[Social Criticism] Ugly Narcissism - Sonder in Short Supply

[Pr0]

Recent cultural changes have left me thinking a lot about how we view and deal with the world.

Its been a creeping change over the years but of late its in full swing and its only getting louder and more strident as the months pass.

The topic is a bit obscure but the subject itself is rather evident. Everywhere you look in "new media" there is this huge shift of cultural focus towards body diversity and rejection of previous standards and almost a narcissistic obsession with the celebrating the average and mediocre "reality" of what "people really are".

But I feel this is a direct result of how our educational systems have changed over the decades that I have been alive.

For example, when I was in grade school and on to high school. You passed or failed or had varying degrees of acceptable levels of grade, but there was no such thing as a curve, no one was graded on a classroom average when I went to school.

You had winners, you had losers, and you had all the people in between. Somewhere in the late 80s and into the 90s and beyond educational systems changed from individual grade point averages to classroom based grade curves and then just no grades at all just, you were there so you must have learned something, heres your diploma.

Twenty years later this has seeped into our culture in the most insidious of methods. "Social Media". And yes there was a heavy clang sound on the insertion of those quotes.

To expand, we now live in a cultural era which is socially dominated by millions of people that don't quite understand psychologically that they are not the star of their own personal movie. They have been socially programmed to believe that they are special and that they have a purpose on this planet beyond taking up space in the line at Starbucks and that everyone else around them is merely background scenery. This is a well documented mental state that many people live in daily. Its not a mental problem, people that think like this lead completely productive normal lives of course, but its a known self delusion based in uneducated Solipsism. In fact if you faced off with someone with a word like Solipsism on a Scrabble board, and they didn't have a smart phone handy to look it up they probably wouldn't even know what it was a real word or that they have a small mental area in their brain that already subscribes to it.

Anyways, this unconscious Solipsism, this belief that all people are special because everyone is an individual stems from unconditional acceptance. You didn't lose, you didn't win, but you did participate. And this is the basic psycho-social mental state that has crept into most of the social movements of our time.

So we montage forward again to the present day, and you have all these extremely angry movements of absolutely average and mediocre people consistently shaking the foundations of established industries demanding equality and acceptance when the actual problem is there are winners and losers and not everyone can win.

From a purely physical perspective, one cannot state that one body image for a male or a female is "perfect" in fact the prevalent social opinion of what is biologically perfect has been in relative amounts of flux in the 2000 years or so of written accounts and artistic representations that we can visually account for.

But that doesn't mean that in every age there hasn't been an standard for what is "better" than everything else. In ancient history these people were regarded as heroes or descended from gods, or even gods themselves depending on the culture. Today, we call them celebrities, even if they're not particularly good at anything but being who they are.

And again back to 2015, and its huge social attempts to celebrate mediocrity. From a purely physical standpoint again...its understandable that some individuals are simply medically and physiologically incapable of "physical perfection" as such, but to deny that "physical perfection" is a possibility, simply because some of our human numbers are incapable of ever achieving it, to state that no body image or no facial proportion is more visually appealing than any other is a direct and obvious fallacy. Its a white knight delusion.

Using myself as an example, I am 6'2". or just above two meters in the metric system. I also naturally weigh about 180 pounds. I have a strong jawline, a prominent chin and light blue eyes that stand out well from my dark hair. Genetically I have all the basic foundations of physical "perfection"....but I'm not "perfect" and there is a reason for that. Its because I'm lazy.

That's right, instead of pointing my finger at anyone else, I will use myself as an example and say exactly why I'm not perfect. I could quite easily top 225 pounds and be cut like a comic book super hero if I wanted to and this is considered to be in most western society to be a "perfect" physiology for males. Not built like a wrestler but muscular and toned...I can do that quite easily, in fact when I was younger I used to do it more regularly and I got quite a lot of attention from the ladies and even other men. But the simple facts are is working out is hard....it takes time that I'd rather use doing other things like reading books or playing a game or working or spending time with my family.

So at this point in my life I'm around 180 pounds, I'm not particularly visually stunning, I am occasionally pasty white and flabby depending on what time of year it is and whether I'm getting any exercise at all or not..and thats all on me, thats my decision, I'm not "perfect" because I don't try to be. I could be, or at least my version of perfect...I just don't put in the effort.

And thats what it really comes down to for a large portion of modern society. The roots of "perfection" are in everyone and everyone has their own peak they could climb and summit and be as physically perfect as their genetics can allow for, they just don't try...they don't put in the effort. And the effort is not made for a lot of the same reasons I don't make the effort...but its not as if the possibility isn't there.

