The NIC Sentinel

Issue date: 5/5/08 Section: Opinion

Just as the cross-hairs are in place, a twig snaps. The frightened animal, hearing the small warning, must choose its course of action in the presence of the newly discovered threat. A pre-emptive attack? Or a hasty retreat? v This instinct, the fight-or-flight response, forces the prey to react to the surrounding danger. A deer might run for safety. A cougar might attack. But humans are a most unique animal in that their response is physically subdued.

Well-socialized humans, when threatened, will not attack an aggressor nor run for cover. Instead, they internalize the fear and stay in that middle stage, a paradoxoical frozen moment in which they do not move. But their mind is racing.

The unique, manipulative way of humans is unnatural; it has infected our society and has caused the decay of the morals on which we used to stand above the animal world.

"But we who are wiser shut ourselves in on either hand, and no one knows whether we think good or evil," says William Carlos Williams in "Pastoral," a book of poetry.

It is this secrecy that sets us apart from our natural surroundings. Instead of setting us above the barbarism, however, it sends us to a level below that of the beast. A beast, at least, is honest. He is raw, but he is true. If he is hungry, he cries. If he is angry, he roars. If he is sad, he howls. If he is hurt, he bleeds.

Humans hide their emotions and their pains for the illusion of social contract. Whereas a beast is willing to take care of himself, a human would rather be what is now called "politically correct," meaning that he would shut out anything about himself that might possibly ruffle someone else's feathers.

The social contract ideal has been bred into us, hoping that a democracy would thrive out of a race of people who would rather put themselves down and ignore their basic needs in order to appear socially apt. This poison, this fear, has slowly started to eat away at our society. Tolerance has change into "anything goes." Instead of voicing their ideas and their needs, people now choose to compromise internally rather than disagree with a colleague.

If this madness continues, we will find ourselves in a world that we will not recognize. When nobody speaks his or her mind, what happens to democracy? The blessing of communication has been too long forsaken. It's time we open our big mouths and start talking about what's wrong, and more importantly, how to fix it. The most powerful weapons a man can wield are words.

Continued...

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