Sick of the Race

My friend Rachel had some interesting observations on competition in our society so I got her to let me post them. Presenting our first guest post: Rachel Silverman.

Pure competition. That is my life, and it is probably yours too.

Think about it.

You learn how to run, then you race.

(I feel like I just ripped off a Jerry Spinelli quote there. Yup, I probably did.)

When was the last time you played a game with your friends without keeping score, at least subconsciously?

And caring about looks, is really just so that your exterior can be compared with someone else's. That is what the "standards of beauty" really are, after all. Your appearance against someone else's looks. Changing who you are to stay in the running.

I have been against this since I was a toddler. I remember standing in front of our house door, arms spread out stubbornly to block my mom from leaving to get her hair dyed. I screamed, cried, threw a fit. My dad had to pick me up and carry me to my room, plopping me onto my bed and scolding me for not letting my mom do what she wanted.

I don't have a problem with people dying their hair funky colors. That's individuality.

What I do have a problem with is dying your hair its natural color to hide that it is turning grey, which is absolutely ridiculous to me because EVERYONE's hair turns grey.

That is something which I still have failed to understand:

Why girls have to endure the pain of waxing and plucking when NO ONE has perfectly shaped eyebrows. (I plucked my eyebrows yesterday and I almost cried. Not because of the pain, well that too, but also because of me doing something that I did not believe in at all. But I still did it anyway. I don't want you thinking that I'm some crazy bra-burning feminist, because I'm not. It's more than that.)

And then the traits that some people have- large breasts, long eyelashes, huge butts- have to then be mimicked and imitated.

Back to that whole thing of competition again.

But it isn't just that.

Anything in life:

Being funny is really just being funnier than others.

Being smart is being smarter than others.

Being nice is being nicer than others.

Sorry. Back to my point.

I am just really really tired with the pressures of society.

I figure: I am going to go from working my butt off in school for no reason, to working my butt off in college for no reason, to working at a job I will barely even care about just to earn that pay check? Nuh uh.

I registered on collegeprowler today, despite only being a sophomore in high school and having absolutely no desire to start planning which colleges I will be applying to. Each page of a prospective college was filled with questions of anxious students who are desperate to get in, begging to know what is that they can do to get noticed.

You need the 4.0, you need the leadership positions, you need the large array of clubs and the community service and the great teacher recommendations- this is all common knowledge. You need these things but more, you still need to stand out- to beat them. To be part of that select few to get in.

But frankly, the whole process just made me sick.

And it will continue!

It will continue from the limited admissions to being top of the graduating class to the hiring positions to the companies battling each other for the best deal.

And. It. Never. Stops.

Best wishes!

Rachel Silverman

"The surest way to corrupt a youth is to instruct him to hold in higher esteem those who think alike than those who think differently." -Friedrich Nietzsche

I received a new Discover magazine today-along with two solid brass swan heads, but that’s another story- and began reading one of the articles, this one about the aging brain.

Now there’s something that has always intrigued me, something that comes up in whatever I’m reading, be it YA fiction, my History notes, or, today, an article from Discover magazine. I’ll give you a hint; in the Discover article Robert Epstein writes “Recent studies suggest that the total loss in brain volume due to atrophy—a wasting away of tissue caused by cell degeneration—between our teen years and old age is 15 percent or more…”

Why did this sentence catch my attention, spurring me to run upstairs without even finishing the article and start writing this? Well because it’s pointing out something that is in our society today downplayed- the fact that as teenagers, we are in the prime of our lives. No, some of you will say; that’s when we get into our twenties, maybe even a bit after that; that’s when we have all the energy and opportunities that our parents (aka the ‘old people’ in our lives) constantly yearn for and miss. That’s what they want you to think, I say.

The truth is, despite how our lives are structured today in the twenty-first century, our bodies are made to fit the minimum lifestyle. Years and years and years ago our primary function was to survive- not become famous, or fight for equal rights or anything “meaningful” by today’s standards; we were simply to survive, and do so in the most efficient way possible. Because of this our bodies came to fit our needs, so that we reached maturity quickly, reproduced, and then were useful enough until we died a few years later so that we could contribute to the rest of the community. We still reach physical maturity very early, even earlier, some of us, because of the chemicals we are subject to today, only our lives are structured differently now. I mentioned earlier that this comes up in YA fiction and my History notes, and it’s true; it bugs me. YA fiction has young people, teenagers, in the physical prime of their lives, actually doing things, saving the world, sometimes; but only because they are subject to adverse situations that make our normal social structure meaningless. In History class I am met with the stories and portraits of men and women who have accomplished more than I ever will, some before even reaching their eighteenth birthday. Theodore Roosevelt is constantly in the back of my mind, fueling an inferiority complex- he had what, seventy two jobs and was seven times more badass than anyone alive today?