My own girlfriend is a beautiful redheaded girl who constantly complains about how fat she is. Shes not fat shes just not in the shape she wants to be in....but she never does anything about it. We live in a downtown building and there is a gym in the basement and a full sized Olympic swimming pool. She could easily change what she doesn't like about herself but she doesn't try...because she has other things to do or because shes lazy, kinda like me.

So what it comes down to is that being ugly, being "body diverse" isn't really about changing social standards and "acceptance" its really not anything but ugly narcissism. Its people like me who could be physically better that don't put in the effort, but then, for some strange reason, demand that the rest of the world change its standards for what is "beautiful" simply to accommodate their lack of effort.

I know everyone says that beauty is only skin deep and its whats inside that is truly special. But I hate to break it to you, but you're nothing inside but a collection of neuro-chemicals, hormones, various organs and connective tissues more or less. There is nothing special about you on the inside. That is a romantic (if not ill-educated) belief that humans have a soul or a heart or something else inside them that makes them special. The simple facts are is the only thing that makes you special at all is how special you decide to be to others around you and that is more or less about it. And if you don't put any effort into doing that...then you're likely to be rather forgettable and that is not the fault of media culture nor is it the fault of society in general.

And in general, there is nothing wrong with choosing not to chase perfection or personally believing that social standards of perfection are, somehow, in error.... even when its obvious that regardless of that belief, theres still a a huge industry of people that are simply famous because they're beautiful and whether you think they're beautiful or not they're still celebrities and you are a barista.

In the end and somehow trying to tie up this huge wandering ramble that I don't expect many people will read and the ones that do will mentally reject it because its cutting too close to the bone...is that ugly narcissism is still narcissism....its just uglier. Bimbos are people too, and you might hate them because they're bimbos, but yanno what? While you might sleep in til 9AM, they're getting up at 5AM to go to the gym, to put on make up, to pick out the right outfits...in all fairness, as bad as a rap as "bimbos" get, they put more effort into their lives than most of their critics.

So in closing, whether we agree to it or not, whether we collectively agree to give everyone a participation award (which to be fair, generally everyone gets a headstone somewhere...so most of us get a participation award by default), so they can feel equal and valued in our society, the undeniable, basic truth of human existence is that there will always be winners and losers, physically, mentally and psychologically...and attempting to change that with hashtags is the epitome of human arrogance and laziness.

 

[Euryalus]

Abandoning the idea of "excellence" in ethical theory was set in motion a looong time ago during the Enlightment era, where obedience to moral rules became the focus.

The idea of rights, moral and non-moral acts, utility, universality, and individualism started reigning supreme. You start to see new "secular" moral theories arise as the old philosophies associated with church were thrown off and abandoned. All of these philosophies, while remaining rigorously internally consistent, start with premises that have no argument given. You're just supposed to accept them.

No reason for why Ends justify means as measured by pleasure, no reason for why I should act in such a way as to wish for my acts to become a universal law, and no reason for why I should agree that all knowledge and morality should be rooted in sensory input and empathy instead of earlier rationalistic or combined rationalistic and sensory interpretations like Descartes and Plato or Aristotle and Aquinas respectively.

Then these obvious interminable but "rational" arguments led to people like Nietzche or Emotivists who said there's no rational morality, and it's all just will or projection of subjective wants.

Which a lot of people parrot to be edgy without necessarily realizing that that position isn't as free of problems as they'd like to think.

This all filtered down into the culture and so we now live in a "Post Modern" world where pluralism isn't seen as something that just is, but something that's genuinely good since there's no such thing as Right or Wrong per se. Right and Wrong are just your interpretations of the world and your own personal pursuit of happiness. That's modernity, Pluralism and personal happiness as virtue.

I tend to feel that throwing out the baby with the bath water during the violent pre enlightment era cause a lot of problems and stunted in some ways rather than progressed us as is commonly seen. The argument is nuanced and way too complicated for me to really go into here, but I recommend reading Alasdair Macintyre's "After Virtue"

Everything humanity does seems to take us two steps forward and one step back it seems.

Only tangentially related, but I never get a chance to use this quote. It's Heideggar asking what people hold to be their meaning in life, and lack of an answer to this is one of Modernity's potentially greatest problems.

