FA+
Shop
Unpopular Opinion Meme
12 years ago
"A man is about as happy as he makes up his own mind to be." - A. Lincoln
There is an “Unpopular Opinion Meme” circulate here in the journals, with the last question being a chance to write something that “grinds your gears”.
For the greater part of the meme, ‘what television show, or popular musical performer", or whatever did I not care for. I found that I simply could not answer those questions. Why? Because once I realized that I did not care for a program or performer or whatever I simply stopped thinking about it which would have left the meme largely empty. So I decided to just post this, my answer to the very last, what ‘ground my gears’ question.
When we are born, and for the next ten or so years, we have to have our parents take care of us (yes, cooking and serving us our food, washing our clothes, entertaining us when we are bored (and still cute)) was part of that ‘taking care’ of us).
Then for the following ten years we and our parents engaged in a running battle as we tried to get out from under all that no-choice ‘caring’ they imposed on us. We did not need it obviously, since we had already done all that eating, clothes-wearing and playing so it was obviously we could do it on our own (which to our minds was proof that we were ready for adulthood).
Then, once we entered our twenties, it was Adios Scumbeegoes to our “tyrants” (parents) with major goal in life (particularly since we had discovered that that “thing” or “place down there” was not just for peeing) was to get out of their house and out onto our LIFE. Freedom!!! Doing what we wanted to do! Yay!!
A job? Nah, didn’t need one. “Crashed” for a while at a cool older friend’s pad usually as a “friend with benefits”. Eventually that arrangement would begin to suck when that older friend started making unreasonable parent-noises at us. We should being paying our share of the rent, our share of the food bill, we should do the laundry since we didn’t have a job like they wasted their day working at while we played their video games, we should stop wearing his/her clothes, and we begin picking up our s**t off the floor and couch.
Now unless we had other “friends” to mooch off -- er, temporarily live with -- we had to begin thinking of getting our own pad/apartment where we could do what we wanted to do whenever we wanted to. Nothing special. Just a small palatial place where we could lay our head and a few friends.
Now, being forced to this decision (by people who obviously didn’t love us as we deserved) the first real ugliness of Being an Adult raised its ugly head. To get our own apartment, we needed money.
As a “kid”, money had never been a concern. You asked, you whined, you cried, or threw enough tantrums until your parents eventually gave in and gave you what you wanted. Of course, the really cool macho kids will always tell you that they never had to go through any of that crying or whining stuff and would never since they were macho -- or at least they tell you they didn‘t.
In any case, up to that point in life we were never concerned with money unless we were playing Monopoly.
As a side-note, it is also at this point in life were most growing-ups begin to pick up that “money is evil” and ‘people who have a lot of money (while I do not have any) are likewise evil’ philosophy.
Ah, but there is a temporary side-road to avoiding the unfairness of full-fledged adulthood, or crass money pursuing The accumulation of “friends”.
Now “friends”, at this point in our lives, are the people that we weave into our personal social “safety net”. They are collected and expected (since they are our friends) to provide us with all things like “a place to crash for a few weeks”, “loans” (or to answer our on-line pleas for a hand-out), provide us with a free ride to a furry con, shared a date (threesome?), or just be someone to have sex with at no cost to ourselves. Free is good.
Hey, why not that latter benefit to friendship? After all, these were the same kids we played “house”, “soldiers” or “Ninja Turtles” with in kindergarten or grade school, so why not now with those really neat “toys“ we discovered “down there“ on our bodies?
Sex, after all, is the undeniable proof that we have definitely become an real honest-to-goodness, I-Am-Special, ADULT. An adult who no longer needs anyone to take care of us, aside from a few friends and … and there is always the GOVERNMENT to fall back on.
The government is supposed to take care of us by taking money away from all those evil rich people (probably all parents in disguise) and taking care of us. Sort of like having a Robin Hood with a social conscience who steals from the evil rich and gives to the noble poor like a SUPER-parent taking care of us.
“Mommy, I’m home again!”
For the greater part of the meme, ‘what television show, or popular musical performer", or whatever did I not care for. I found that I simply could not answer those questions. Why? Because once I realized that I did not care for a program or performer or whatever I simply stopped thinking about it which would have left the meme largely empty. So I decided to just post this, my answer to the very last, what ‘ground my gears’ question.
