Last week I learned that Robert Paul Wolff, the philosopher who got interested in anarchism and marxism, died and I wanted to write something dedicated to him — this was the first reason I started writing this. The second one, was to finally finish an essay that I have in my /temp folder for at least 10 years, which my 20-year-old self titled “Why should I care?”. This essay, which came about as a regular attempt to say “Fuck authority!” remained unfinished, as I didn’t feel I was prepared to arrive at the necessary conclusions. Now, I realize why — my thoughts were in strong conflict with most all philosophy ever published, notably the moral philosophy of Kant. And the position of a 20-year-old who is saying everyone else are wrong, is too anti-intellectualistic me to take.

But now I know that I do have some allies, like the aforementioned Robert Paul Wolff, who tackles the same issues in his paper/blog post THE COMPLETION OF KANT’S MORAL PHILOSOPHY IN THE TENETS OF THE RECHTSLEHRE. And that guy from Plato’s Republic (more on him later). So, I will attempt to finally express my thoughts of whether we are obliged to participate in society, and to treat all people, and their problems, in a way that society wants us to treat.
As an experiment, I decided to leave what I wrote before unchanged and unedited, and then continue with my current thoughts. So here we go:

Introduction (by my 20-year-old-self)

In loving memory of Robert Paul Wolff 1933 – 2025

Amidst protests [2013 protests against the Oresharski], I decided to write something about the political situation in Bulgaria. I thought I had something to say on the topic. But how do you write a political article that doesn’t waste the time of those who read it? I mean, what new can be said on the subject? And what is worth saying? These questions tormented me greatly, but the more I tried to reflect on them, the more I actually drifted away from them and began pondering another question:

Why should I care?

This might sound bad on many levels, but I don’t understand why I should spend my life talking and thinking about people who are below my level, when at the same time I don’t have enough time for the things that truly interest me and bring me joy.

I’m not saying we should be indifferent to the wrongdoings happening around us, nor that we shouldn’t care about anyone or anything. But we should also value the time we have. Obviously, it won’t be enough to fix the world. It probably won’t even be enough to do more than one percent of the things we want. But at least we can choose which one percent. We can choose how to use the time we have. This right to choose is perhaps the only thing we truly own. For this reason, I am extremely hostile toward people and institutions that try to take it away from us.

And they are everywhere. From the time we are babies, we are taught about the various things we must dedicate our lives to. Taking an active stance on political issues is just a small part of the obligations we acquire as humans, citizens, parents, employees, residents of some apartment block, and so on. And our free time… They might as well outlaw it.

My question is, “Can’t it be the other way around?” Can’t we cut out the media, Bulgarian, and any other realities that are shoved into our heads, just as mothers shove food into their children’s mouths, and start living some other reality—one where we can use our time to satisfy our own needs and desires, and where we don’t care about the stupid demands, causes, etc., that society imposes on us?

My thoughts on this topic probably don’t sound unfamiliar to you. They are shared by the majority of people in the world. Or at least that’s what they say: No one claims to be interested in Bulgarian politics and similar things out of their own volition and because they find it interesting. Few people will tell you that they comply with social, corporate, or any other norms with pleasure. But the general understanding is that if you actively care about these things, you are something more than just a person—you are part of something big, something that will exist forever and, despite all its flaws, is ultimately good. That you can express your true feelings, but with a measure that varies between nations and periods, but is always there.

In such a situation, anyone who demonstrates individuality is more or less repressed. People are merciless toward anyone who doesn’t show the necessary respect for their rules (After all, they put so much effort into following them, how can they bear to see someone ignoring them?) In this regard, I don’t know how many times I’ve had to prove to the people around me that I’m not an idiot, and that what I feel is not apathy, nor some pubescent desire to rebel, but simply a complete and continuous disinterest in the “problems” that concern them, in favor of things I consider more important.

Now let me tell you a few words about people’s idealized notion of society and their role in it: it’s wrong. We are not evolving together, nor have we ever done so. Our entire social contract boils down to, “I promise not to kill you if you promise not to kill me.” There’s nothing more to it. Society itself does not generate progress. And the vast majority of inspiration and insight that drives it forward comes from people who have nothing to do with it. We call these people “geniuses,” a term I dislike because, on one hand, it’s insulting to all of us mere mortals, and on the other, I believe it’s insulting to those very people.