Spoiler

"When the farthest corner of the globe has been conquered technologically and can be exploited economically; when any incident you like, at any time you like, becomes accessible as fast as you like; when you can simultaneously ?experience? an assassination attempt against a king in France and a symphony concert in Tokyo; when time is nothing but speed, instantaneity, and simultaneity, and time as history has vanished from all Dasein of all peoples; when a boxer counts as the great man of a people; when the tallies of millions at mass meetings are a triumph; then, yes then, there still looms like a specter over all this uproar the question: what for? ? where to? ? and what then?"

 

[Pr0]

Ahh an unexpected but kindred soul. I feel that the roots of current culture wouldn't subjectively benefit from absolute rational morality or total nihilism. Social philosophy is such a variant beast depending on the culture and our culture cannot be described in such narrow absolutism.

In fact quite a lot of the issues we face socially, well at least issues of a philosophical nature, are based in varying degrees of absolutism. Whether its absolute equality or absolute tolerance the thing to remember about these stances is that despite their positive sounding natures, they are still positions of absolutism....which by design breeds extremity and from extremity, extremists.

 

[L. Declis]

An interesting topic I've also thought about. Let's break your thing down:

The topic is a bit obscure but the subject itself is rather evident. Everywhere you look in "new media" there is this huge shift of cultural focus towards body diversity and rejection of previous standards and almost a narcissistic obsession with the celebrating the average and mediocre "reality" of what "people really are".

People don't want to feel they don't measure up. Telling people to measure up is now met with "Ugh, I'm busy". You're arrogant for thinking so, you're condescending.

There is a famous story in a body-building magazine about how a bodybuilder is always asked by a guy "How do I get in shape?"

The body builder responds "It's hard and difficult. I work hard to do it. You want me to say it's easy? It's not. You want me to show you that it's okay if you don't bother to improve yourself? It's not. It's disgusting that you're so lazy."

But I feel this is a direct result of how our educational systems have changed over the decades that I have been alive.

For example, when I was in grade school and on to high school. You passed or failed or had varying degrees of acceptable levels of grade, but there was no such thing as a curve, no one was graded on a classroom average when I went to school.

You had winners, you had losers, and you had all the people in between. Somewhere in the late 80s and into the 90s and beyond educational systems changed from individual grade point averages to classroom based grade curves and then just no grades at all just, you were here so you must have learned something.

Twenty years later this has seeped into our culture in the most insidious of methods.

To expand, we now live in a cultural era which is socially dominated by millions of people that don't quite understand psychologically that they are not the star of their own personal movie. They have been socially programmed to believe that they are special and that they have a purpose on this planet beyond taking up space in the line at Starbucks and that everyone else around them is merely background scenery. This is a well documented mental state that many people live in daily. Its not a mental problem, people that think like this lead completely productive normal lives of course, but its a known self delusion based in uneducated Solipsism. In fact if you faced off with someone with a word like Solipsism on a Scrabble board, and they didn't have a smart phone handy to look it up they probably wouldn't even know what it was a real word or that they have a small mental area in their brain that already subscribes to it.

To be fair, the English language is extremely large and far-reaching. Verisimilitude is a word I use often, but many people don't. I bet most people know words you don't. I would suggest you stop treating ignorance like you're so much better; instead, embrace it as a teaching opportunity.

https://xkcd.com/1053/

Well, individualism is very much a part of Western society, and in particular, American society. The American Dream is based upon the idea that anyone, even you (and especially you) can be President. Children are told from day one they are special. You get awards for turning up. You get awards for taking part. No one is allowed to fail. In the U.K., this is literal. We don't even hand out Fail grades anymore, we simply call them "Ungraded", because Fail is too harsh, apparently.

Anyways, this unconscious Solipsism, this belief that all people are special because everyone is an individual stems from unconditional acceptance. You didn't lose, you didn't win, but you did participate. And this is the basic psycho-social mental state that has crept into most of the social movements of our time.

So we montage forward again to the present day, and you have all these extremely angry movements of absolutely average and mediocre people consistently shaking the foundations of established industries demanding equality and acceptance when the actual problem is there are winners and losers and not everyone can win.

To be fair, people have always thought they could change everything when they're young; have you spoken to teenagers? Always arrogant, always self-righteous, always know better because they did a bit of research.

The only difference is now they have the internet, Reddit, and Tumblr, and so they can organise their views into a force.

From a purely physical perspective, one cannot state that one body image for a male or a female is "perfect" in fact the prevalent social opinion of what is biologically perfect has been in relative amounts of flux in the 2000 years or so of written accounts and artistic representations that we can visually account for.

