I’ve been in a ranty mood lately, but the last thing I want to do is complain. I do and have done it enough already. Yet, when you read this, it will be another complaint, so I really suck at saying I won’t do something, because in the third sentence, I go ahead and do it. But a lot of the things I’ve wanted to write are about the negative things I’ve been noticing and seeing around me. There are people out there who think they’re better than…well, everyone, and that’s been making me angry. And I’d be an idiot if I didn’t include myself in that category. Then there is this new culture of hypocrisy that includes me as well, but we’re cool with it because it’s the norm. We hate on a type of people and go around and be that people, and it’s just bothersome. But who wants to keep reading about all the crappy things that are going on and apparently a part of our human nature? It seems that the older I get, the more annoyed and…angry(?) I get. Bothered maybe? I don’t know what the word should be.
The other day Dave the Drummer and I were talking after recording the podcasts and we were discussing human decency, and how that’s really just not a thing anymore. Well, I don’t know about the rest of the world, but here in the U.S., we are an individualistic society. It’s about me, and doing something for me, and then stepping on as many people as we can along the way. That’s called success I guess. Remember that whole thing I was talking about a couple weeks back where I was asking what makes you happy? Apparently it’s entitlement for some. And in order to make ourselves feel better about ourselves, we will force feed the people around us our ideals and our philosophies because “we” are the only one’s with the answers. If you don’t agree with me, you are wrong. Then people turn around and do the opposite. Be good to each other people while I treat this person over here like crap because I think he deserves it. And here I am, trying to promote that this mentality is not a good idea and asking people to stop forcing their ideas on others. I’m no better. Why should I push the idea of human decency when people don’t have to be and seem to not want to be that way?
I realize this is a HUGE generality. I know there are a plethora of people who are decent and kind and genuinely beautiful people. I know they exist and I know some of these people. But I also know people who are not this way, and I don’t understand why. People tout wanting to be treated well and all that jazz but don’t go and do it? People recall the Golden Rule, in any of it’s iterations and just go about treating people like trash? How does that work? What am I missing?
There’s situations all around us of people who feel entitled and who expect to be treated like royalty, while thinking that others are beneath them. This happens in the service business all the time. That the person doing work for you is smaller and more insignificant and therefore does not deserve to be treated with any kind of respect. What!? If they screw up, sure, they don’t deserve the tip, but why treat those doing it right like second class citizens when they’re just doing the job you prefer not to do and may actually be doing it WELL. It just does not make sense. Yes you are technically in a position of power, and yes, there are people who are doing a service you paid for and thus work for you, but that is no excuse to throw decency out the window. Maybe it goes back to prejudice? But holy crap, I don’t really want to go there. I live in California, the most diverse state ever and despite that fact, I fear racism. Not just from “white people”, but from any race. It’s like equal opportunity hate. It’s weird that the once oppressed are oppressing others. Like this unspoken hierarchy of ethnicity.
It is really weird to fear racism in this day and age too. Segregation still exists, even if we think it doesn’t. It’s just much less noticeable with much more conspiracy, and often thought to be self inflicted. That people put themselves in their places. Apparently that’s why Asians are over here, Hispanics are over there and Black people are over here, etc. A VERY sensitive subject for a lot of people with a lot of butting heads and really, that’s not what I DON’T want to talk about now. Personally, though, I often think of myself as a person of no ethnicity. Sure I have brown skin and am considered Asian, but I don’t think that on a daily basis. Instead, again, thanks to living in California, I am treated like everyone else (for the most part). This is quite the melting pot, if you didn’t know. But I have had my share of stares and unease in neighborhoods that were more dominantly one race or another. Again, here is that weird, “we want to be treated one way, but we’ll treat you, Mr. Outsider, another way.” It’s just so strange. But the majority of the time, my race doesn’t play a factor, except in the dating scene, but that’s beside the point.
Maybe some compassion and some empathy would not be so bad. We forget that there are other people in the world other than us. Unless the world around us is a figment of our imagination and we’re just interacting with some virtual world completely constructed by our brain and the true reality is in some distant land where our bodies are stored. Woah…we’re in the matrix!
In the end, I admit, I don’t treat people equally, I have my prejudices and stereotypes and I fight them all the time. I prefer not to label people because, well, I know I am and will continue to be labeled myself. Still, I am not fond of people who refuse to see another point of view, if just to acknowledge that plausibility of it. I automatically think these people are idiots. Not all the time, but if I don’t know them personally, and they refuse to even notice that there are other points of vies, then I think they are a moron. I really dislike people who demand that a person should believe any one thing whether it is science or religion based as if a person can’t reason it out on their own. Either way, here I am not complaining and not whining about things. Look, I’m not perfect, and I’m the last person to say I have the definitive say in anything, but I do my best with what I have. Hell, I could very well be an idiot, but there are people out there who find what I have to say sound and worthwhile, so maybe I’m not as much of an idiot as I say I am. See? Me being hypocritical…I think.
