The Driving Force of Anonymity

It was the perfect day to get an early afternoon buzz going. The October weather blessed the state of Florida with clear, bright skies and a cool, calming breeze. A friend and I were enjoying the salty air blowing off the bay as we sipped overpriced mimosas and nibbled on Brie and calamari. It was a gorgeous, soothing kind of day where you shouldn’t have a care in the world.

Too antagonistic to just revel in our bliss, our conversation turned (quite heatedly) to traffic; Florida drivers in particular. After a few minutes of discussing how much we despised other drivers, I began to reflect on a recent trip that had gotten under my skin. A few days prior, while running late for school, it felt like every driver on the road was against me. Everyone seemed to be cruising at 5 under the speed limit, while simultaneously boxing me in, so I couldn’t break away.

After 10 minutes of screaming at people who couldn’t hear me, I had a bit of a (non-drunken) revelation. I took a step back, and thought, ‘maybe you are the asshole.’ I was the one who was weaving through traffic and cutting people off, but with the anonymity my car provided, I felt comfortable throwing social decency and self-accountability out the window. In my own mind, I had turned the normal, safe driver into a dick.

From this thought, I expanded the idea to all the knee-jerk reactions we come to about other drivers. It seems every city/state/country believes they have the worst drivers in the world, but do all people suck at driving, or is traffic a collection of small human errors in rapid-fire form? Everyone has nearly taken a wrong turn, swerved because of a distraction, or waited too long to move after a light turned green, but everyone I drive with comes to the same conclusion: one mistake makes you an asshole driver.

The more we discussed the topic of anonymity, the more I realized it’s not just a problem with driving. So many components of our lives involve little direct interaction with other people. So, I began to wonder, as our worlds become smaller, with walls built by ourselves, society, and careers, does the patience and acceptance for human error exist in the anonymous, give-it-to-me-now world of today?

The Internet is an obvious example. Discussion boards and comment sections are filled with loud, obnoxious opinions that are rarely backed by anything but pure emotion. Even intelligent people can be intolerable. I’ve read some insightful counter arguments that were brushed off because of grammar or spelling errors. Online, there is no such thing as social decency. We hide behind our computer screens, so if we don’t like what we hear, we can resort to name-calling to prove our point.

In a face-to-face debate, there must be a level of respect if there is to be any headway in the topic, but with the Internet, people are able to say whatever comes to mind without any filter or immediate feedback. People are essentially arguing with themselves online while breaking down others for not being clear and precise the first time.

The way business is run today doesn’t help either. Many careers and jobs have been divided into niche categories that never truly communicate with each other. Yet, the amount of shit I hear different sectors talk about each other is ridiculous.

I’ve worked in the restaurant industry for seven years now, and had my fair share of this experience. Whenever I worked at a place that lacked communication between front and back of house, service became a giant blame-game. The servers hated hosts for over- or under-seating them, bussers moved too slowly for management, and the kitchen and wait staff were always at each other’s throats. Without communication, everyone in the restaurant was a fuck-up, except the individual thinking it.

Whether it was human error, or the luck of the draw, no one wanted to give each other a break. It was easier to say all the hosts sucked, as opposed to considering the flow of customers. Why take into account that the bussers were also playing food runners when there is a table that needs to be cleared? And why try to take a moment to reestablish the delicate balance of tickets and delivery time of food, when it can be everyone else’s fault?

Customers are no help either. While a good percent of people can be understanding, there is a solid customer base that has no sympathy for the circumstances surrounding them. In a packed restaurant, many can’t seem to put two and two together. In the chaos, things get overlooked and sometimes lost. No one is out to ruin the customer’s experience, but there are hiccups in the system that any normal person can make.

I chose to highlight what I know best, but when I hear friends and family complain about their own jobs, I hear the same tune. Insurance companies, retail, the tech-industry, etc., all seem to lack consideration for human error, especially when different departments never meet face-to-face.

So, again, I pose the question: is there room for human error today, or have we become a hypocritical culture that can’t except that everyone, including ourselves, makes mistakes? Are we are losing the human experience to selfish necessities and demands? It sure seems so.

“After the first glass, you see things as you wish they were. After the second, you see things as they are not. Finally, you see things as they really are, and that is the most horrible thing in the world.”

