I read this in a book recently. The idea that we are stuck in a society, which itself may be the jail. The rules put upon us, the levels of threat we are alerted to, the regulations government deems fit, the taxes we pay.
But what if we break it down to a fundamental of human moral, Truth. We live in a society in which the truth is always one step out of our grasp. One can even assume that levels of the truth do not exist for any one person. Although we all put our trust in one person. That person being our president. But the presidency is made up of people and organizations. The president himself probably probes for the truth. He may have sat in that room the first day of his presidency where they revealed the secrets of the world to him, yet someone in the next room probably held their own secret which was passed to another office and so on. The secrets become a game of telephone. They change and fall far from the truth.
Our world is an evolution yet we have so many implementations of rules and governing ideals that are not updated to go with our evolution, because we are too busy trying to make the first set of rules work.
Technology itself is an example of how we have trouble keeping up with ourselves. An 85 year old man would look at an idea like twitter and laugh himself to sleep. Is it because we are not accustomed to knowing the world around us in truths, but snippets, and “Good Media”.
The introduction of money into any society causes there to be competition, often considered to be good, but also a key factor in changing the rules of engagement. This could be as simple as buying an apple at the market to launching an attack on foreign soil. So maybe we should put ourselves into the situations we often wonder the truth about. We should become soldiers… but a soldier will form his own truths from what he sees. What he sees may be part of the telephone game, where the people he encounters got the wrong message, skewing his truths off center.
So when do we get to know the truth, is it when we die and go to heaven we can look down and see all the answers? Or is it giving up on actively working toward the truth to fall into faith.
Faith gives us a chance to forget the truth and hope for a reality. It cleanses us from our own lies. Not to say faith is not helpful to bring the miracles within a person to the surface, but when as a nation we default to it 7 out of 10 times, you start to wonder if we are being passive with our own existence.
Under God we Trust, yet we will not trust the stranger next us, an embodiment of god, with our money, our families, or our well being.
When will we take an active role in our own lives, when will our questions or concerns, truly be answered? Does our own evolution stunt our ability to ask questions, because as they are asked they change in context?
We hold truth close to our hearts, we value it as a moral, yet we turn a shoulder when the lies are not prominently in front of us. We do not ask when they are not shown to be or are part of our lives; when the lies are a bill of congress not being updated with the times, or the times breaking a good bill of congress.
I often ask myself what it would be like to know the entire truth, and I often imagine it would hurt or turn me insane.
Would I rather go on living in this world which could be the “jail itself” as the author wrote, with my luxuries and comforts, or on the edge of insanity, everyday having to digest the truths of the world, the truths as they forge themselves in time.
CONVO SPARKED FROM IT:
- Ben Our civilization requires methods of control to exist, but when they are placed in the hands of powerful men they are easily and often abused. I despise the finger pointing, pass the buck mentality our culture has, but I am not a powerful man with the ability to change it. All a person can do is live a life of personal responsibility. There is a lot of power in owning your mistakes. I drink because I like to get drunk, not because I’m controlled by beverage advertising. I’m overweight because I eat too much and exercise to little, not because McDonalds made me fat. I judge for myself what is correct (not right and wrong) based on my logic and my meager if ever increasing wisdom, not for the fear of an invisible parent figure that will spank me. Of course it’s impossible to ignore these entities’ influence on us, if only by the sheer volume of advertising and media proselytizing we are inundated with every day. However once we identify these methods of control, we can then choose to reject them. If I have anything it’s the knowledge I hold myself accountable to the personal code of honor by which I abide. Not God, not the government, not a mega-corporation. Most of the time they really only have as much control as you let them. You don’t have to buy what they’re selling. They all want a piece of our brain-space so they can define what is good and bad according to their own agenda. I’d rather answer to myself and advance my own. Anyway don’t worry, you’ll wake up tomorrow and this will all have been a dream.
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Tristan G Pope You cannot make the statement that you are doing these things on your own, because break them down further, and you are working for the money to get the alcohol and the McDonalds. The work put in place to buy things, a simple thought placed into economy. But another idea started by a person expanded over generations unchecked to see if it still provides us with what we need to evolve. Or is it a grandiose statement to think we should evolve rather than sit and be content. Who’s to say we cannot be content with growth. Why was your hamburger 8 dollars? Why is your bottle service triple that of the alcohol store… Economy, Profit, etc. But like star trek, why is it so important to profit, if we can better ourselves and explore the possibilities of ourselves.
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The problem I see is that one person says they choose for themselves, yet the things they choose are already in a regulated environment in which their own choice is not that of their own. As well why do the statistics of our country point to faith rather than pro-activeness. And does making your own choices against the grain of a very ingrained society hurt the choice of this very fragile existence we live, or merely a flicker of light or a twinkle of a star in the grand scheme of what we have made for ourselves. Not the “grand scheme” as if there is soo much more in the world to do and see and achieve and become but the “scheme” we have made for ourselves.
