The Absolutely Right
“We live in terror because persuasion is no longer possible... We suffocate among people who think they are absolutely right, whether in their machines or in their ideas.” ALBERT CAMUS · NEITHER VICTIMS NOR EXECUTIONERS
Writing in 1946, between one war just finished and another already feared, Camus tried to name the atmosphere of his age. The diagnosis has lost none of its accuracy.
Persuasion is a quiet limit, so quiet we rarely notice we are honoring it. To try to persuade someone is to accept two limits at once. They may refuse, and you may be wrong. The person who is absolutely right needs neither.
For him there is nothing to discuss, only obstacles to remove, and Camus saw exactly where that leads. When persuasion dies, force is all that remains, whether the force of armies or just the force of shouting.
The suffocation he named is now daily weather. Comment threads, family tables, meetings where every position arrives already hardened. Certainty has become a style, and the style leaves no air in the room for anyone else.
In one disagreement, act as though persuasion were still possible in both directions. Ask a question you do not know the answer to. Concede the point that deserves conceding. You will feel the limit as you honor it, and you will also feel the air come back.
