Identity differentiates humans from other creatures. Humans alone envision themselves as individuals with distinct stories. Our stories vie to impress our acquaintances and ourselves. We invent values by which to evaluate ourselves. What does it mean to succeed?

The Nameless One envisions himself a winner and all others losers by comparison. I envision you and me winners and the Nameless One and his ilk calamities in the game of life. That’s because our values contradict. The Nameless One measures mankind by what they have; you and I by what we are. Jesus’ question resonates with us: “For what profiteth a man, if he shall gain the whole world, and lose his own soul? or what shall a man give in exchange for his soul?” The Nameless One sneers at the mere mention of a soul.

This opposition is existential, not political. Politics permits, indeed demands, compromise between diverse interests so all get along. You cannot split the difference between Good and Evil to arrive at a pleasing middle way. Good and Evil are engaged in an endless war to the death. For if the Nameless One wins, you and I lose, and if we win, he loses. Each seeks to extirpate their foe.

Morality studies the conflict between these irreconcilable outlooks. The Nameless One considers Morality nonsense, since possession, not behavior, defines success. You and I think the opposite: who we are is what counts, not what we have.

I didn’t think much about Morality growing up because Right and Wrong, Good and Evil, went without saying. Of course, you loved your neighbor as yourself, at least tried to. Of course, the Golden Rule applied. Of course, others’ lives deserved respect. One thrill of my youth was testing these rigid dictates, playing hooky from Morality.

The Nameless One spent his life getting and getting, no matter how. Others’ opinions of him did not matter, if he could keep on getting.

These days Evil feels empowered and ascendant. Young people are being taught what you and I consider the wrong lessons. Morality is being trampled on.

Neither contender will win this war because the opposition is permanent in the human psyche. Good and Evil, Right and Wrong, God and Satan, We and Me are forever at odds. The dominance of either is temporary. Temporary, though, can last a long time. Christians foresee the battle persisting till the end of time, when – conveniently – the good guys win. I can’t wait for eternity to feel better, you probably can’t either. The war is now.

And it’s bracing, however dispiriting. For the first time in my life I feel I’m fighting a war for the betterment of all, not just my advantage. My dad and his generation felt this way about Hitler and his gang, the Nameless Ones of their age. Defeating fascism was a cause worth dying for. It still is. Dog-pal Henry is right, this ruckus seems crazy from other creatures’ vantage. But that’s who we are. Evolution gave us brains to make us stupid. Go figure.

For most of my life I believed my life didn’t matter. With dust our common destination, might as well enjoy. I was always ambitious to accomplish stuff, but that was because I’m competitive and like to win. But win or lose, so what? What difference in the end?

Now my life matters. Yours too: every life. Because this is a war of the many against the few. Will we retain our identities, the dignity of individuality, or will we be herded into cattle pens by self-pleased plutocrats? Heroes or zeroes, that’s our choice. To arms.