Today most of us (unless we’re among the ranks of Gabby Douglas and Missy Franklin and other exemplary badasses) have a set path that may or may not lead us to a livable, mostly unremarkable life. We go to school, for a set number of years (a set number that is getting harder and harder from which to deviate; my aunt skipped a year in high school, but I doubt most anyone in my generation would be allowed to. I wish I could do that.) then we may or may not go to college; though if we want to be “successful” and can either afford it or con the school into giving us enough money, we probably will. Then we try to graduate, and now in our early twenties, move on to searching for a job and trying to settle down with a family or something and white picket fences and blah blah blah. Our lives aren’t based on the same things anymore; in fact, human priorities have changed so much that our lives seem to be created for us. To some extent we all follow a pattern that has been formulated by the generations that preceded us.

It seems, though, that the most successful people are those that break this pattern. It’s probably been this way in all societal patterns; dissenters either die, become pariahs, or are written into history as a great mind of their generation. I suppose that’s what makes the Steve Jobs’ and Theodore Roosevelts- people who are brave enough to disobey, strong enough to take advantage of not just what certain jobs or paths offer them, but their own resources. People who take advantage of themselves, and how they are made to work, not just how our culture wants us to.

This is slightly rant-ish, but basically this is stuff that should be recognized; our technical restraints, and then those cast on us (loosely, despite our interpretation). Our lives are structured by competing schedules.

This year I’m seventeen. I hope I’m strong enough to ignore the timetables and accomplish something that means something for real.

With sincerest regards,

Leigh

The Olympics and How They Remind Us We're Alive

                So I’ve been watching the Olympics, and unlike my parents, don’t mute and ignore all of the commercials. Personally, I think that’s a generational thing; our generation, children of the information age, cannot pass up a soundbite. Especially those thirty seconds or less that aim to trick us into buying something. That’s where we are most at home; it’s like the internet.

                Anyway, so my interest has been piqued by the commercials for the new show Revolution; scheduled to come out September 17^th (because I’m sure as hell watching it. You best remember that date. And isn’t that the day after Nick Jonas’ birthday? Haha). This show is based on the premise that somehow, all the power in the world has been knocked out, throwing our information-driven world back into the dark ages. It is going to follow the path of one girl who gained her own power when everyone else lost theirs, and is now a Katniss-like badass survival machine.

                This story is not unique. Hullo, the Hunger Games, first of all. A girl, hopeless against outside events as she fights for survival? With a bow? Yes. This has been done before. The whole survival thing has been done; it’s like some ingrained human fetish. And I am definitely one of those most affected; Survivor is one of my favorite shows, Hunger Games was for a time, an obsession, anyone heard of the game Lost in Blue for DS? I’ve had it for years, and need to replace it, so I can beat it for the third time WITHOUT it freezing up on me. Survival isn’t just the aim of all living things, it’s ingrained into their conscious minds, too. And now that humans, at least most of them, don’t have to worry about it, we still return to it for entertainment.

                Why is this? Well, for one, like sex, it’s something that never gets old. It’s the essence of our existence, and nothing gives us more of a thrill. Just like the Romans, with their panem et circenses, and Panem of the Hunger Games, with their own arena. Those who are comfortable, and safe, still need to feel, to be thrilled, and this is how.

                That’s the ultimate intrigue of Revolution, and why, come September, I will be hard pressed to miss a single episode(unless the writing makes me headdesk too hard. That has been known to happen, and is severely disappointing). Not only does it offer a kickass new female protagonist, but it looks like it will be thrilling and relatable. Especially for teenagers and younger people in general. We seem to feel the survival tug the strongest, seeing as we are just reaching the primitive definition of maturity. Our minds have yet to catch up with the centuries of what we call progress that has made our world much more boring in comparison to the sudden death thrill of primitive times. It was no mistake that Hunger Games and games like Lost in Blue are aimed at and are successful within the age groups they are.

                That’s possibly something that relates to your thoughts on inspiration by water; a return to our roots, the revealing of the human essence and what is purely necessary to us. There are things, in the collective human consciousness, that cannot fade through the years. Perhaps that’s the root of all excitement and inspiration, whether it be through the suffering that reminds us of the struggle for survival, or glimpses of what we came from at the basest of levels. The things that tug at our very standard heartstrings are incredibly straightforward, if we think about them.

~Leigh Shine