The Phenomenology of the Betrayed
People hates betrayal. Yet, it is no strange phenomenon among individuals. Every person experiences betrayal: either as the betrayed or the betrayer. Every person has his/her own way to see it. Thus, it would take eternity to define this phenomenon objectively. As my professor would explain it, if there are seven billion people in the world, there will also be seven billion ways how to account reality. I interviewed people of different ages, orientations, state of life, and occupations. I personally choose this topic primarily because I see this reality as one of the most hated but almost everyone suffers from it. It is a reality that no one can ever escape from. It could never be explained. It just needs to be faced.
Betrayal is defined by the Dictionary as an act of (1) aiding an enemy; (2) to expose treacherously; (3) to be a traitor to; and, (4) to reveal unknowingly. Literary and scientific experts dared to explain this reality fully but it would be impossible. However, to really account for this reality, I asked people how they see this as regards their work, community and personal life. I asked them five basic questions: (a) who is a betrayer? (b) How do you consider an event as betrayal? (c) What are the effects of this betrayal to you? (d) Have you ever betrayed someone? And, (e) if yes, why did you do it? Carefully listening to their statements, I observed that there is indeed variations in the way they understand betrayal. I tried to collect these data and come up with two major ways of understanding betrayal: understanding from the inside and from the outside perspective. This dichotomized presentation of the phenomenon is the summary of the interviews I conducted. There are people who see that betrayal is done by people dear to them. For some, betrayal is committed by people whom you do not really know, understand or like.
There are kinds of people who sees betrayal as breaking one’s trust. It is a bitter reality to accept that the person whom one trusts the most will be the person to turn his back against him. A young student shared that a person who betrays is usually a person whom one greatly trusted. Betrayal for her is when someone exposed her secrets to others. It upset her because she said that she is afraid that her reputation will be damaged and because she lost a friend. A seminarian who claims to have been bullied and betrayed by his fellow seminarians, believes that only your friends can betray you. He defines a friend here as a trustworthy and understanding buddy who can accept one whoever he/she may be. A betrayer for him is somebody who does not take relationships seriously. He said that betrayers do these things because they may have offenses or mistakes which they would not like to be exposed, and so, to conceal their misdeeds, they betray other people. As an effect to him, he grew indignant towards some of his companions for some period in time until he decided to forgive. There is a tendency to fight back. He argues that one needs to return the favor to these people so that he/she will not be oppressed. Another effect is that even if he learned to forgive someone who betrayed him, he said that it is hard to give full trust again to that person. For a senior high school student, betrayal is returning evil towards someone who treats you well. Pero di mo ito pinapahalata kasi nakikinabang ka pa sa kanya. This is the most appealing accounting that I got. I did not expect to hear this from a high school student. A betrayer is somebody whom you consider as friend, and yet, he/she just uses you to attain his/her selfish desires. Yet, he told me that he forgives so easily. He does so because they are his friends. This student does not believe Sartre’s statement that Hell is other people. These statements constitute the inside definition of betrayal. In Filipino, it is much easier to say taga-loob o malapit sa loob – somebody dear [inside of us] to us. This is one way of measuring our endearment or affection with other people. In contrast, we used to call those whom we do not know or we do not like as ibang tao.
To understand betrayal from an outside perspective, there are two accounts. For a young professional, incidences of betrayal among people are normal in a working environment. A betrayer for him is someone who compromises his relationship with others for another thing which he/she values more. In his work, he sees betrayal as an act of somebody who destroys his/her officemate just to get merits and let others (whom he does not want) suffer. As an effect, according to him, he became more cautious with the people whom he converse and join with. He also affirms that there are times which he like to fight back, but he did not do it. He also experienced betraying others, he said by reasonably failing some of his colleagues in the quality test. He said that one’s work should not be stained by barkadahan. He did it so not as a friend but as a professional. For him, it is not betrayal, he just did his job to test, and however, the others looked at this the other way around and were really convinced that they were betrayed. For another seminarian, betrayal is an act committed by persons who are envious of another. It is when people would put down others out of envy. For him, these people are the ones who think that all are equal and so, there one should not be better from the others.
Betrayal is undeniably an act of man. What is common among these persons’ statements as I interview them is the way they deal with the reality that they were betrayed: they acknowledge that they have a tendency of thinking to fight back by doing the same thing against the people who left them. But, for sure, this is not the way for others. Other people may just choose flight just in order to prevent situations to grow worse. Or some would face it bravely by confronting these persons.