The punks are correct, old wise philosophers are wrong

Now let’s get down to the nitty-gritty. We are asking the following: if I am free, why do I have to defend my actions against a specific body of people and doctrines? And who chooses those people and those doctrines? The simple answer to those questions, which every old punk will give is, of course, _ If you do that you are not free, those people, all those people, are your oppressors. Resist if you can!_ ,but my 20-year-old-self didn’t quite dare to give this answer, as giving this answer (which SPOILER ALERT is correct.) will get you called, stupid, I inconsiderate, arrogant, evil… In one word, it will get you called a punk.

This reminds me of this quote from “The Republic” by Plato.

“I proclaim that justice is nothing else than the interest of the stronger. [..] And the different forms of government make laws democratical, aristocratical, tyrannical, with a view to their several interests; and these laws, which are made by them for their own interests, are the justice which they deliver to their subjects, and him who transgresses them they punish as a breaker of the law, and unjust. And that is what I mean when I say that in all states there is the same principle of justice, which is the interest of the government; and as the government must be supposed to have power, the only reasonable conclusion is, that everywhere there is one principle of justice, which is the interest of the stronger. Plato — The Republic

If you haven’t read the dialogue, it begins with a random guy who makes this point and then Socrates starts making him explain himself, twisting and reinterpreting his words until they become self-contradictory, which is counted as a win for Socrates. Overall, nobody takes this guy seriously, as he is just a punk, but he actually has a very solid point, just like my 20-year-old self had one: If I don’t think it is just, it is not just, whatever other people say! And so, I will not care about anything, unless I have a good reason to do so!

On the other side is the old wise philosopher, who would say: of course it is just, of course you should care, of course you should be involved in it, the other thing is childlike, immature (punk).

But the old wise philosopher never really tells us why we should do that (and isn’t this his job?) It seems that there is some implicit consensus, that the old wise person is obviously correct and the punks like my 20-year-old self are obviously wrong.

But if we dare to question these “obvious, self-evident facts” we arrive into a pretty different picture.

The social contract in Kant’s philosophy

“take no action according to any maxim which would be inconsistent with its being a universal law and thus to act only so that the will through its maxims could regard itself at the same time as universally lawgiving.” — Immanuel Kant

Some old wise philosophers did take the punk’s stance a bit more seriously, most notably Immanuel Kant, who made a serious effort to resolve the questions outlined above. Here are his aims, as summarized by Robert Paul Wolff (all quotes is Wolff’s paper which is linked above):

The announced aim of Kant’s moral philosophy, as stated most clearly and unambiguously in the Foundations of the Metaphysics of Morals, is to discover unconditionally valid principles of practical reason. Kant conceives his task as falling into three parts, exactly corresponding to the three Sections of the Foundations. First, he must identify and state the Moral Law, the highest principle of practical reason, by which all rational agents, merely in virtue of being rational agents, are bound.
Secondly, he must demonstrate that the Highest Moral Principle can be derived, entirely a priori, from a conceptual analysis of Practical Reason. Finally, in light of the teaching of the First Critique, Kant must connect up his conclusions concerning the principles guiding the choices of rational agents with our experience of ourselves as causally determined beings in the realm of appearance.

Now, Kant is obviously still playing from the philosopher’s team (e.g. he wants to “discover” the principles, rather to determine if there are any in the first place), but at least he doesn’t just ignore the other position.

Kant’s very ambitious idea is to derive some moral laws that we must follow and enforce in others i.e. he is up to prove that we should care about everyone else, and that not caring, not participating in society, is a result of some kind of a logical error. And to do that, he theorizes that a group of individuals transform themselves into a society by entering into the mutual agreement (referred to as a social contract by Jean-Jacques Rousseau). Upon “signing” this contract, Kant argues all people agree to what he calls “the categorical imperative” (actually a rehash to an old religions principle, know as the golden rule: “Treat others as you would like others to treat you” i.e. all people should care about all other people.

The categorical imperative

The golden rule/categorical imperative is a grand idea, which makes sense up to a point, when it concerns things that we all want or don’t want e.g. we can agree with each other not to kill each other just because nobody would want to get killed (although we haven’t fully reached that point yet), but there are plenty of cases where different people would like different laws e.g. we cannot use the categorical imperative to agree in which hour is it OK to play loud music: a person going to bed at 10 would be OK with everyone playing till 10, but the person going to bed at 8 would probably disagree.

