What Is Normal? Does It Exist?
"Normal is an illusion... What is normal for a spider is the chaos for a fly". The word normal represents relativism, it is a philosophical question and as such does not have a simple answer, also the "normal" can be used as an extremely effective manipulation tool or even as a fallacy. Being aware of this relativism and of the meaning of the word itself which refers to: "That which is in a state that is considered natural. What acts as a rule, canon or model, and what fits, because of its nature, precepts established in advance." We may think that the word normal refers to what can be expected of something or someone.
Let's take the example of medicine where, when you have a medical examination, they evaluate your values with others considered "normal" because they represent values of a healthy person and therefore serve to differentiate and have as a reference what problems your organism has, in this case, what we consider "normal" has a reason to be quite valid and practical, has scientific rigor and is of great help to doctors when making diagnoses and when medicating the patient. However, when we enter the social plane this meaning and utility begins to deform to the point of becoming a tool for mass control or discrimination.
A tool used by governments and organizations to define the behavior and way of thinking of the "ideal citizen"... Think for a moment about this, What is a normal person? It seems like a simple question, but its answer is extremely complicated and in practically all cases it is condemned to be erroneous for the simple fact that it is a response conditioned to our values, raising, way of thinking, ideologies, political currents, knowledge... In short, it is something tremendously subjective.
I think we can all agree that the act of killing is bad, by X and Y argument, it is not something that would make someone "civilized" who respects freedoms or the law. However, there are people who just don't agree with the above, that is why I started the sentence with "I think". This can be extrapolated to anything else that we might think is "common sense" whether it's respect for freedom, property, nature, being against violence and indoctrination... But those are things that are common sense to me, not necessarily to someone else, so there are different ideas and debates, to reach points of agreement, expand knowledge and thanks to them maybe you can consider ideas better or more efficient than others.
The vast majority of us consider that killing is bad. Most of us, or at least that is what I would like to believe, believe that freedom is good. It is popularly considered that if a child misbehaves, he is engaging in abnormal behaviour. The common point between all this is that we consider normal a type of behavior or belief that is repeated in most... On certain occasions, as we have seen before, we could say that it is okay, but there are other times when it is wrong... Or at least it has the potential to be pretty bad.
Governments, politicians, lobbies and businessmen who prefer to lie in bed with politicians in exchange for favours instead of competing in the market as it should be. Everyone seeks profit and power, everyone seeks control... "Normality" has always been a tool of mass manipulation. From governments that seek to limit freedom of expression to governments that pathologized the dissident in order to have an excuse and lock him up for life. There is no collectivist political current that has not done this.
Conservatives had and have certain policies that seeking an idealized normality can oppress, in the non-prostituted sense of the word, deviations from what is considered "normal". Progressives are focused on seeking a different normality through the elimination of ideas that they do not consider "adequate," of more authoritarian ideas such as Fascists or Communists, let's not talk... All this is based on the fact that there are powers that have certain interests and supported in a speech in question they seek to achieve a concrete result.
Being a social scenario nothing is so simple and things go beyond simple politics, it can be language, accent, sexuality, ideas, religion. Anywhere and everywhere you are going to see normal things that in other places would be abnormal or even crazy, this is influenced particularly by culture, but that is another issue.
Not being "normal" in any aspect can be grounds for discrimination, the emos in the 2000's era, the nerds or any sexual orientation other than the Straight, were and are examples of this. The Normal is closely linked to the Norma... Therefore, it is simple and valid to consider that it is normal everything that goes according to the norms or what the majority does, be it the appropriate, the good, the desirable or even the average... There are two problems with this, the first one: "Standards imposed by whom?" the answer would be "Governors who have specific interests in this matter in question". The second: "What's wrong with being different?" The answer would be "It shouldn't be a bad thing as long as you don't hurt anyone or engage in self-destructive behavior.
Human beings are different and we all have behaviors or traits different from the average, using social engineering to eliminate, lock up or exterminate the different have no reason to exist, because being objective there is no "normality" in the society, everything is based on subjectivities and the idea of creating an ideal and homogeneous society, but it is not so fortunately simple... "If there is something normal it is because it follows a norm, and if there is a norm it is because someone put it there, and if he put it there it is because it suits him". Thank you for reading, Peace!
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Posted from my blog with SteemPress : http://daniscib.steemblogs.club/2019/06/08/what-is-normal-does-it-exist/
This is a great question and important idea. What each of us has to learn is "what is normal for ME?" and then to observe and measure change against that. The homogenized, vanilla, western idea of "normal" is both debilitating and surreal - it simply doesn't exist.
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No doubt about it. The western civilization being more homogeneous in what they respect their roots, they have a vision of normality more idealized and more according to their values and principles. The civilizations of the East are much more diverse in that sense, for better or for worse.
They are only projections of something. ^^
Greetings and thank you for commenting!
exactly the norm is just some one else's opinion, of what is acceptable to them and that then is what we are held against. Another form of containment and control. I feel the same way when people talk about personality disorders, how can you define a personality, we are all so different. It is the diversity that we need to embrace xx
Absolutely true, it's practically an imposition. There is nothing wrong with being different as long as it does not harm the lives of others or one's own. In the case of personalities, no doubt, we are all different despite following certain "lines" created to label, although this in a more scientific field of course. It is something very interesting in the case of disorders, Psychology considers them a problem because they actually tend to be because they make the personality of the person so... "toxic and unstable" to put it in a generalized way that can damage their environment and the same.
In fact!, personality is something we can change ourselves, it is a process, but it is possible. Throughout our lives it evolves together with us specially when we are young, it is extremely interesting. ^^
Thank you for taking the time to read to me, Peace!
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