But that doesn't mean that in every age there hasn't been an standard for what is "better" than everything else. In ancient history these people were regarded as heroes or descended from gods, or even gods themselves depending on the culture. Today, we call them celebrities, even if they're not particularly good at anything but being who they are.

Many celebrities are good at what they do. Even Paris Hilton is a master of marketing and business; she effectively conquered the world with a sex tape. Same with the Kardashians. It is what they did afterwards which was clever.

And again back to 2015, and its huge social attempts to celebrate mediocrity. From a purely physical standpoint again...its understandable that some individuals are simply medically and physiologically incapable of "physical perfection" as such, but to deny that "physical perfection" is a possibility, simply because some of our human numbers are incapable of ever achieving it, to state that no body image or no facial proportion is more visually appealing than any other is a direct and obvious fallacy. Its a white knight delusion.

Again, this was rooted in an acceptable idea. There was an idea that certain types of looks are simply unattractive; not being white, not having the right kind of eyes, not dressing a certain style. The idea of a more open system of what is attractive comes from letting more than just Pamela Anderson or Marilyn Monroe be the standard of beauty.

There is also the idea that women are being judged purely on how they look, rather than their personalities. This movement was done so we would judge people by their character.

But you are right, that this has mutated into things such as the HEAS movement, where they will push a narrative that being hugely, dangerously and grossly obese is attractive and society should find them similarly attractive, and they should brook no disagreement. People have taken what was supposed to provide leeway to be attractive and used it to lower their own standards and demand people also lower theirs.

It's also extremely ignorant of humans; we are still animals, and we still have a biological attraction. You can shout about how you think this or that is attractive, but what SHOULD be attractive and what IS attractive is often too different things; people who are honest about this today are labelled as being "shallow" or other things meaning a horrible person.

Using myself as an example, I am 6'2". or just above two meters in the metric system. I also naturally weigh about 180 pounds. I have a strong jawline, a prominent chin and light blue eyes that stand out well from my dark hair. Genetically I have all the basic foundations of physical "perfection"....but I'm not "perfect" and there is a reason for that. Its because I'm lazy.

That's right, instead of pointing my finger at anyone else, I will use myself as an example and say exactly why I'm not perfect. I could quite easily top 225 pounds and be cut like a comic book super hero if I wanted to and this is considered to be in most western society to be a "perfect" physiology for males. Not built like a wrestler but muscular and toned...I can do that quite easily, in fact when I was younger I used to do it more regularly and I got quite a lot of attention from the ladies and even other men. But the simple facts are is working out is hard....it takes time that I'd rather use doing other things like reading books or playing a game or working or spending time with my family.

So at this point in my life I'm around 180 pounds, I'm not particularly visually stunning, I am occasionally pasty white and flabby depending on what time of year it is and whether I'm getting any exercise at all or not..and thats all on me, thats my decision, I'm not "perfect" because I don't try to be. I could be, or at least my version of perfect...I just don't put in the effort.

Well, you're honest about yourself. However, since you know this, you should put in the effort. How to say, be the change you want to see?

Also, to quote Aristotle; "It is a great crime for a man to grow old and not see the miracles it can achieve" (or something like that.

You can make it, bro. Also, it's about 80% diet, these things. Okay, I'll stop trying to motivate you now, you know what you're doing.

And thats what it really comes down to for a large portion of modern society. The roots of "perfection" are in everyone and everyone has their own peak they could climb and summit and be as physically perfect as their genetics can allow for, they just don't try...they don't put in the effort. And the effort is not made for a lot of the same reasons I don't make the effort...but its not as if the possibility isn't there.

I agree with this. However, I do think that you can't tell other people to do what you wouldn't do yourself.

My own girlfriend is a beautiful redheaded girl who constantly complains about how fat she is. Shes not fat shes just not in the shape she wants to be in....but she never does anything about it. We live in a downtown building and there is a gym in the basement and a full sized Olympic swimming pool. She could easily change what she doesn't like about herself but she doesn't try...because she has other things to do or because shes lazy, kinda like me.

I must say, nothing annoys me more than when my girlfriend will complain about something, but won't do something to fix it. Sometimes they just want you to shut up, listen and be aware of their problems.

However, work out together? Solves two problems with one stone, and it'll drastically improve your quality of life in so many ways.

