Thursday, November 11, 2004
“That Donkey Is Such A Bad Influence On You!”
Or so says Marge Simpson of Homer. We all have a few donkeys in our lives. People or things that motivate us through threat, guilt, or promise. There are real things that act as harpies, will o’ wisps, and that proverbial little devil on your shoulder.
There was a huge chunk of my life in which I honestly and passionately believed that there was no such thing as peer pressure. I thought that it was an excuse used to either get out of trouble, to place blame elsewhere (i.e. “may baby would NEVER do that…”), or to justify social workers and high school counselors. Basically, I thought the entire notion of influence is a myth.
My skepticism started early in my life. The movie The Day After nearly ruined my mind for good as it scared us all senseless with the threat of nuclear war, but I used to think, why would anyone want to destroy us if they knew we’d destroy them too (it was years before I saw, and fell in love with, Dr. Strangelove).
I was a big fan of role playing games (back before home video games were so sophisticated and so widely owned). I also loved heavy metal music. In the early 80’s if there were two things that got a lot of negative attention when it came to teens (other than sex and drugs), it was RPG’s and heavy metal.
They said that RPG’s made you lose grip on reality. There was an urban legend at the time that kids were so distraught when their characters died, that they would commit suicide. And of course, many of us remember the one about the kid who was convinced he could fly… all of these and more were furthered by an awesomely awful made for TV movie (which I think starred a young Tom Hanks).
And then there was heavy metal. It had back masking. It made you want to kill yourself. It led to drug abuse and Satanism. Twisted Sister was a bigger threat to the US than smutty TV like Dallas, and wonton materialism. You may not know this, but Judas Priest actually had to go to trial for manslaughter, based on the assumption that heavy metal bands were purposely telling kids to kill themselves through back masking. As we all know now, the industry is all about money, and it would make no sense to slaughter your prime demographic.
Fast forward. When the events of Columbine temporarily changed the United States into oversensitive, overreacting mother hens, I was one of the loudest critics of those who said that movie, music, and video games held any role in the tragedy. Then came the whole Jackass phenomenon, backyard wrestling, Grand Theft Auto, and Britney Spears.
Whether it is a vast conspiracy or some sort of psychological mumbo-jumbo, I treat it the same, with extreme skepticism. I had serious doubts that any one person could be so easily bent into something else just because of the imposed will of others.
What I didn’t realize is that I was starting to question the very nature of identity. The whole debate over influence asks hard questions about what makes you “you.” Am I predisposed to certain activities? Will I completely surrender my self to defer to someone else? Can another person make me do, say, or be something I am not?
Now, I am at a point in my life that I believe strongly in the power of influence. Granted, I still don’t hold Motley Crue or TSR responsible for the actions of others. But there is some validity to the idea of influence. I can feel it working in my own life; what I say, do, wear, eat, and drink. Decisions of whether to skip class, spend money on an item, or participate in an activity all depend in some part of what someone or something is telling me. And the consequences for listening to others can ruin a person.
It is a sad state. It makes me unsettled to know that I allow who Carl is to be tainted by something outside of myself. And I consider myself such a individual! I feel influence working its magic when I let my Sailor Mouth fly around people that don’t mind so much. I feel influence when I am dressing in the morning before school compared to mornings before I hang out with my brother. Most of all, I feel influence at work when I submerse myself in angry, negative media.
The truth is, influence is a useful tool when it comes to biology. As we became social creatures, we needed a mechanism to unify minds. We become susceptible to those with stronger personality. We let the mob mentality sweep over us. And the bad thing is, the same mechanism also allows us to be led astray and taken advantage of (see also advertising and nightly news). Influence changes what you value, what you care about, your morals, and your goals.
There are humorous examples of the powers of influence. Look at the distribution of social fads. Remember the flurry of patriotic car decorations after 9/11? Most were made out of the country, and almost all of them were emblazoned with some platitude that was barely understood by the owner of the SUV it was stuck to. Before that it was the WWJD bracelet and “Jesus” fish (and their rebuttal counterparts). Now it is the ridiculous magnetic ribbons.
The Democratic Party was very hip to influence, as they proudly trotted out rock stars and movie star to sway voters. The GOP was no different, they just chose different spokes models. Before President Bush addressed Council Bluffs, crowds were treated to a short concert by beloved Christian songster Michael W. Smith… catch the subliminal message there? These messages are EVERYWHERE! It’s an awful movie, but watch Rowdy Roddy Piper in They Live. I feel like if we all could just put on those special sunglasses for one day, we'd feel very used and angry.
