Our lives are based upon beliefs. Everything we do starts as an idea which we build upon and adopt as a way to accomplish life’s tasks. Sometimes we simply go with what people around us believe, rather than formulate our own opinions. When we do decide on what path of belief to follow, even if it’s just whether to wash our face or brush our teeth first, we can be stubborn about what we believe in. Take, for example, when we go to the pizzeria and order specific toppings because that is what goes on pizza in our opinion, it’s what we have always put on pizza, and we tend to not deviate from what we believe is the way to order a pizza, we restrict ourselves by our need for a concrete principle (this is what goes on pizza).
How strong is this stubbornness? When somebody posts on social media about pizza with anything else on it, people feel compelled to challenge it. Sometimes people reply, “That’s not what I order: I put this and that on pizza,” while other replies attack the individual for their choices: “What an idiot you are, when you know that was never designed to go on pizza.” The other tactic is to put down the concept, as in how cheese on pizza exploits the cows whose milk is stolen from them to make the cheese. I still haven’t figured out who originally put anchovies on pizza, and I have never known anybody to use them as a topping, but I don’t counter opinions on it or call somebody who would use anchovies an idiot. And quite frankly, I’m not sure if anchovy exploitation is a thing in the pizza industry. If I were like some of the upset masses out there, I would storm into the nearest chain pizza joint and demand they remove anchovies from the menu boards, but somebody I don’t even know probably wants them on their pizza, and I’m fine with that. If you don’t like them, that’s fine, too.
It’s a shame to turn everything into confrontational cannon fodder, but our fears, anger and frustration over the past (nearly) two years has made all of us edgy, and we forget our manners. This is why we’re dealing with hyper Karens (and their male counterpart Darrens) with their sense of calmness gone out the window, and our teenagers trying ridiculous social media challenges to find some humor at the expense of others (and frequently causing injuries to classmates). We’re desperate for some sense of order so we can find solace in the certainty of believing in solid, proven ideas which are less vulnerable to challenge.
Strangely enough, the very persons in authoritarian roles, who can best guide us with truth and logic, are being challenged by the hyper Karens and Darrens in our society, and panicked throngs are going mad with confusion because of all the unrest. The biggest challenge right now is to medical science. Suddenly the thousands of years into which men and women have pored over observations, experimented, calculated and saved countless lives through the use of pharmaceutical breakthroughs and groundbreaking technology have been downplayed by distrust and misinformation. Much of the misappropriated hearsay doesn’t even come from reliable scientific sources, but from soapbox speeches delivered by ordinary people with no background in the medical arts. The masses are trusting politicians over masters of medicine.
When political figures become trusted to extol the virtues of snake oil, just because they say it works, and people believe that, we are truly going down a tunnel of doom. The people who know are those who have started at point A with the problem and seen it through to solution Z. They are the ones who work long hours to find out not what they believe, or what somebody wants them to believe, but what evidence-based studies lead them to conclude, and so they believe.
I could type here that anchovies are the healthiest thing to put on pizza, but I haven’t a single qualification to do so; however, I could lead you to believe me by going down one of two paths. I could extol the virtues of eating fish, tell you how many anchovies are available to feed the entire world population, discuss their costs against other toppings like pepperoni and mushrooms, and I could color my presentation with lots of beautiful words, and you might want to believe that putting a little fish on a food which is not exactly soundly dietary would help it along. Or I could, instead, ask a foremost authority on fish to speak about what benefits an anchovy offers, in plain language, and more of you would be likely to think about the facts and believe them.
It is always helpful to know from where a person is speaking; whether they are experienced in the subject matter, and can tell the truth without personal feelings getting in the way. It is how our Supreme Court operates, and medical science–solid, proven, medical science–also is done in this fashion. A politician is experienced in how to give convincing arguments and act as a bridge to settle disputes through their words, but without the MD by their names, they should not guess at how to deal with diseases.
If you sit down and ask yourself what you believe and why, you may find some answers creeping in such as “that’s just how I do it,” or “I just know it’s that way.” That’s when it’s time to look deeper at who is helping you believe what you believe, and put something new on your pizza.
Susan's Scribblings the Blog 