So what it comes down to is that being ugly, being "body diverse" isn't really about changing social standards and "acceptance" its really not anything but ugly narcissism. Its people like me who could be physically better that don't put in the effort, but then, for some strange reason, demand that the rest of the world change its standards for what is "beautiful" simply to accommodate their lack of effort.

There is something I heard once. I'll paraphrase it.

"Good people see people like James Bond and aspire to be like him. They climb the mountain to reach the highest point.
Lazy people get jealous and say it's unrealistic, they then stop where they are and say it's the new mountain top, and anyone who disagrees is a horrible person"

I know everyone says that beauty is only skin deep and its whats inside that is truly special. But I hate to break it to you, but you're nothing inside but a collection of neuro-chemicals, hormones, various organs and connective tissues more or less. There is nothing special about you on the inside. That is a romantic (if not ill-educated) belief that humans have a soul or a heart or something else inside them that makes them special. The simple facts are is the only thing that makes you special at all is how special you decide to be to others around you and that is more or less about it. And if you don't put any effort into doing that...then you're likely to be rather forgettable and that is not the fault of media culture nor is it the fault of society in general.

Careful; you're getting a bit close to fedora tipping territory with the "humans are nothing but flesh and chemicals" bit. Sounds angsty.

But the general point is true; society owes you nothing, and the sooner people get used to that and start making themselves worth knowing are the days when your life starts to improve. 99% of people will not make the time to know you, and guess what they'll be using to judge you?

Not your wonderful sense of humour.

And in general, there is nothing wrong with choosing not to chase perfection or personally believing that social standards of perfection are, somehow, in error.... even when its obvious that regardless of that belief, theres still a a huge industry of people that are simply famous because they're beautiful and whether you think they're beautiful or not they're still celebrities and you are a barista.

People think being beautiful is a lottery.

Sur, genetics plays a part, but you have to eat well, dress well, learn how to be good socially, look after yourself, learn to say no to bad food or habits, exercise, spend time grooming yourself.

If someone is beautiful, they have a lot of good traits. Are they good people? No. But I can tell you they have the above, and if I have two people equally qualified, but one is attractive, I know that at least the attractive person puts the effort into maintaining a good standard of themselves, and will probably do the same on their work.

In the end and somehow trying to tie up this huge wandering ramble that I don't expect many people will read and the ones that do will mentally reject it because its cutting too close to the bone...is that ugly narcissism is still narcissism....its just uglier. Bimbos are people too, and you might hate them because they're bimbos, but yanno what? While you might sleep in til 9AM, they're getting up at 5AM to go to the gym, to put on make up, to pick out the right outfits...in all fairness, as bad as a rap as "bimbos" get, they put more effort into their lives than most of their critics.

This is true.

The recent anti-beautiful drive, the massive self-importance and then the attempt to change goalposts when people don't find them attractive is a bad habit in the west.

People will do something stupid, like gain 200lbs, and then say that people who do not date them are selfish, completely unaware of how selfish it is to do that to yourself and then demand someone else curb their own attractions to suit their lazy lifestyle.

People work damn hard to look good, and anyone who says otherwise is an envious liar.

There is also the fact that many who do not look after themselves have so many chips on their shoulders about whose fault it is (never theirs), why society should accept them (but never will to change themselves), why people are shallow (but would never date a fat person themselves), and so on.

At least attractive people are confident and willing to have a good time, rather than blame the world.

So in closing, whether we agree to it or not, whether we collectively agree to give everyone a participation award (which to be fair, generally everyone gets a headstone somewhere...so most of us get a participation award by default), so they can feel equal and valued in our society, the undeniable, basic truth of human existence is that there will always be winners and losers, physically, mentally and psychologically...and attempting to change that with hashtags is the epitome of human arrogance and laziness.

Fair enough.

 

[San Martin]

I once had 'epithet' in a Scrabble game, though I'm not sure if that'd get as many points as 'solipsism'. Anyway, that day I was most decidedly a winner.

On topic, what hashtag campaigns have been pissing you off? I think I see what you're getting at, but I ain't entirely in the know.

 

[Pr0]

If I had to be honest about what hashtag campaigns have been getting on my nerves the most...I'd have to say all of them.

From an objective standpoint, hashtag campaigns aren't a way of doing anything...they're a way to force other people to do things for you, or to force people to do things your way. There is no actual effort in social media, its simply snake oil marketing for the new millenium...except now its about selling you what you think, or cures for social ills, as compared to trying to get that wart off your Nana's nose.

Hashtag campaigns are the cultural groupthink in weaponized form. And in that form, they are all disgusting.