The Christian church exemplifies this topic well (as do most religions and cults). A widely accepted indicator of a person’s faith is often superficial things like who they hang out with, what music they listen to, and how they dress. Basically, there is a matrix you are expected to be plugged into (which varies from family to family, church to church). You listen to Christian radio, marry Christians, wear Christian clothes, read Christian fiction (funny concept to me), vote for Christians, hang out with Christians, read books by authors sympathetic to your sect, seek education by Christians (often at home), push for Christian laws, go to camps funded by your own church, play softball in Christian leagues, and in some places, frequent Christian businesses.
The problem is you are ignoring the intellectual inbreeding that can give birth to monstrosity. The church (as an example) is failing to see the power that influence can have. It realizes the positive power of constant reinforcement, but misses the fact that influence takes away a degree of personal accountability. It is hard to be self-actualized when you are bombarded from every angle by one particular ideology. Jesus called Christians to be in the world but not of it. Ignatius of Loyola realized that segregation from society was not a good exercise for holiness, and thus we now have Jesuit learning institutions that mix religious thought with the secular sciences. (And thankfully, we have Creighton University)
The Jesuits realize that influence clouds us finding who we are, and how we relate to the universe and God. How can we be expected to fill our role in life if we are forever being led about? Even if you think God is a notion born of this need to enforce influence, you have to admit that there are plenty of sources out there trying to cloud you from being a true individual, and from making truly informed choices.
Perhaps the truest tests of who you are is perhaps these two things; 1) how you act and think when no one else is privy to you, and 2) the moments you choose to buck influence in public. Jim Harrison, author of Legends of the Fall, wrote that sometimes our most uncharacteristic moments are our mist deeply revealing to what we really are. Think about this in your life. Who are you, and what makes you this way? In the next week, try to pin point influences that change your course of action, and pay attention to how you handle your life. Maybe in a short time, you can start to become acquainted with who YOU are.
To close, there are two great mindsets that sort of kick against this notion of influence (almost to the point of paranoia). One is the refrain of the crotchety Iowa male that says, “If I want to know what the weather is doing, I’ll stick my head out the window.” The other is the warning made to me in Bible college; “if you want to know what the Bible says about something, maybe you should read the Bible and not read a book telling you what it says.”
See ya!
There was a huge chunk of my life in which I honestly and passionately believed that there was no such thing as peer pressure. I thought that it was an excuse used to either get out of trouble, to place blame elsewhere (i.e. “may baby would NEVER do that…”), or to justify social workers and high school counselors. Basically, I thought the entire notion of influence is a myth.
My skepticism started early in my life. The movie The Day After nearly ruined my mind for good as it scared us all senseless with the threat of nuclear war, but I used to think, why would anyone want to destroy us if they knew we’d destroy them too (it was years before I saw, and fell in love with, Dr. Strangelove).
I was a big fan of role playing games (back before home video games were so sophisticated and so widely owned). I also loved heavy metal music. In the early 80’s if there were two things that got a lot of negative attention when it came to teens (other than sex and drugs), it was RPG’s and heavy metal.
They said that RPG’s made you lose grip on reality. There was an urban legend at the time that kids were so distraught when their characters died, that they would commit suicide. And of course, many of us remember the one about the kid who was convinced he could fly… all of these and more were furthered by an awesomely awful made for TV movie (which I think starred a young Tom Hanks).
And then there was heavy metal. It had back masking. It made you want to kill yourself. It led to drug abuse and Satanism. Twisted Sister was a bigger threat to the US than smutty TV like Dallas, and wonton materialism. You may not know this, but Judas Priest actually had to go to trial for manslaughter, based on the assumption that heavy metal bands were purposely telling kids to kill themselves through back masking. As we all know now, the industry is all about money, and it would make no sense to slaughter your prime demographic.
Fast forward. When the events of Columbine temporarily changed the United States into oversensitive, overreacting mother hens, I was one of the loudest critics of those who said that movie, music, and video games held any role in the tragedy. Then came the whole Jackass phenomenon, backyard wrestling, Grand Theft Auto, and Britney Spears.
Whether it is a vast conspiracy or some sort of psychological mumbo-jumbo, I treat it the same, with extreme skepticism. I had serious doubts that any one person could be so easily bent into something else just because of the imposed will of others.
What I didn’t realize is that I was starting to question the very nature of identity. The whole debate over influence asks hard questions about what makes you “you.” Am I predisposed to certain activities? Will I completely surrender my self to defer to someone else? Can another person make me do, say, or be something I am not?
