Zombie post: Appealing to reason, driving towards cynicism

AKA If We Sit and Wait for Shit To Happen, It Won't.

Uh, I know for sure this was a Facebook note but I can't recall if it's here too. No matter, I'm expanding on it anyway. I suck with this updating thing lately. My extra special bloggiversary is coming up anyway so I might just refrain from the usual hourly posting. My edits in Italics.

Anyway, so I was wracking my brain with something interesting to talk about, because I know it's my duty to entertain you all. Whether I feel like it or not. And after scrambling to think of something humorous, I failed, got hungry, then as all starving folks do I got desperately serious.

I thought of something my Af.Am [Ed: Yeah African American, I'm lazy as hell] History prof said as we talked about WEB Dubois. You know Dubois as the polar opposite of Booker T Washington and one of the founders of the NAACP. He did a lot of things, but we talked about his philosophy in class for a while and how, at the beginning of his career, rather than the slave "yessa massa" mentality of Washington (I don't hate the man btw, that's just kinda how it is) Dubois tried desperately to appeal to reason.

The moral of his story, really, is you can't appeal to reason and rationality. Ever. Uh-uh. I say this because Dubois eventually said "Fuck some America" and moved away never to return.

Appealing to reason. You know, and this is just my personal philosophy, if we could appeal to reason, frankly we'd never have to. It's like anti-racists declaring "I AM ANTI RACIST!" then they usually do/say something racist. Or saying "sorry" even. If you were, you just wouldn't have to now would you?

Or better yet, as I vaguely got into last week, trying to avoid things that are too conflicty for tastes. Like avoiding the issue of homosexuality because it polarizes too many people. Or matters of church & state. Or racism. If we just ignore then because we can't figure out how to solve them, tell me, is that really being reasonable or just doggedly denialistic? Yeah I said denialistic.

If humans had any reasoning to appeal to, why, just think of it. No more separation of the sexes & races (races, which, don't even actually exist). No more wars. Hell, I think we'd all be at the very least agnostic if that were the case. So think on that. Appealing to reason. If Dubois had been a little less idealistic, he'd have probably realized that slavery & oppression of blacks wouldn't exist if folks had some decent reasoning power. [Ed: I was clearly feeling misanthropic when I wrote this, damn I'm a bitter one.]

Then, you know, he got older and like I said, essentially got tired of being black in America and moved to somewhere in Europe or Africa I believe. As we get older I do think there is a bit of drive towards the schools of cynicism and skepticism. You almost have to, I think, unless you're so stuck in your world view and you just aren't evolving at all, which is bad.

And I'm not talking about "omg I hate the world *starbucks coffee*" modern cynicism, I mean real ass Greek definition. Yeah, different ain't it?

I will say I believe that. I do. I try not to follow too much of a defeatist attitude but I think as we do get older, get away from friends and parents and other influences, as we find ourselves we do grow more towards cynicism. And no I don't mean cynical as in the "i hate everyone" actually that's apathy sense.

Since I'm not feeling nearly as spiteful today I do think it's good to appeal to reason. Sometimes. That just can't be the basis of your struggle because...well, yeah, if we could just appeal to human reasoning you think we'd have nearly the shit that we weigh ourselves down with? It's sad. Folks don't learn. There has to be conflict. I say, and I think I'm quoting someone indirectly but I can't find it, to my friends & other sometimes that people CAN indeed change, but only with time and much force. MUCH force. You have to literally snap the wool from over their eyes and make them SEE, damnit. Not "the light", just anything. That makes me sad but unfortunately it just seems to be a fact of life. It's not that people are slow witted, just slow to change. Evolution takes millions of years for a reason I guess. Silly people.

Hah, I guess what I'm saying is I have no faith because I haven't been given reason to hope. Not a whole lot anyway.