capri0mni | Metacognition: Thinking about thoughts

(Or: Beliefs I've held about people that I didn't really know I believed, until I tried to write them into a story).

Chances are, the future will be neither utopian nor dystopian. "Utopia" is a word made up by Sir Thomas Moore. It means "No such place" (roughly). As far as I'm concerned, dystopias are equally unlikely. Even in the worst of times, human peoples find small ways to be happy and to be kind to each other and get through the day. It's just that in some places, and in some timess, it's damned difficult to do. But in any case, we're just muddling through. It's the rare individual who actually relishes being mean.

George Orwell was in the end stages of TB when he wrote the final chapters of 1984, remember. I think it skewed his worldview.

Violence doesn't need to be on an overwhelming scale to cast a wide shadow over society. I think the mainstream authors and historians are pretty much on target when it comes to the numbers of people killed in the European witch hunts between 1100 and 1600 CE. It was not even close to the numbers of people killed in the Holocaust. I find it troubling that many New Age and Neo-Pagan writers have the urge to make the comparison in the first place, and in the second place, I find it really troubling that some people feel the need to make the numbers bigger to "compete" with the Holocaust.

Imagination and memory have a greater impact on society than statistics and facts Citing both the Holocaust and 9/11 in one post? Well, here goes: Some 3,000 people died in that one attack. I've been tootling around the 'Nets since I wrote the previous sentence, trying to find the number of people who died in Manhattan, period, on that day: from old age, car accidents, slipping in the tub, whatever. ... I haven't found that information, yet, because all the Web sites I can find links to are all about the attack. Anyway, it still makes my point: statistically, the number is not really that big, and it didn't destroy the City, not by a long shot. But it struck a blow to our imaginations, and now, we have new government departments, and secret prisons, and reasonable people who are arguing for the benefits of torture (I disagree with them vehemently, but I acknoledge they are reasonable, and not crazies in tinfoil hats) -- things I couldn't have dreamt would be in our future, ten years ago.

Small, but significant, blows to the imagination are more likely to change our beliefs about reality than one big cataclysmic event. If someone comes up to you and, out of the blue, punches you in the nose and knocks you down and kicks you, the attack is likely to raise your sense of righteous indignation. If that same bully attacks you in small ways, over the course of weeks or months (blowing spitballs at the back of your head, dropping sand down the back of your shirt, calling you an insulting nickname), then that's what's most likely to change your self perception, and question your role in the world. It's the same with history and cultures -- especially if the "insulting" events happen over a course of time, within living memory of each other.

Watching someone else go through hard times and/or pain has a bigger impact on our imaginations than going through it ourselves. I know this from personal experience: whenever, on those rare occasions, I slip on my crutches, or fall out of my chair, the people witnessing the event act a lot more hurt than I feel... and often, I'm the one who has to calm them down. Also, Bush's using 9/11 to get reelected was more effective in the middle of the country than it was in Washington DC or New York, where people actually experienced the attacks.

We have more in common with people who lived at the height of the witch hunts, psychologically, than we have differences. If people could believe in the literal reality of supernatural monsters in the past, then it's possible for people to believe in them in the future. It doesn't have to be everyone who believes, or even a majority, just a coherent minority reaching a certain critical mass. (Points to idea #2, above).