Now, I am at a point in my life that I believe strongly in the power of influence. Granted, I still don’t hold Motley Crue or TSR responsible for the actions of others. But there is some validity to the idea of influence. I can feel it working in my own life; what I say, do, wear, eat, and drink. Decisions of whether to skip class, spend money on an item, or participate in an activity all depend in some part of what someone or something is telling me. And the consequences for listening to others can ruin a person.
It is a sad state. It makes me unsettled to know that I allow who Carl is to be tainted by something outside of myself. And I consider myself such a individual! I feel influence working its magic when I let my Sailor Mouth fly around people that don’t mind so much. I feel influence when I am dressing in the morning before school compared to mornings before I hang out with my brother. Most of all, I feel influence at work when I submerse myself in angry, negative media.
The truth is, influence is a useful tool when it comes to biology. As we became social creatures, we needed a mechanism to unify minds. We become susceptible to those with stronger personality. We let the mob mentality sweep over us. And the bad thing is, the same mechanism also allows us to be led astray and taken advantage of (see also advertising and nightly news). Influence changes what you value, what you care about, your morals, and your goals.
There are humorous examples of the powers of influence. Look at the distribution of social fads. Remember the flurry of patriotic car decorations after 9/11? Most were made out of the country, and almost all of them were emblazoned with some platitude that was barely understood by the owner of the SUV it was stuck to. Before that it was the WWJD bracelet and “Jesus” fish (and their rebuttal counterparts). Now it is the ridiculous magnetic ribbons.
The Democratic Party was very hip to influence, as they proudly trotted out rock stars and movie star to sway voters. The GOP was no different, they just chose different spokes models. Before President Bush addressed Council Bluffs, crowds were treated to a short concert by beloved Christian songster Michael W. Smith… catch the subliminal message there? These messages are EVERYWHERE! It’s an awful movie, but watch Rowdy Roddy Piper in They Live. I feel like if we all could just put on those special sunglasses for one day, we'd feel very used and angry.
The Christian church exemplifies this topic well (as do most religions and cults). A widely accepted indicator of a person’s faith is often superficial things like who they hang out with, what music they listen to, and how they dress. Basically, there is a matrix you are expected to be plugged into (which varies from family to family, church to church). You listen to Christian radio, marry Christians, wear Christian clothes, read Christian fiction (funny concept to me), vote for Christians, hang out with Christians, read books by authors sympathetic to your sect, seek education by Christians (often at home), push for Christian laws, go to camps funded by your own church, play softball in Christian leagues, and in some places, frequent Christian businesses.
The problem is you are ignoring the intellectual inbreeding that can give birth to monstrosity. The church (as an example) is failing to see the power that influence can have. It realizes the positive power of constant reinforcement, but misses the fact that influence takes away a degree of personal accountability. It is hard to be self-actualized when you are bombarded from every angle by one particular ideology. Jesus called Christians to be in the world but not of it. Ignatius of Loyola realized that segregation from society was not a good exercise for holiness, and thus we now have Jesuit learning institutions that mix religious thought with the secular sciences. (And thankfully, we have Creighton University)
The Jesuits realize that influence clouds us finding who we are, and how we relate to the universe and God. How can we be expected to fill our role in life if we are forever being led about? Even if you think God is a notion born of this need to enforce influence, you have to admit that there are plenty of sources out there trying to cloud you from being a true individual, and from making truly informed choices.
Perhaps the truest tests of who you are is perhaps these two things; 1) how you act and think when no one else is privy to you, and 2) the moments you choose to buck influence in public. Jim Harrison, author of Legends of the Fall, wrote that sometimes our most uncharacteristic moments are our mist deeply revealing to what we really are. Think about this in your life. Who are you, and what makes you this way? In the next week, try to pin point influences that change your course of action, and pay attention to how you handle your life. Maybe in a short time, you can start to become acquainted with who YOU are.
To close, there are two great mindsets that sort of kick against this notion of influence (almost to the point of paranoia). One is the refrain of the crotchety Iowa male that says, “If I want to know what the weather is doing, I’ll stick my head out the window.” The other is the warning made to me in Bible college; “if you want to know what the Bible says about something, maybe you should read the Bible and not read a book telling you what it says.”
See ya!
Comments:
*lmao* I was just given a little religious comic book that warns about RPG's prompting suicide and satanisim. Chick comics, I think they're called. They're fantastic, in a freak show sort of way.
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