Robert Paul Wolff describes those problems very aptly:

At the close of the Foundations, despite Kant’s introduction of the evocative notion of humanity as an end in itself, and his invocation of a Rousseauean conception of a republic regulated by a social contract, we are left with the two problems outlined earlier: First, how to demonstrate that rational agents as such must, in all consistency, enter into collective agreements that establish structures of social practices in the context of which substantial meaning can be given to the notion of contradictory willing; and Second, how to demonstrate that rational agents who have thus constituted themselves a realm of ends or republic will, qua rational, arrive at a single universal, necessary, and therefore objective set of substantive laws as the content of their collective rational willing.

i.e. if the social contract is a contract, then how come nobody asks us what the terms of this contract should be.

(yes, I know that there is no way to actually really agree with everyone and everyone how to live, but that is no excuse to assume everyone’s agreement and present some principles as universal).

Kant’s argument

In order to convince us that those are not real issues, Kant constructs a very elaborate argument, based on the idea of property and that in order for people to have property, there must be some central body, regulating who owns what. Here is his original argument:

When I declare (by word or deed), “I will that an external thing shall be mine,” I thereby declare it obligatory for everyone else to refrain from the object of my will. This is an obligation that no one would have apart from this juridical act of mine. Included in this claim, however, is an acknowledgment of being reciprocally bound to everyone else to a similar and equal restraint with respect to what is theirs. The obligation involved here comes from a universal rule of the external juridical relationship [that is, says the translator, the civil society]. Consequently, I am not bound to leave what is another’s untouched if everyone else does not in turn guarantee to me with regard to what is mine that he will act in accordance with exactly the same principle. This guarantee does not require a special juridical act, but is already contained in the concept of being externally bound to a duty on account of the universality, and hence also the reciprocity, of an obligation coming from a universal rule.

Now, with respect to an external and contingent possession, a unilateral Will cannot serve as a coercive law for everyone, since that would be a violation of freedom in accordance with universal laws. Therefore, only a Will binding everyone else - that is, a collective, universal (common), and powerful Will - is the kind of Will that can provide the guarantee required. The condition of being subject to general external (that is, public) legislation that is backed by power is the civil society. Accordingly, a thing can be externally yours or mine only in a civil society.

Conclusion: If it must be de jure possible to have an external object as one’s own, then the subject must also be allowed to compel everyone else with whom he comes into conflict over the question of whether such an object is his to enter, together with him, a society under a civil constitution. — Immanuel Kant

Wolff summarizes the whole chain of reasoning like this.

1. Rationality as such entails consistent willing.
2. Consistent willing, for a phenomenally appearing agent, entails the possibility of property.
3. The possibility of property entails the necessity of establishing a state through a social contract.
4. A legitimate state composed of rational agents will necessarily enact one and only one set of fundamental principles of justice, namely the Two Principles of Justice.
5. Therefore, we are all, as phenomenally appearing rational agents, obligated universally and unconditionally to form legitimately grounded political communities with those with whom we come into contact, and in those communities to enact the Two Principles of Justice as the fundamental laws governing our interactions.

Of course many questions arise immediately, like, what about people who don’t own anything? Are they exempt from the social contract? I imagine Kant has something to say about all of that, but I had enough, as, seeing his argument, I have to say that, although I have to give props to Kant for really taking this problem seriously, although his treatment is truly interesting and enlightening in a lot of ways, although I consider Kant one of the greatest philosophers of all time, I don’t buy it

These clearly are the thoughts of a person who is defending his own conviction. And his attempt at arguing that this opinion is a law is clearly misguided. And if you go through his post, you would find that Professor Wolff reaches the same conclusion:

I think we can conclude immediately that we cannot compel others to enter with us in a social contract, for the essence of such an agreement is that it represents mutual willing, and that implies that it is voluntary.

And in his lectures on Kant, Wolff puts forward another very interesting refutation of Kant’s argument, which is based on the distinction between things in themselves and things as they appear to us, which Kant himself makes in the first critique. His argument is related to the following question: if we only know about things in the way they appear to us and i.e. if our knowledge is subjective, then how can we claim that we know what is best for other people.

