To me, humanity at its absolute fundamental core is comprised of two things:
We see faces in toast and the shifting of clouds. We feel deeply for anything and everything from tiny infants we bore ourselves to critters we see in the wild to a random tool found in a drawer. We name everything, we talk to inanimate objects like they are our weary coworkers and animals like beloved children and strangers like our oldest friends.
When disaster strikes, people rush in to help however they can, headless to the danger they could be in. People who have never even seen each other before will link arms and form a chain to brave rushing waters to save someone - human or animal - without having to even to speak to each other, its instinct alone that drives us to reach out and help.
And we are curious too. Always asking questions, always wanting to know more. What's over that hill, that mountain, that ocean? What happens if I do this, change that? Who are you, what have you seen, what can I share with you?
Empathy and curiosity is who - is WHAT - we are. And I truly, deeply believe that it is when these aspects are our of balance within a person or a culture that the awful things happen.
Too much curiosity without empathy leads too cruelty in the name of learning more.
Too much empathy without curiosity leads to only causing more problems because you care so much and want to help so badly but don't know to ask if what you're doing or saying will only cause more harm.
Too little of both and that's where things get hard, get painful, get to the point where you look around and go "humans are fundamentally evil" when they're not. They're human as you are human, just removed by their past or actions from those pillars of their nature.
Humanity is empathic and curious and tha meant as a species we "grew up" - for lack of a better word - incredibly fast.
When a kid is forced to grow up too fast, because thier environment is dangerous or unstable in some way, they develop coping mechanisms to help them survive. They learn how to hoard food and supplies, be cautious around strangers, sometimes they force themselves to to squash the empathy that is so natural to them because it will only endanger them in the situation they are in.
Then the kid grows up. They are no longer in that place where they were in danger. No longer facing that physical or emotional or existential threat.
But their whole life was spent using those coping mechanisms to survive. So even though they aren't needed anymore, even though they are actively causing problems in their new adult life for themselves and others, they don't know any other way. They're having to unlearn it all, and that is such a painful, chaotic time.
That's what I think humanity is going through now. We grew up too fast, had to learn things to help us survive and now that those threats are gone we turn those coping mechanisms upon each other while, struggling to unlearn them all the while.
And we do that by going back to who we are, fundamentally. WHAT we are fundamentally.
Care for those around you, for those who aren't. Ask questions about everything and then ask more about the answers. Try and find the right balance between the two. Look past the painful trauma of all the terrible things that humanity had to survive through to get so far and see who we are at the heart of everything.
We aren't inherently evil, we're just inherently human.
stormborns
turnnoffyourmind
germansingergirl
tangentwithtanner
titsay
