“I have curves, so I’m fat. If I wear makeup, I’m fake. If I say what I think, I’m a b****. If I cry sometimes, I’m a drama queen. If I have guy friends, I’m a slut. If I stand up for myself, I’m mouthy. Seems like you can’t do anything now a days without being labeled.. So what, go ahead and label me, see if I give a s***. Repost this if you’re proud of who you are…”
I’ve seen a few girls post this on Facebook. Clearly this was written by a 14-year-old trying to vent, but a lot of my friends are in their 20s now. Time to dispose of this garbage, bit by bit:
“I have curves, so I’m fat.” – This may or may not be true, and perhaps you should consult a physician to determine if you are actually fat. I doubt you have many friends that qualify, so be careful with your subjective approach to this matter. You wouldn’t want to become skinny, because that’s also a label.
“If I wear makeup, I’m fake.” – This implies the real you is a person with makeup. In a similar manner, if I were to modify your appearance in Photoshop, your statement would imply that either a modified “you” is still real, or that only modifications you make and/or approve of qualify as “real”. If the latter is the case, you would have to also have to consider that people that have been crippled against their will to be “fake”, which I personally think is not a very nice thing to do.
“If I say what I think, I’m a b****.” – It depends on what you think. Do you think all babies should be thrown off skyscrapers? If so, you probably are. Do you think the world could use more happiness? I doubt you’d qualify as anything negative at that point. Seriously, a seven-year-old could have had a good rebuttal for this one. Why do you post this garbage all over my Facebook feed?
“If I cry sometimes, I’m a drama queen.” – Pardon my subjective question, but doesn’t this depend on what you’re crying about?
“If I have guy friends, I’m a slut.” – Depends on what you do with them, and this is also subjective (at what point does one qualify for such a title?). I shouldn’t have to tell you these things.
“If I stand up for myself, I’m mouthy.” – …Did a 14-year-old just type “mouthy”? This has got to be about a fight she got in with her parents. Anyway, no. Unless you are standing up for yourself more often than you are actually insulted, the person calling you this has run out of actual insults and is now attacking your method of refuting them.
“Seems like you can’t do anything now a days without being labeled…” – Ah, yes, this thing where we give something a title to more quickly and easily identify it has got to be stopped. I must point out that complementary titles are labels, too. You wouldn’t be posting this horrid rant (oops, there I go, using those blasted “labels” again!) if someone was complementing you. Though, if you did, I would at least praise you for your consistency… Might be hard to do that, though, since you will have just told me not to label you.
“So what, go ahead and label me, see if I give a s***. Repost this if you’re proud of who you are…” – What’s this “repost if you’re proud of who you are” crap? If a male user followed your rules, people would see “If I have guy friends, I’m a slut.” and call him gay, which is counter-productive to your cause. Also, if someone complimented you by giving you a positive label, you wouldn’t care at all? Perhaps you don’t deserve any, then.
No, I’m not even talking about the “Pass this on and your wish will come true! (Really!)” things. Sometimes people will have these nuggets of vague advice they need to share with the world, and today’s technology enables them. Why anyone would pay for a fancy phone to read these things is beyond me (I’m hoping the facebook app isn’t used to check feeds).
A Slide Show of my State of Mind
This blog is a slide show of my state of mind. All personal thought blogs are, really. I see too many blogs that follow an idea path and don’t ever budge. This is accompanied by a lot of comments by other people that also won’t budge (note that seeing this type of comments doesn’t mean the blog writer is unreasonable). I wasn’t liking what I saw, and I was able to take advantage of my personal observation by not being like that. I also observed that myself and everyone I’ve met for an extended period of time has had a history of being wrong, at least from time to time.
But, with this presents a problem. If I know this, and I am able to actually come to grips with that, why do I take a stance on anything at all, given it may be wrong?
It gives you, the reader, an opportunity to inform me of what I’m missing. The ability to look things up on the Internet is an amazing thing that gives today’s people a learning advantage no generation before has ever had (though some libraries I imagine were pretty fantastic). However, it’s not perfect; I’ve made many searches for information that have been disappointing. Some people know more about certain things than I do, and in order to get their point across as well as possible, the user will post or link to the best example of the idea they wish to convey that they know about. Instead of having to skim through a bunch of sub-par versions and spammy sites, I get top-quality from a reader’s perspective.
What about the four-dimensional factor, Steve? Won’t you look back on posts and say “Man, I was dumb!”?
Perhaps I will, but unlike posting drunk on Facebook, I can look back and know I was actually thinking.
There has already been an occasion where I was intellectually ousted. A reply to a post I made about racism blew away pretty much every point I had. One part in particular: “The power of racism is that it affects one’s thinking, drawing a person from objectivity and clear thinking. Racism overwrites the very reason Steve is counting on to counteract it.” – I previously had failed to identify racism as a mind virus (Man, I was dumb!). I came to realize that I’ve been banking on a social idea that counted on there being very few people with mind viruses. Racism isn’t the only one, and much of humanity is currently infected. My previous social ideas were, put simply, people unburdened by social obligations are most able and motivated to do good, productive things. Unless I can overcome the mind virus problem (and potentially others), I have to accept that based on my current information, Yvette‘s approach is better.
Is it better? I’ll have to do some research to attempt to find out if it is or isn’t. If I find enough good counter-points, I’ll be sure to bring them up. Thanks for participating in and watching my slide show.