People that think they can change the world with their smartphones while sitting on their asses doing nothing are intellectually, creatively and in some cases, morally, bankrupt.

 

[Phasmal]

Well this thread's kind of a downer.
To be honest, I kind of don't get it.

Most people figured out that they weren't special years and years ago, but that doesn't mean they have to either change their whole lives to try and be `perfect` or that they should give up. They just said `fuck it` and decided to be happy doing their own thing, and good on them.

If you spend your time being unhappy at people who are just getting on with it, I dunno, I don't see the productivity there.

 

[Zontar]

If you spend your time being unhappy at people who are just getting on with it, I dunno, I don't see the productivity there.

I think his problem is with those who didn't get it, those who do think they're special and that the reality that they aren't is met with them lashing out instead of dealing with it like the rest of us do.

We've been going through this problem here in Quebec for years, being exemplified by student protests in 2012 and again right now as we speak.

 

[Zontar]

So tl;dr:

"I disagree with people that celebrate normality and don't aim for perfection".

Put that at the top. Hopefully it'll save someone from having to read that long post that goes nowhere.

Aren't typical "TL;DR"s supposed to be abbreviations of what someone actually said?

 

[VanQ]

An entire generation of children told that they're special. That they're unique. Their parents told them this, their television told them this and their games reinforced this with instant gratification and god-like power. Yeah, no shit we live in a narcissistic generation.

You only need to look so far as the phenomenon that is the selfie. Is there any narcissistic manifestation more obvious than taking a camera, turning it towards the mirror and snapping a photo of your duck-billed face to post on social media for the world to throw dozens of "likes" at. Like, don't judge guys. Meanwhile, I'll ignore the fact t hat Facebook didn't install a Dislike button because focus groups found that it caused unparalleled rage and anger from people aged 25 and younger. They're special, remember, unique. How can anyone dislike them?

You think I'm making this shit up? I'm not the only one that has made this observation. The Proceedings of National Academy of Sciences, a peer reviewed Science magazine recently published a study about exactly this, and came to these same conclusions by following and surveying 565 children ages 7 through 11 and their parents -- 415 mothers and 290 fathers.

The study is behind a paywall, but the link is here in case anyone else is able to see it: http://www.pnas.org/content/112/12/3659.full?sid=011072bf-482e-40fb-9ce9-dc3081c18f52

For those who can't, there are article here that have written and summarized it, pick your poison:
http://www.washingtonpost.com/news/to-your-health/wp/2015/03/09/how-parents-create-narcissistic-children/
http://www.forbes.com/sites/alicegwalton/2015/03/09/parents-stop-overvaluing-your-kid-you-may-create-a-future-narcissist-study-says/
http://www.theguardian.com/world/2015/mar/10/parents-who-praise-children-too-much-may-encourage-narcissism-says-study

I mean, when The Guardian of all fucking publications is telling you to stop telling your kids they're fucking special, a print that has spent the last ten years telling its demographic it is special, then you know there's an issue there. Seriously, telling an entire generation of children that they're special creates a generation of narcissists? Who the hell would have thought?

 

[Euryalus]

Ahh an unexpected but kindred soul. I feel that the roots of current culture wouldn't subjectively benefit from absolute rational morality or total nihilism. Social philosophy is such a variant beast depending on the culture and our culture cannot be described in such narrow absolutism.

In fact quite a lot of the issues we face socially, well at least issues of a philosophical nature, are based in varying degrees of absolutism. Whether its absolute equality or absolute tolerance the thing to remember about these stances is that despite their positive sounding natures, they are still positions of absolutism....which by design breeds extremity and from extremity, extremists.

Any morality based on strict adherence to rules is bound to fail in my eyes, because when abstracted out of it's environment it loses its entire context. Including the point of any any action, and, If I ever get around to piecing it out in my head, the answer to that big "Why."

It's like looking at a good chess player and a good boxer and concluding that what they have in common is simply "goodness" and not "goodness at [chess or boxing]."

Chess and Boxing are unique environments with unique sets of rules that govern them. Being good at them is more than just winning, it's winning within the confines of the rules otherwise we wouldn't make a distinction between cheating and playing fairly.

If you cheat, yeah, you may be clever and a good winner, but in a sense you're still a shit chess player or boxer. You couldn't achieve victory within certain parameters because you weren't "good" enough to do so.

