The two terms have been used interchangeably in recent times and both are related to our reaction to other people's possessions, abilities, or circumstances.
Jealousy (particularly in the case of a jealous lover) is more to do with the fear of losing someone who we are already with. While envy is typically of wanting or coveting what others has that we do not have.
Both can be summed up as the reaction to a perceived inequality in how we are treated. The main word here is "perceived" which is by us and controlled by us.
Can we control our envy? Convince ourselves that our perception of inequality should be changed, then move on to change it and not be envious anymore?
Another way of looking at it is entitlement. In older societies where the class system is more set, the lower classes were not envious of the upper class as there was not a feeling of entitlement there.
However, with modern society where we are told that we have equal opportunities and we can be whatever we want to be, it is much easier to become envious of other people's better circumstances.
The negative connotation of envy is likely associated with the inferiority we feel when we see other people being better off. Will we still be envious or jealous if we are more confident of ourselves?
Some people at the meeting said that with age and experience come confidence and they feel less envy and jealousy as they got older and more at peace with themselves.
But then envy is a motivator to do better. Nothing like seeing other people's achievements to spur one on, to emulate and to surpass.
Should young people be content when they are at the growth stage of their life and careers?
Gerald wonders how we can be more appreciative of what we already have. Some suggested mindfulness as a way of getting out of the "rat race" of chasing after ever changing carrots dangling in front of us to think of what we already have.
Mindfulness is a big topic on its own. However, I am always reminding myself of how seamlessly we tend to push routine things into our unconscious and that our mind is always on what is changing, new, exciting, or tragic. There is nothing like getting out of our routine to see how much goes on in our unconscious motions. Travel and being away from our familiar surroundings is one way to bring some of these back from the unconscious back to front and center when we come home.
There was also the interesting thought that scarcity must play some part in envy and jealousy. No one will be envious if they live in abundance and can help themselves to whatever others already have.
David Hume had much useful material in his major work about envy and I think jealousy too. Both materialism and inequality can result in these 'vices'. The perspective from which they 'become' vices (i.e., a genealogy of morals) and the various transvaluation(s) of values may be reshaped is various ways. Is the Freudian Oedipus Complex an example of envy? Is the archetypal murder of Abel by Cain some kind of envy killing? Or, is it merely conflict between pastoralists and horticulturalists as suggested by a gorilla in "Ishmael" by Quinn? What did Shakespeare mean, I think in "King Lear", when he suggested that envy is a 'green eyed monster' or some such image?
ReplyDeleteIs both morality and immorality (virtue and vice) as well as justice shaped by our characters (whether male or female), our immediate contexts (compare how we 'anchor justice') and the 'scales' we use, and, by our global contexts (compare how trade regimes arise both ancient and modern)? Justice norms and for that matter human values too must be negotiated and internalized. Can envy be transmogrified into virtue?
Matza & Sykes discuss 'techniques of neutralization' as used by juvenile delinquents or young offenders. Things such as appealing to higher laws, blaming the victim, accusing the accusers, or denying the crime or victim, and maybe other techniques too. It might be too easy to perhaps neutralize envy as serving higher laws, etc. Deontologically speaking, is envy by virtue of the act always wrong? Or, do motives and consequences matter and how do we operationalize these?
Does the desire for glory cause wars? And, does this desire spring from envy? Or, is it merely a matter of smaller states wishing to achieve great power status or even higher?
Can we ever have a society with standing inequality and yet design institutions to be envy free? In "Brave New World" by Aldous Huxley, would the Gammas or Deltas ever envy the Alphas or Betas?
Can we have meritocracy without envy? Is there a carrying capacity of envy and ways to manage or limit or control it? CL
Socrates was neither jelous or envious of the fellows in his society, but he couldn't persist in that vain.
ReplyDeleteMerit and KARMA were created as forms of control and oppression. Its not that people shouldn't take on responsibility but the incentive for some isn't enough.
Personally, I would stay away from any organized, heirarchical, merti driven soceity.
But hemlock doesn't seem like an option...
vts