Greetings, my fellow homefries!
This post is going to circle around a philosophical breakthrough I've had today while contemplating the meaning of a fruit fly's life compared to the meaning of my life.
I've decided that humans are obsessed with categorizing. No matter what it is, we always group it. Cliques, Taxonomy, Dewey Decimal, etc. There are infinite groups, too, because of how many humans there are, and how many different things that need to be grouped. We have created a set number of "bins" around our life to deposit everything. This includes thoughts, ideas, stereotypes, feelings, etc. The picture I see when I try to visualize this is similar to Sherlock's Mind Palace-- millions of bins, stacked in a storage room, all carefully labelled and organized.
I feel like this could be both a good thing and a bad thing. Good, because we can find whatever we need, and we can avoid certain bins (like fears, worst moments in life, heartbreak, etc.). But the bad side is we are, again, obsessed with doing this. We can't stop. This can be harmful to others because, depending on the person, we group them pretty much by first impression (JUDGING IS NOT OKAY!), and then end up changing their category once we gather more information.
The worst side to this phenomenon is the way we group people, definitely. By creating cliques, we are creating boundaries that work to keep a distinction between us and them. Examples of this include Mean Girls (the Populars) vs. The Nerds. Also, Jocks vs. Theatre Kids. This is a problem because it makes it seem like it's pretty much impossible to hang out with the people from a different group without consequences--judgement from others, distancing from previous friendships, etc.
Another face to this is the set kinds of bins we have created. This includes music genres, literary genres, and courses. Music is a big one because everyone tends to stay within one genre, because of the assumption that if they like one song in that genre, that will be the only genre they will like music from. This is not necessarily true, same with literary genres. There needs to be a way in which people have complete creative freedom, and can create things that don't necessarily fit into a previously made category.
Our society, the way it is now, is kind of stifling towards art. We have divided past art into eras, which helps the people studying art history, and is not inherently bad, but what it does tend to cause is the idea that "Everything has been created already, what could I possibly create that would be completely unique from someone else's creation?"
I guess there isn't really a solution to this problem, or at least not one that I can come up with in a single blog post, but I am surrounded by a group of friends that are complete and utter geniuses. Maybe we can continue this discussion as a group?
Talk to you guys later, and we need to hang out!!!
<(") The Purple Ninja
Wow. That's deep!
ReplyDeleteIn order for humanity to thrive, there has to be exactly that--order. We demand order as a species. Hierarchy, law, that's how we function. Governments and cliques are modern-day groups rather than weak and strong members of the human race, but the groups exist to please humanity as a whole.
ReplyDeleteHowever, pertaining to the individual, creative "bins," as you put them, can be overcome. Music and literary branches can and will overlap in the lives of those refusing to be governed by control and order. Within the realm of the individual, sections of culture such as these can be set free to roam. Where creativity lies, a perfect chaos can be found.
In groups, these cannot be maintained in today's world. Our culture is obsessed with labels, gossip, the sense of overwhelming an individual with those around it--uniformity in its most disjointed state.
We are a complex species with minds beyond manage and therin lies the problem. Because we cannot control even ourselves, we attempt to control all else as compensation.
~'.:.'~ Sarah
Yeah, we need to continue this in discussion. Preferably while I am sleep-deprived. That comment of mine will look much more interesting tomorrow morning. Thus is life.
DeleteThis is glorious... I feel like we may now have initiated late night philosophical discussions. WE ARE AWESOME!!!
DeleteBreaking through my writer's block, I've written two rapid theoretical illusions and a character development. Death and life in a predetermined race outcome, the way a soul dies in a body that traps it, and a girl that sees with her mind rather than her eyes in the phenomenon of synesthesia. Late night musings are fun.
ReplyDelete