You can't take away the telos[footnote] That oh so dirty word because how hard Aristotle's biology failed[/footnote] from any action and still use good meaningfully. If there's any such thing as an objective good it's going to be thoroughly situational, thoroughly relativistic and linked to the environment it exists in, and concerned with more than just "winning" but "winning well."

An absolutist position I find to be very empty. A friend on facebook posted that it was wrong to tell women "Smile!" or something to that effect because it made them feel uncomfortable (and harms them in a utilitarian sense). Well what if a camera man told her to smile for the picture? Would it be sane to object and say it makes them feel uncomfortable? If so why, why does your discomfort matter, and if not why is that situation different from a guy on the street saying "Hey babe Smile for me."

Well this thread's kind of a downer.
To be honest, I kind of don't get it.

Most people figured out that they weren't special years and years ago, but that doesn't mean they have to either change their whole lives to try and be `perfect` or that they should give up. They just said `fuck it` and decided to be happy doing their own thing, and good on them.

If you spend your time being unhappy at people who are just getting on with it, I dunno, I don't see the productivity there.

What? You mean you've never had an existential crisis yet?

I think your answer at least in part encapsulates what he's saying. Your mantra of be happy puts comfort and "Hedonistic" (in the philosophical sense) pursuits over other concerns like excellence, adherence to rules, or even a buddhistic "removal of self". Why? Why is a society where everyone pursues their own idea of happiness something good or better than one where everyone strives to achieve a sort of technical and character based "perfection?"?

Brings us back to the interminable differences you know? We agree to disagree just because *shrugs*

I think that that may be a destructive attitude when you put it into a sphere where a decision needs to be made, like politics.

 

[thoughtwrangler]

I agree that we should celebrate excellence, and that by celebrating normality we're steering too hard in the opposite direction. Trying to make up for an unnecessarily hard-handed society that enforced norms and values that were hidebound in tradition and morality for its own sake rather than any real end goal.

But the opposite end of the spectrum is bleak. Maybe we shouldn't celebrate mediocrity, but accept it. And understand that mediocrity is incredibly diverse. (i.e. everyone is less-than-excellent in some aspect.)

Additionally, EVERYBODY naturally sees themselves as the star of their story. The instinct for self-primacy is something that is beaten out of us rather than being instilled. Societies past and present are rather effective at this when there's a need for plenty of people tilling fields and blacksmithing, but without wanting to feel, like INDEBTED to them for it or anything.

The opposite end of the spectrum -- that anyone owes it to you (and here I'm using the "subjective" you, not anyone on this thread personally) to be in shape or have a master's degree or a well-paying job -- is REAL narcissism. Unless you have some reason to be personally invested in that individual, such as being their friend, lover, life coach, your standard of how they should look or act is about as relevant and based in ethical concern as a Bonobo's choice of target for poo-flinging. (And one's gut response to a "disgusting fat person" is every bit as civilized.)

No, we shouldn't remove the need for standards of excellence, nor dilute the incentives to excellence by artificially setting up mediocrity as its equal. On the other hand, removing the harsh penalties for mediocrity that are imposed on people -- and we must admit that is a state that we must admit most of the world will inevitably occupy -- is a good thing.

So let's not elevate mediocrity by artificially incentivizing it. But let's also not denigrate those who are mediocre by artificially depriving them of what they CAN get for themselves (which has historically been the case.)

 

[Dirty Hipsters]

I think it's good that not everyone strives to be perfect, that not everyone strives to achieve, and that some people are happy with their station in life and don't feel that they need to improve it.

Here's the deal, society needs a bottom tier of people to function. We need people to flip burgers, we need people to be garbage men and delivery boys, we need people who are willing to do simple tasks and lead simple lives.

I think that one of the biggest problems right now in first world countries is that too many people are going to college. At this point in time a college degree is worth less and less because more and more people have them. A college education no longer guarantees you a well paying job, hell it doesn't guarantee you a job at all, especially not if you picked the "wrong" major.

Society has taught people for decades that they could improve their social position through education, that if you tried hard, went to school, and learned that you would be successful and we all listened. We've been going to college in record numbers, we've been educating ourselves and now the number of college graduates is outstripping the number of jobs that actually require a college degree. Now we have tons of smart, capable people who are working minimum wage dead end jobs and who are miserable and have student loan debt and who feel that the system has failed them. They went to college, they got good grades, they held up their end and society failed them.

It's all well and good to try to be exceptional. The world needs exceptional people for the sake of progress, we need engineers, scientists, writers, scholars. The problem is that we need fewer exceptional people than we need average people. We have more need of waiters and short order cooks than we do of rocket scientists. Not everyone can be exceptional, we can't afford to have a society where everyone is exceptional, it just wouldn't function. So I think it's good that society is reinforcing the idea that it's ok not to seek greatness.

