I haven't been entirely religious about my blog posting lately. Actually, I've been positively neglectful of the entire deal. When was my last post? October? Shameful, truly. But now, on to the current thought...
Fact: People don't care. Now listen carefully - I'm not trying to be overly depressing, and I promise I'm not suicidal. I'm not mad at my family, nor do I come from some abusive situation with friends, sisters, and parents who have ignored me or something (not that I'm bashing on those who have). On the contrary, I've come from an absolutely peachy situation, and I haven't a thing to complain about. However, I'm just get a little sick of misleadingly optimistic opinions most hold of their fellow humans.
If I had a dollar for every time I've heard someone say, "Well, people are mostly good, it's just society that messes them up," I'd be... well... let's just say that I wouldn't need to take out loans in college. Not only are all humans selfishly evil and proud people, but they just plain don't care. However, we all persist in dogmatically pounding our little pulpits and making logically unsound arguments like, "My mom loves me and feeds me! How can she be evil?" or "What about whats-his-face the hero who did that thing to save that person? Do you think he's selfish? Huh? HUH?!"
Now now, before you start breathing in my face all angry like, take a breath mint and calm yourself down. I may be a presumptuous prig, but I like to consider myself relatively intelligent. However, I don't consider myself a very good debater, and frankly, I find the entire process rather boring. So, I'm not going to even bother to come up with some sound argument about how so-and-so (who loves you and helps old ladies cross the street) is plagued by inner sins. As so many other lovely (and probably more populous) blogs have already broached that topic, I see no reason to myself.
Nope. I'm much better at ranting. So I shall restate my fact: people don't care. They really don't. And I'm so irrevocably selfish that it actually took me this long to figure out. We care so much about our own lovely faces and stupid jokes and boring lives that we simply assume that everyone else (especially those who love us) care as well. Of course, those who love us are much better at pretending to be interested, but in the end, all they really want us to do is shut up so that they can prattle about their own banal subsistence.
Is it any wonder that we don't care? The only stories and words we want to hear are the sensational ones - those that make us laugh, cry, gasp, or feel some other emotion. I've been coming to this horridly depressing realization over the past several months, and the more I think about it, the more I recognize this ungodly behavior in myself and my friends. In conversations, we really truly only care about what we have to say.
I realize that there are all sorts of counterarguments to my assertion, but I honestly couldn't care less. I'm not arguing a position, I'm simply stating something. I know all of the other views, but the fact still remains: humans are selfish. Christians, of course, should be the exception - the only ones who are even remotely capable of something bordering caring about another for unselfish reasons. But to be blunt, even we aren't that good at it. In fact, sometimes it's in my Christian friends that I notice it the most - that obsession with dominating the conversation. We are always trying to get a word in edgewise, trying to sound smart, trying to be funny, trying to get people to like us. "Look at me! Look at me!" we say over and over and over and over, but everyone else is too busy waving their hands and jumping up and down to look over at us. We're just a bunch of narcissistic bums who want to make ourselves feel good.
Of course, this isn't strictly true, but why should I provide the positive, hopeful counter arguments when your lovely brain is capable of providing that itself? If I'm lucky, you too are now haunted by the idea that everything (supernaturally powered actions aside) you do, and most of what everyone else does is driven by little more than "selfish ambition and vain conceit."
And on that note... Go! Live your dream!
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