Why would I care about...?
The worst kind of rhetorical question. And some better ones.
Consider how easy it is to make a thing seem ridiculous by reducing it to its mechanical, physical facts. You see this a lot from people who don’t like sports: Why would I care about five people bouncing a ball and trying to throw it through a metal hoop? Why would I care about eleven people kicking a ball around and trying to get it into a net without touching it with their hands?
Such rhetorical questions sound sophisticated and worldly wise at first blush (or if you are a sophomore), but there’s nothing sophisticated about choosing to see meaninglessness where others clearly find meaning. The basketball player might just as well say to the bookworm, Why would I want to sit in a chair and look at black squiggles on pieces of paper? And I’ve never heard anybody say, Why would I want a bunch of rectangles of green paper with pictures of dead presidents on them?
I got on this subject because of something I read in Hartmut Rosa’s little book, The Uncontrollability of the World:
Let us imagine that we are captivated by the sight of the moon, turn to our companion, and say: Oh, look, the moon! To which they respond: What about it? It’s been there the whole time. It’s just a rocky orb, 385,000 kilometers away, littered with craters, without any life. It’s been like that for millions of years, it never changes. What are you talking about? We wouldn’t know what to say. That is in fact what the moon is. But it is not only that. It is also an object of fear and desire and longing, and it has been for millennia. It’s the moon of “Fly Me to the Moon,” The Dark Side of the Moon, and thousand of other songs and fairy tales. It's biological significance as well as its psychological influence on us are still not entirely clear scientifically. It even has an important social meaning, as it structures and modifies our social rhythms and calendars.
Rosa goes on to explain that any attempt list the moon’s “meanings” can’t quite account for what we mean when we say Oh, look, the moon!
The moon is indeed a rocky orb 385,000 kilometers away. Basketball is indeed five people bouncing a ball and trying to throw it through a metal hoop. A hundred-dollar bill is indeed a rectangle of green paper with a picture of Benjamin Franklin on it. But in each of these cases, these mechanical, physical facts are among the least interesting things about them.
The rhetorical question, Why would I care about [insert least interesting thing about subject at hand]? forecloses meaning and confirms our prejudices. Better questions are the genuinely curious, Why might I care…? or Why do people care so much…? or What do others see that I’m not seeing yet?
During this World Cup summer in the US, it has been fun to see so many people say things like, “I’m not a sports fan, but I’m learning to love soccer,” or “I’ve never cared about soccer, but now I’m starting to get it.” I say that not because I’m a particularly avid soccer fan, but because it’s always good when people learn to share other people’s loves.
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Love this, Jonathan. It made me think of this:
"In our world," said Eustace, "a star is a huge ball of flaming gas."
"Even in your world, my son," said Ramandu, "that is not what a star is, but only what it is made of."
"...but there’s nothing sophisticated about choosing to see meaninglessness where others clearly find meaning." Thank you for this lovely reminder to be humbly interested. Being finite, we need the others around us to teach us the joy, beauty and awe of what we can't see.