― Oscar Wilde

Prayer Hotlines

Somewhere around 3am, I drunkenly stumbled through my front door. My brain told me to turn on the kitchen light, so I could navigate the minefield that was my studio apartment, but my feet were confident in maneuvering through the piles of clothes and papers scattered across my floor. After nearly breaking my neck 3 times, I then proceeded to fall into bed.

Merely drunk, not tired, I turned to my favorite herbal remedy and clicked on the television. The blinding blue light revealed the only form of entertainment one who pays $30 a month for internet and cable could come across at 3am, local pastors and their prayer hotlines. My excitement only amplified when I realized the reason the screen was shining so exponentially blue, was that the plump, 50-something year old woman sitting behind the desk was wearing a jean jacket with a jean shirt (I could only assume she completed the outfit with a pair of jeans I was unable to see.) Then, like a gift from god, she began speaking in tongues. This was the perfect way for me to end the night, drinks and a show.

There were a few callers that affected me, but the majority were about stupid things like injuries that wouldn’t heal or some unpaid debt. It was at this point my mind began to reflect on a new idea about this type of prayer. If god does exist, and he/she doesn’t answer prayers the first thousand times, does it become stalker-ish to start using other people’s “prayer lines” to attempt to communicate?

I couldn’t help but make comparisons to some psycho exes my friends have dealt with. When these crazy exes were desperate for contact, their solution was to call from any phone they could get their hands on until they got all their friends blocked from their former partner’s phone. I remember when my ex’s ex stalked our relationship. For three years, he received calls from an endless amount of numbers that always had her voice on the other end. Even though he proceeded to ignore her, she somehow formulated in her mind that the message just wasn’t getting through, and by calling from a different number, what she had to say would have a greater impact.

I am aware of the fact that there are many variables to this topic. One’s understanding of god determines the way they pray, but I just found humor in the fact that there were people thoroughly convinced that a jean clad pastor rambling nonsense could somehow be a better messenger to the creator of the universe. The all powerful just didn’t receive any of the messages left for them.

If you haven’t figured it out yet, I am an atheist (I hate that fucking word.) I wonder sometimes, if I were religious, perhaps I would have an answer to this question. There are things religious people do that I will never, in a million years, understand. Human emotion is almost always irrational and we hold on tightly to small things to comfort us. But this is one of those comforts that make no sense to someone ruled by logic. Some choose to pray away their problems, I prefer to drink.

“Beer is proof that God loves us and wants us to be happy.”

― Benjamin Franklin

I Heart Alcohol

I’m a bit of a cynic. I genuinely dislike most of the general population. I feel like it stems from the idea that we can never truly know a person in a broad social setting. Most of our interactions are faked on the basis of social politeness. It can take a lifetime to truly understand the inner workings of another human being, and even then, there are things everyone is afraid to say out loud. But I like to take the easy route, get um’ drunk.

I’ve always preferred to converse with my fellow man wasted, not because they are more intelligent, or gracious, or even nice; but because with a few beers, one can absorb a person’s entire life philosophy in one night. You will never learn more truths about the person sitting in front of you than when they are drunk.

Every drink peels back a carefully crafted layer of a person’s social identity, until self-censorship is no longer an option. Loves and fears and hates will bubble over; it is some of the most beautiful, eye-opening, messy, honest conversation you will ever have.

Without the aid of alcohol, many of the outside opinions I’ve let influence my life would have never seen the light of day. When heavily drinking with someone, there is some sort of mutual agreement that things might get deep and ugly. Every sip is a step closer to knowing the dark secrets people hide. There are monsters that dance behind every individual’s eyes, begging for their masters to let them escape through their host’s lips. All it takes is one more glass of wine and the right topic of conversation.

Alcohol shows the best and worst of humanity and it upsets me that people no longer worship it like in the old days. Empires had gods dedicated to the drink. So my fellow human, next time you are out, for me, raise your glass to the beauty of alcohol! My brothers, my sisters; let us learn the way the world really thinks and celebrate being loud, crude, and blunt about it!

To Alcohol! Human kind’s kryptonite! The savior and destroyer of personal ideologies! The shortcut to truly knowing each other.

 

“I drink to make other people more interesting.”

― Ernest Hemingway

Consensus by Anecdote

I’ve participated in a lot of drunken debates, and there’s one go-to defense that always sticks in my craw: the fallacy my mother calls “consensus by anecdote,” or when the exception trumps the rule. When it comes to the most sensitive topic discussions, why do people try to undermine a rule with the exception? The one-time variable can become the driving force behind a person’s opinion, and the sweeping generalizations that come from this thought process drives me crazy.

