On my friend's principle, you might have thought they'd be preserved from these sins just by age and biology. They're old and rich and venal, so shouldn't they be devoting their energies to devising tax dodges instead of getting their rocks off?
But, on review, probably it's not all about sex. Though we're often told that poor people have an overdeveloped sense of entitlement, they aren't in the same class as many of the fair and favored few who have risen to the top notches of entertainment, media, law, politics. So accustomed are the highest achievers to mountain air that they fail to acknowledge the humanity of their assistants and all the young strivers who toil below in the domain that they have conquered. It's as if the philosopher's moral imperative, concerning how people must never be treated as the mere means to another's end, applied only near ground level. At altitude, you exercise your prerogatives. This must be why the details of the individual cases lack the mutuality of even the most forlornly casual sexual relationships, and we read instead about disturbing, ritualistic humiliations of passive victims being made to watch while [unmentionable].
If the perpetrators were asked why they did it, their only answer would be that they could. It appears that boredom is a hazard of having "made it." We may hope that restaurant managers and the supervisor of the hotel housekeepers have actual work to do, but I imagine there is down time in those industries as well.
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