So, like Kant, I conclude my writing, with a solid body of evidence which backs my original opinion, namely that no, there is no general reason why you should care.

The punk’s way

“Teacher, which is the great commandment in the Law?” And he said to him, “You shall love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your mind. This is the great and first commandment. And a second is like it: You shall love your neighbor as yourself. On these two commandments depend all the Law and the Prophets.” — Matthew 22:36-40

One should as a rule respect public opinion in so far as is necessary to avoid starvation and to keep out of prison, but anything that goes beyond this is voluntary submission to an unnecessary tyranny, and is likely to interfere with happiness in all kinds of ways. – Bertrand Russell, The Conquest of Happiness

It’s important to realize that disagreeing with Kant that we have no grounds to compel all people to enter a social contract is not equivalent to not participating in a social contract. Indeed, the non-compelling means very little in practical terms — I don’t know all the reason why people become murderers and criminals, but I doubt that it is because they are philosophically opposed to social contract (or that they can be tamed by putting forward the thesis that they are obliged to do good by the categorical imperative).

What it means, for me at least, is that there is no justification for having a central body of authority that governs our lives: one monarch, one church, one school of philosophy, (at the time of Kant this was the scholastic school, which Kant aimed to reign upon).

It means (if we go back to the question about caring) that there is no single reason due to which you should care about society. But it doesn’t mean that there can be multiple reasons for caring about multiple things. And if you really care about someone or something you should not try to change it into someone else (same if you don’t care about it ;DD).

Every person has a different way to perceive things, and nobody can know what the things-in themselves are. This simple fact, which Kant himself acknowledges, and which is central for his philosophy, exposes the stupidity of the categorical imperative, and of the golden rule: How can we act as if what we do is a universal law, if we don’t and cannot know what universal laws should be?

Why would we do to others what we want the others to do to us, when all people want different things (e.g. I like to listen to death metal, while riding a brakeless bike)?

(and if this example sounds silly to you, remember that we really do live in a society, where there are people who do intervene with every aspect of our life, including our taste of music, or modes of transportations.)

Conclusion

“You shall love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your mind. This is the great and first commandment. And a second is like it: You shall love your neighbor as yourself. On these two commandments depend all the Law and the Prophets.” — Matthew 22:36-40

People often accuse punks of being destructive, that we saying that a given thing is bad, without offering alternative (not realizing that not offering an alternative is our whole point). So, in this case, they might ask me: How shall we act, if we don’t have this notion of society that we are part of? How shall we live our lives?

When we rid ourselves of the conviction that we have a duty to do this and that, and that there is some external force determines what is good and what isn’t, we discover that the answer to this question is quite easy (it is easy, but you have to give it for yourself). Doing away with the abstract and meaningless social contract leaves room for us to make smaller, but much more numerous and meaningful social contracts with real people that we know. We don’t have to think about what is good for the “society” or for people at large, We only have to care for people that are around us.

Doing that takes the question “Why should I care?” to a whole different dimension — when we aren’t being coerced into it, caring is a deeply transformative practice, which makes us better and happier (as Bertrand Russell, says “The happy life is to an extraordinary extent the same as the good life”). It becomes who you are, rather than some thing that you should do.

However, our capacity of caring, true caring, is limited. I am sorry but I cannot care about the latest thing Trump and Musk did, nor about what some Bulgarian politicians did (fuck them). I don’t care much about the latest changes in Facebook’s privacy policy, simply because I don’t use their product (as I think everyone else should). Am I to blame? Don’t think so. First, it is actually not not caring, but caring about all these things that made them relevant in the first place (caring, as enforced by media, is largely a scam to keep people distracted, but that’s another topic). And second, as we said, it is not my job to care about everyone and everything. I don’t have the capacity to care about everyone and everything, but even, if I did, I don’t have the capacity to fix everything, so the whole exercise would be totally pointless. Practicing deep caring about something, means practicing deep non-caring about everything else… To be free, we need to cut some ties.

This is where we can bring up the teaching of Jesus Christ — “love your neighbour.” Why does he say “neighbor”? Why not “love everyone” or “love your friends” or “love the people who are different from you”. Simple — because a mere person cannot care about everyone, a mere person (or even a god in human form) cannot enforce some sort of universal justice to the world. All a person can do is to look at the things happening before their eyes, simple things like the condition of the person whom they see every day, and try to change those for the better.