I finally snapped and had to rant about the fallacy when I began research for my Feminism vs. Sexism series. Every time I read an article about women’s issues, there was at least one guy in the comment section that felt the need to use a counter point of “this happened to me” or “men are exploited too” or “women are jealous and/or sluts looking for attention.” Here are three examples I found in the span of 20 minutes:

Essays about women creepily being told to smile:

“So what should i make of women who have met me in the subway and said ‘i like a man in a suit’ this double standard that women can be sexually aggressive and nothing is wrong with it goes to show you the same entitlement that you seem to suggest men have…”

Articles about women being objectified:

“I rarely hear any complaints from attractive women when I tell them they are attractive. It's usually the not-so-attractive women who complain about men objectifying women when I compliment a woman's attractiveness. ”

Pieces about sexual harassment in the work place:

“Do women ever use sex to get what they want? What are the charges for that? If you want respect, act respectable.”

While it is true men can be objectified and human beings enjoy attention from each other, it is a laughable concept to believe men face anywhere near the same discrimination as women. It is equivalent to a white person trying to compare the plight of whites to blacks.

This kind of reasoning doesn’t just apply to sexism and racism either; it can be applied to all spectrums of debate discussions. I’ve conversed with many people who used the minority opinion or distorted facts to justify or confirm the “gay agenda,” alternative medicine, not vaccinating children, gun control, global warming, and/or essentially all political or religious beliefs held close by someone. Some of the “facts” I hear are nothing more than here-say or flat out lies (I’m looking at you anti-vaccination parents).

A does not equal B, if A is the fucking variable. If I have to hear one more argument –  how someone knows a person on welfare who is lazy, so all poor people are lazy; how there is one story about a woman who used abortion as birth control, so that means all women will; how your one black friend speaks for the entire population – I am going to scream.  In an age where a person needs to do Internet research to confirm a news story, how does one miracle example trump the obvious problem in many debates?

People from all walks of life enjoy living in the dark, and it always seems to involve anything that stands to exclude, define, control, manipulate, or profit off the individual. This should be a huge red flag, but the more sensitive the topic, the less likely someone is to be persuaded by facts. This fact has been somewhat proven in multiple studies. (There are a few inconsistent variables in the math and political belief study.) Why can people be so afraid of introducing a new idea into their belief system?

The psychology behind ignoring facts fascinates me, especially when the masses follow suit. The 24-hour news networks are a great example of the exception trumps rule issue. They have become nothing more than a source fueling “Talking Head” drones that run around screaming their favorite pundit’s opinion. FOX News, the master of propaganda, has turned this into an art form that I must admit, I respect to a degree. No one is quite able to produce mindless clones like this network. There is no second-guessing if someone exclusively watches FOX News. It is like speaking to a walking fact sheet of O'Reilly and Hannity bullet points. It is the same diluted facts spit out over and over again, and the moment a new, unfamiliar idea is introduced, then they revert to the FOX panic button mode of, “if I scream louder than you, I win.”I’ve noticed that anyone who needs to ramble aimlessly about a sensitive issue is typically trying to justify a strong bias they hold with only facts that contribute to their argument.

After thousands of years of humans playing sheep and following each other off a cliff, how have we not learned how to properly rationalize information? Obviously, we have to stop yelling at each other first (no one likes to feel lectured or stupid), but if we ever make it past the first step of artful debate, what is the next step? If we, as a species, have moved on to social evolution, how have we not evolved past taking sketchy, manipulative sources at their word?

The only time I really felt like I made an impact on an important issue with an opponent was when it came to gun control. After about a half hour, I stopped the conversation and asked the guy one simple question: stripping away all the facts on gun control, do you believe America has a problem with people being killed by guns? Even as an avid fan of guns, the only answer he could come up with was yes. Only when I subtracted the dramatic stories and overwhelming facts did we come to a mutual agreement.

Can the answer really be that basic? Do we put too much information on the table and forget the fundamental question that started the debate in the first place? And why have we not socially evolved to answer and focus on the first question on our own? I ask so many questions with so little answers, but I guess that is the fun of a philosophy blog.

“Everybody's got to believe in something. I believe I'll have another beer.”

― W.C. Fields