 

[Euryalus]

I think it's good that not everyone strives to be perfect, that not everyone strives to achieve, and that some people are happy with their station in life and don't feel that they need to improve it.

Here's the deal, society needs a bottom tier of people to function. We need people to flip burgers, we need people to be garbage men and delivery boys, we need people who are willing to do simple tasks and lead simple lives.

It's all well and good to try to be exceptional. The world needs exceptional people for the sake of progress, we need engineers, scientists, writers, scholars. The problem is that we need fewer exceptional people than we need average people. We have more need of waiters and short order cooks than we do of rocket scientists. Not everyone can be exceptional, we can't afford to have a society where everyone is exceptional, it just wouldn't function. So I think it's good that society is reinforcing the idea that it's ok not to seek greatness.

Excellence or a goal oriented "perfection" isn't at odds with societal classes. You say it's good we don't have everyone striving to be excellent, because we need burger flippers, but what good is a burger flipper that doesn't flip well? In every task that has a goal as its end, you either achieve that goal or you don't, how you do it matters a great deal if the results of accomplishment can have varying levels of desirability.

Every goal oriented task has this quality, even simple ones. What you're doing I think, and I'm going to use a dirty word here, is privileging certain jobs over others. Solving differential equations and flipping burgers are being judged according to certain lawlike utilitarian standards that have no place in the idea of excellence. Perfection or excellence can only have meaningful existence in their goal oriented environments.

 

[Vault101]

ooooohhh fun times

there's a difference between demanding "winners" and "losers" be treated the same...its more about [I/]"well actually I think your standards for "winning" are kind of dumb and don't see why I have to be held to them"[/I]

snip.

your using body acceptance as one such example...the issue being that its kind of subjective

I mean sure in our current society we have "generally' agreed upon standards for attractiveness, except often

1. they are aren't realistic
2. they might not even be [I/]healthy[/I] notice how women are more focused on their "weight" than they are on their fitness and health?

like what if my face isn't the same as Natalie portmans? do I need to hate myself? am I morally obligated to strive to that level of "perfection" via getting plastic surgery?

or lets say I'm not very well endowed in the chest area, and I LIKE that fact about myself, am I celebrating my mediocrity when I SHOULD be out there getting a breastjob? or am loving my own body in a way society constantly says I shouldn't?

or lets get down tot he REAL issue here...our hatred of fat people

fat people are easy to hate because we can point to them and say "look! lookat thease fatass they did this to themselves!" unlike other groups in society were given a free pass to hate them because we can justify it...never mind however many other factors go into ones body shape OR the fact that humans are different have different bodies

but even if we assume its all self inflicted were held to weird standards

due to whatever reasons (metabolism, genetics) I'm naturally skinny, I could eat crap all day, do very little exercise and whatever difference it might make I could easily hide

yet no one is going to act like I'm a moral failure, no one is going to say to me "NO, YOURE SUPOSED TO HATE YOURSELF"

instead its all "go you!" my inherent skinniness is treated like an achievement, when I've done little to "earn" it

a person fatter than me could actually be fitter/more healthy yet theyre considered a moral failure

[quote/]So we montage forward again to the present day, and you have all these extremely angry movements of absolutely average and mediocre people consistently shaking the foundations of established industries demanding equality and acceptance when the actual problem is there are winners and losers and not everyone can win.[/quote]
[I/]oh my...its so simple isn't it?[/I]

this thread really belongs in R&P since you've highlighted a mentally of certain right wing schools of thought

the false notion that the world is a meritocracy and that it is inherently fair

its a comforting thought, if poor people are poor because they're bad with money and or made bad decisions then "I" can never be poor

if oppressed people are oppressed its because they're inferior and/or don't do anything to help themselves, therefore I don't have to feel bad about it/ I can never be oppressed

that's why people spent so much time trying to convince themselves the "other" were actually inferior, it absolved them of any guilt/responsibility and helps them sleep at night

now don't get me wrong "striving" and all that is great, we should all be constantly learning/improving because its all we have in an uncaring world

but to believe that there aren't other factors at play is pure ignorance...you never bothered to question why things are the way they are... the foundation for all your assumptions

 

[Vault101]

snip.

that would be all good and well if certain lower tier jobs were liveable, as I understand they generally aren't in America