After I have asked their insights, feelings, and experiences, if I were in the situation where I will give them a piece of advice, I am thinking of an appropriate way which can help them cope up, face, and accept this reality. I chose to share with them the little that I know about the Absurdist Appropriation and our Indo-Malayan Appropriation. I chose the former because I believe this may help them boost up their self-esteem, with the hopes that they will respect themselves as persons; and, stand with their personal convictions without letting others dictate or destroy them.
Albert Camus, one of the most promising philosophers of this age is an existentialist. Inspired by the school of Jean Paul Sartre, a fellow Frenchman, he formulated another way to account reality, this is by way of being absurd. Sadly, what people remember about Camus is not the totality of his thought or philosophy. What comes to people’s minds when they hear Albert Camus is suicide.
For a person who experienced betrayal, one thing is certain: he/she is not certain how to react to the situation. Yet, everyone has a choice. I will tell him/her that Camus’ Absurdism offers three possible choices. First, if you are really on the breaking point and things seem to fall apart, you can instantly end this and take your life. If the pain and damage brought by betrayal is totally devastating and you know not where and how to begin, why suffer more? Better end the injustice and pain that life brings. This could be an experience of somebody who lost everything, even his/her identity. But I will never recommend that. The second option is though Camus disagrees with it, I can see light and liberation here. If you do not want to terminate your life, you may give meaning to what you are going through. This is the leap of faith. An experience of betrayal may have given you so much pain and desperation, but there is hope. There is God. You may make this experience meaningful or meaningless. Some of the persons I interviewed chose this option. For some, they see this as life’s challenge that will make them stronger. For others, it is a lesson – a lesson that taught them to choose carefully persons to trust. Others may inspire this betrayal to make a stand about it, that is, become a poet, an advocate against betrayal, a better listener, a faithful friend and many more. Life is simple that you only have to choose and decide. It is complex when one begins to look for certainty and precision with the choices and decisions he/she makes.
The final option which is the core of the Absurdist phenomenology is the way of the absurd. Camus would always say, life is absurd. There are actually no such things as meaningful and meaningless. We just need to look at life in its face. One could not escape from the reality of betrayal I guess. For, one may have the most faithful of friends, loving of officemates but, there always comes the time where we actually betray ourselves. Our body and actions may betray us as well. There are three ways of living out the life of absurdity. The first one is called the Revolt. When somebody teaches you how to cope up with betrayal, you just have to ignore and reject it, for no one will ever understand how you felt about the betrayal done to you.
Life is simple that you only have to choose and decide. It is complex when one begins to look for certainty and precision with the choices and decisions he/she makes.
The second is Freedom. Camus improved Jean Paul Sartre’s freedom which is absolute indeterminism. You are always free to do what you want in life, for you only have one life. In coping with betrayal you can always have the choice to reform your life besides, no one really cares. You can live as though you are a new creature or being still undiscovered by the sciences. You can lead a life of happiness without being branded by the society and other exaggerated moralists. You can do this because you have no other way but to face betrayal – the pain and the glory it brings.
The third way is Passion. An experience of betrayal most of the time leads one to a melancholic, downhearted feeling. Camus does not disagree with this; for it is normal for people who experience betrayal feel bad about it. However, Camus would suggest another way of facing betrayal. For Camus, only the absurd mind can endure through life’s absurdity. Only those who can suffer life’s absurdities without the sense of meaningfulness and meaninglessness are the real persons. With this, a betrayed and a betrayer as well is dared to face life with equal value. Everyone who is driven by passion sees everything with an equal value experience. To endure the pain betrayal brings, one has to face and accept it, and embrace the feeling with equal value to the feeling of having not been betrayed. This is simply profound that I personally could not understand fully, yet, I believe it is possible. I can see that this can help one balance not only his/her emotions but also, discipline his/her mind.
This may serve as a disclaimer, but, the reason why I chose Camus’ Absurdism as the first way of appropriation for the betrayed is that because, chances are, people who were betrayed may obtain a devastated and irredeemable self-image. Though, I believe, this may not apply to others, yet, as I review the statements from the interviews I conducted, most of them would say, “I learned from my mistakes… I will be more careful in choosing my friends…” and many more statements which implies one’s effort to uplift one’s self from betrayal’s nightmare. Camus’ phenomenological appropriation, the way I understand it will help a person face life anew – through a shift of perspective beginning with one’s self.
