The mind creates fear by listening to the stories it is told and reacting to physical trauma. All humans start out with a clear slate when they are born. Until something happens to an infant they have no reason to fear anything until it is learned. As babies gain awareness fear begins to develop.
Some people develop irrational fears over the course of their lifetimes and lists of some really crazy ones can be found all over the internet. What i want to address today is the Critical Voice that encourages you to fear. That voice that talks to you day in and day out and convinces you to be afraid. This voice that you can literally turn against you can also be turned off.
All of us have a voice that can promote irrational, angry, judgmental and cynical attitudes towards groups of other people, single individuals or local and international events. This voice warns us to beware while at the same time blocking out signals that there is nothing to fear. Some of us are more hard wired to look for and dwell on things that can be perceived as dangerous. If we listen to that Critical Voice and don’t challenge it there can be serious downsides to our lives and our nation.
Fear is a very real tool that can be used to control the masses.
Fear of Ebola, Fear of Islam, Fear of Terrorism, Fear of Liberals or Fear of Conservatives are a few of the fears infecting our nation at present. These fears are very real to a lot of people but are they justified?
Fear of Liberals…they are commies, socialists, takers, dirty hippies, they will ruin America.
Fear of Conservatives…they are greedy, self interested, afraid of change, bigots and they will ruin America.
The below was found on a comment thread and i revised it to include both Conservatives and Liberals because both sides say this about the other side.
“Conservatives/Liberals are easily conned, easily manipulated, and utterly unwilling to admit when they are wrong. (Their obsession with constantly attempting to elicit “apologies” from Conservatives/Liberals is an offshoot of these strained thought processes.) Conservatives/Liberals, when confronted with bare-bones truth that contradicts their irrational world view, will scrunch their eyes shut, shake their heads, and chant “nah-nah-nah-nah-nah-nah” until whatever truth it is they find offensive “goes away”, rather than revise their thoughts and beliefs to conform to a truth that is slapping them in the face. They simply do not have the capacity to revise their thoughts and beliefs to conform to the truth before their very eyes if that truth contradicts the foundation of the beliefs they irrationally hold onto as a weapon in the constant struggle against their own insecurity.”
But is this comment true about either political persuasion…i don’t think so? If more of us could recognize the strengths of each side the fear of the other might be diminished.
Fear of Terrorism…Sean Cordry wrote a piece early this year where he states that each political group could learn something from the other. “Progressives might learn some things from conservatives about the danger of foreign and domestic threats. Conservatives, on the other hand, might learn something from progressives about tempered diplomacy and the power of social cooperation.” Personally i think there is room here for a more nuanced approach to the fear of terrorism. Does anyone really believe terrorism is more of a threat to their lives than getting in a car accident?
Fear of Islam…there are 1.3 billion Muslims and most are living calm, family oriented lives. Why is it that such a small percentage of wackos can lay claim to the whole religion? Fear of Muslims, Islam and Sharia law are all out of proportion to the real threat.
Fear of Ebola…the virus is mostly contained in west Africa with three cases so far in the US. Enterovirus on the other hand which attacks the respiratory tract is in 12 states and counting. Children from all over have been hospitalized needing critical care. Doctors on the front line have claimed they haven’t seen anything quite like this in their careers and yet you hardly hear anything about it because EBOLA FEARS are rampant. If i had a youngster i’d be much more concerned about my child contracting the enterovirus.
Check your fears…are they realistic, really an immediate threat or are you deluding yourself and/or being conned?
See ya next week.
1 comment:
Favorite quote from RSN this week, "Alert - Man contracts Ebola from close contact with cable news." Since the attack on the World Trade Center it seems the primary focus of mainstream media is to stimulate and sustain the very human fear response. Yikes!
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