Societal thoughts

Two pence worth of thoughts, i.e. things I feel worthy of contemplation.

1. In December last year, I predicted a future Western society where values and thoughts, instead of money and gadgets, rule. I still believe in this vision and I'm wondering when this transition will be completed. When will the zeitgeist equal thoughts and values, not things and gadgets, and focus on the process, not the final product? And when we're there, how do you show off to others? Say today, you can flash with a designer bag worth of 5 000 euros. Not everyone, but significantly many, admires that item. But in a world where thoughts, ideas and visions make the currency, how do you show off to friends and colleagues? The contemporary Finn may buy an even better, more powerful SUV to outdo the neighbor, but that won't do the trick tomorrow. Probably, clothing will still play an important role, signaling what you stand for and in what intellectual hemisphere you currently roam.
2. Will categorization according to gender ever disappear? I mean, will we ever primarily consider the human, and the gender as a secondary aspect? It's seems hard to stop labeling people and raise expectations on others depending on their gender.
   
3. Will micro issues surrender to macro ones when debating politics, visions and suggestions? It seems today, when important and relevant issues are being discussed, the focus lies on details and is not often shifted to the bigger picture, to a macro level.
   
4. How many have considered who, if anyone, has something to gain on the climate debate currently raging? Is the question of who may have an interest in instigating such a debate, and why, and are these reasons of such a kind that we want to support them or not, raised at coffee breaks at work places around the world? I wish it was raised and genuinely analyzed. I hope I'm not falling into a conspiracy trap here but I believe it's sensible to ponder why we are debating current issues and who benefits from it.
   

Attributions to bad driving

Lately, I've had a hang-up about appearance and constructions of social reality. I've reflected on how, and why, we choose to convey who we are and how others interpret the message and ultimately understand us. Today, I learned something in relation to this, namely that I tend to make external attributions. I'm digging into Rhodes's and Hamilton's article "Attribution and Entertainment: It's Not Who Dunnit, It's Why" (in Vorderer's and Bryant's Psychology of Entertainment) where the reader is provided an explanation of the attribution theory: it's the prediction of whether an observer will attribute an actor's behavior to internal or external causes.

Think about the last time you were driving, and another driver cut you off.

the writers ask rhetorically. Peace of cake, that happened today, on lunch hour. So they continue:

Did you explain the breach of driving etiquette by focusing on the situation characteristics such as that the driver must be in a hurry, or having a bad day? Typically not. Under those circumstances, most Americans would make disparaging remarks about the driver's bad character, that is, they would make an internal attribution.

Interestingly, I did make a situational attribution as I suggested to my angry passenger that she, the driver cutting me off, probably was late for a meeting or had stretched her 30 minutes lunch break a bit too much, transforming the shortening of the Friday working hours an illusion yet again. I did not look for causes in her personality or character. But I'm wondering if that has anything to do with her being a woman. If it would have been a male driver, I suspect I'd be more prone to look for causes in a bad character.

Jean Valjean and the changing identity

Tonight, I did something I can't recall doing for ages. Flickering through the TV channels only to find a program I've seen before, but nonetheless remaining absolutely absorbed hooked the next hour although every scene is familiar and totally predictable. I normally don't do that but when something as brilliant as the story of Jean Valjean and his move from being an prisoned thief to becoming a noble citizen and mayor of a small town is on the telly (in the Les Misérables from 2000), you simply got to make an exception.

And I'm not much of a superstitious person, but indeed a drama queen, and therefore, I'm amused by a coincidence here. I stumbled upon the show at a major turning point where Jean Valjean, the villain, chooses to alter his identity, name and to change his way of leading his life. That's one way of looking at it. Another is that he cowardly escapes and runs away as his noble turning point, that is returning the penny he stole from a child, came a bit too late and he's charged with theft and thus sought after by the police.

I'm also at a major turning point in my life where my decisions will influence my identity. I've decided to buy a house, which is a golden opportunity to express who you are to others. I know pretty much what I want, and in what surroundings I want it, but I was thinking the other day, could you get away with faking it? At the end of the day, what the brochures with new houses try to sell you is an identity, "the modern one", "the traditional one", "the arty one" etc. But what if you find yourself in seven years saying, this is not me (anymore)? I don't see myself in this house? Suppose that a city girl, much like Carrie in Sex and the city, fancies a big red house out in the countryside, and decides to get one with huge vegetable gardens, sheep, bees and apple trees, solar panels and a life style endorsing an ecology and sustainable living. And it'd turn out, she tires of it in a couple of years, then what?

What I'm ultimately chasing here is the volatility of identity, and in the long run, much like Jean Valjean in Les Misérables was pondering, the importance of appearance for how others perceive who you are. Foucault claimed that identity is not something you have or possess, it's a shifting discourse, a construction that emerges when you interact with others. Giddens talks about the reflexive project, that we keep working with, reconstructing and rebuilding, our identity our entire lives. If this is the case, how do you succeed in making a sustainable and honest (to yourself) choice as to how you're going to live the next 20 years, at least, and in what area you'll live and so on? What if in the midst of skyscrapers a desire for a lush garden emerges, or if a yearning for a city life with cafés and bars rages in the midst of fields of wheat? I doubt that my favorite character in Les Misérables, Mr Javert (magnificently acted by John Malkovich), would agree with the life project ideas of Giddens nor with Foucault as he states that once a thief, always a thief, there's no way a villain will regret his doings. And if this was to happen, the person will always remain a thief in the eyes of the public. He'd better not be right.