The second way I wish to share (and wish to give justice to) is a way of appropriation truly dear to us Filipinos, dear to us Asians. My professor ingeniously articulated a phenomenological approach based on a Filipino’s attitudes and aptitudes. Yet, he would never claim it as his phenomenology; he will always coin this as the Indo-Malayan Enspirited Phenomenology.
It is fascinating realization for me to learn that after all this time, the cause for man’s painstaking and seemingly eternal pursuit for knowledge and advancement is distance. Religions, philosophies, scientific discoveries and other fruits of the advancement of a thinking humanity were all formed just to defy distance. Religions yearn to eradicate humanity’s distance from the Great Transcendent. Philosophies were formulated so as to proximate reason’s distance from being and existence. I think, without an intention to objectify the reality of betrayal that what is truly common among people who experienced, and experience betrayal is the awareness of distance that this phenomenon created.
This distance in relationship I guess can never be measured and terminated by mathematical calculations and series of psychological sessions. The Filipinos have their own way of dealing with distance – a way unusual for some people in the cosmos, and this is through stories.
The native Filipinos believe that a human being has a human espirit. This is an immanent reality and this is so sacred, for, this is the very espirit which we share to others and is shared to us by others as well. Thus, the simplest yet the noblest manner to share this espirit is by way of breathing. This is life. Before Inspiration was introduced to us, (we live and move and have our being through the breath of God, God’s spirit) we already believe in a spirit which is within each and every one of us. Thus, we already have Enspiration. We understand life simply by breathing. When one ceases to breathe, he is considered as dead. As long as we breathe, we live, we exist. Breath is sacred. The very act of sharing one’s breath with another explains how we understand relationship. Thus, a person with a bad breath for us is not a person whom we can establish with an intimate relationship. In other words, we find a person with bad attitude not a person we can converse with.
We Austronesians, Filipinos in particular, possess a more profound manner in describing the act of sharing with someone. We call this as exhaling out with somebody – paghinga ng nilalaman ng puso sa kapwa. We affirm that we have deep within ourselves an espirit which would like to share his story to another. When we face betrayal, I think, after looking within ourselves and shed tears for it, we need to realize that it is impossible for us to bear the suffering it gives fully alone. We still need others. And this is the beauty of our concept of kapwa as Filipinos, we still keep on entrusting ourselves to others, loving others eventhough we have already experienced being betrayed and hurt by them. Experiencing betrayal may have led one to his/her breaking point, and, having considering Camus’ Absurdist appropriation, one may realize that this is not enough. We just need somebody, at least one whom we can exhale to our problems and pains and who can inhale these groanings of an afflicted espirit. I strongly believe, even though the listening espirit say nothing, comfort comes to the afflicted one and will begin to rise again from his/her discouragements. There will be new hope, new perspective, a new, indetermined self.
We need to develop once more our capacity of Olfaction which was aged out as we grow. If there is something wrong, it is easy for us to determine so as we say I smell something fishy. An awful smell indicates a problem and this form of communication is much profounder than words which at times deceive. As enspirited beings, olfaction is the most advanced way of communication. We can only understand each other through our smell.
As for my personal appropriation, I learned that I can never become a Socrates to others. I can never give an advice or explanation on betrayal that will embrace all people, for each of us has his/her own story. I obtained a better understanding on this phenomenon. I realized that, though one can be as prudent as a pope, this will not ensure him of being spared from betrayal. In other words, people, whether good or bad will always experience betrayal. Personally, I find Camus’ way of appropriation to reality so appealing and practical. However, I would like to practice it with my style. The Indo-Malayan phenomenology is also inspiring and appealing to me because it is dear to my heart. Life may be absurd, yes. But, life is also beautiful. Without things such as betrayal, life is tasteless, odorless, colorless. As a person who chooses and decides to love God and offer myself in service to him and his people, I realized that God can never betray me. It is my understanding of him which at times betrays me. I could not have total grasp of him, and discernment comes here. As a Christian, in choosing a path, I am more confident now to face life and choose the cross. Embracing sacrifice is absurd but it can make me a realer person. I have no need of outward shows. I have no need of blaming others. I just have to look at life in the face. I desire to be an enspirited person for others. This time, with no ambitious pursuit in explaining realities. I just want to be of help – a toilet bowl of people. I can be better at this after all, if I will be get ordained, this will be the world’s perception of me. But I don’t care. I can be a toilet bowl at the same time, a candle which will be consumed just to give light to the world.