The Red Pill - Day 26

 

 

Gah, my undergraduate is finally over. I'm reflecting back now on the journey.

 

Psychology was like waking up and seeing the world around me. With Psychology, you learn why you think how you do, and why others think how they do. It takes the blissful mystery out of many things, to a large degree, such that even people who say "You don't know me; don't think you do!" are known--by you. You may not know everything in their mind, but you know how their mind works--and that's a scary thing.

But--Sociology. God, sociology is like taking the "red pill". My teacher Barbara Greene in high school said "This is going to make you love and hate people, concurrently." Then my college professor Naomi Wolfe took me to a new level with this; such that I began reading things I never would have bothered with before.

Dangerous things.

Things that explain why people react to situations and people in the way they do. Books with history-rich documentary of people responding to this movement or that person in the same way people today respond to this movement or that person. People today, of course want to say "Well that was a different time, and that person was different than me. I'm following this person/movement/idea because of this, not because of that.

Psst--that's what they said too.

I remember frequently wishing that I could magically be transported back to my childhood, but with the same knowledge I have right now. How differently I would do things. However, having the knowledge I have now would be a mental torture chamber. Knowing when and how people would die, for example, and my being powerless to stop it. That's what sociology is like. Knowing why and how people react to things that have happened before, even though they feel their motives today are "oh so different" from the motives of those people twenty, fifty, or even two-hundred years ago.

A lot of people have unfollowed me on Facebook over the past couple of years, due to a concept of psychology related to confirmation bias. It's okay, we all do it. I know I did. Because of that, though, people who used to see my blog no longer do, and that's fine. I see their posts where they are blissfully going about their lives, when actually, I know what they are trying to convey both to the world and to themselves. That knowledge is a frightening thing.

I see you.

 

But you unfollowed me, so you can't see me.

(Ha-ha.)

 

I remember reading an X-Men comic back when I was a kid, and one of the mutants had the power of future-sight as well as mind-reading. Professor X told him that his gift was both a magnificent blessing and a torturous curse. Always knowing the minds of people, but being powerless to change them. Always knowing how things would end, but unable to change them. 

 

Professor X said "The worth of the gift you have been given hinges on how you use it, and whether you always use it for good."

 

"But it hurts." he said. "I want the pain to stop. Please, make it stop!"

"I can't make it stop, but you can use it to teach others before they grow into who we have become. Join us." Professor X said.

Gah, join us.

Barbara Greene and Naomi Wolfe.

What am I getting myself into?