When we are born, and for the next ten or so years, we have to have our parents take care of us (yes, cooking and serving us our food, washing our clothes, entertaining us when we are bored (and still cute)) was part of that ‘taking care’ of us).
Then for the following ten years we and our parents engaged in a running battle as we tried to get out from under all that no-choice ‘caring’ they imposed on us. We did not need it obviously, since we had already done all that eating, clothes-wearing and playing so it was obviously we could do it on our own (which to our minds was proof that we were ready for adulthood).
Then, once we entered our twenties, it was Adios Scumbeegoes to our “tyrants” (parents) with major goal in life (particularly since we had discovered that that “thing” or “place down there” was not just for peeing) was to get out of their house and out onto our LIFE. Freedom!!! Doing what we wanted to do! Yay!!
A job? Nah, didn’t need one. “Crashed” for a while at a cool older friend’s pad usually as a “friend with benefits”. Eventually that arrangement would begin to suck when that older friend started making unreasonable parent-noises at us. We should being paying our share of the rent, our share of the food bill, we should do the laundry since we didn’t have a job like they wasted their day working at while we played their video games, we should stop wearing his/her clothes, and we begin picking up our s**t off the floor and couch.
Now unless we had other “friends” to mooch off -- er, temporarily live with -- we had to begin thinking of getting our own pad/apartment where we could do what we wanted to do whenever we wanted to. Nothing special. Just a small palatial place where we could lay our head and a few friends.
Now, being forced to this decision (by people who obviously didn’t love us as we deserved) the first real ugliness of Being an Adult raised its ugly head. To get our own apartment, we needed money.
As a “kid”, money had never been a concern. You asked, you whined, you cried, or threw enough tantrums until your parents eventually gave in and gave you what you wanted. Of course, the really cool macho kids will always tell you that they never had to go through any of that crying or whining stuff and would never since they were macho -- or at least they tell you they didn‘t.
In any case, up to that point in life we were never concerned with money unless we were playing Monopoly.
As a side-note, it is also at this point in life were most growing-ups begin to pick up that “money is evil” and ‘people who have a lot of money (while I do not have any) are likewise evil’ philosophy.
Ah, but there is a temporary side-road to avoiding the unfairness of full-fledged adulthood, or crass money pursuing The accumulation of “friends”.
Now “friends”, at this point in our lives, are the people that we weave into our personal social “safety net”. They are collected and expected (since they are our friends) to provide us with all things like “a place to crash for a few weeks”, “loans” (or to answer our on-line pleas for a hand-out), provide us with a free ride to a furry con, shared a date (threesome?), or just be someone to have sex with at no cost to ourselves. Free is good.
Hey, why not that latter benefit to friendship? After all, these were the same kids we played “house”, “soldiers” or “Ninja Turtles” with in kindergarten or grade school, so why not now with those really neat “toys“ we discovered “down there“ on our bodies?
Sex, after all, is the undeniable proof that we have definitely become an real honest-to-goodness, I-Am-Special, ADULT. An adult who no longer needs anyone to take care of us, aside from a few friends and … and there is always the GOVERNMENT to fall back on.
The government is supposed to take care of us by taking money away from all those evil rich people (probably all parents in disguise) and taking care of us. Sort of like having a Robin Hood with a social conscience who steals from the evil rich and gives to the noble poor like a SUPER-parent taking care of us.
“Mommy, I’m home again!”
For me, it goes more like this:
"Oh, you had a number of years in English classes, but you've never actually edited professionally? Sorry, we're looking for someone with experience."
"Oh, you have a master's degree? Sorry, you're overqualified for this job." (which would help me get experience)
"We will gladly hire someone with your qualifications at this low pay, high stress job where most people will treat you like dirt or worse. There is no career advancement, and no union to keep us from firing you just before you can collect pension. Thanks for joining our happy family!"
I've had undergrad and graduate English classes (practical and literary), have published umpty-hump articles and stories in "real" magazines, have seven books published, have edited (for technical errors and content) a dozen novels, and even written and published screenplays (dub scripts for ADV Films, sub scripts for Odyssey Anime)... and I'm not qualified because I don't know how to use Adobe FrameMaker.
*raises a fist to the air* Power to the Literate, brother!
I'm curious how you got started in publishing: where did you go? How did you find someone? I think I must have been sick in English class the day they explained all that.
God help the politicians and law-makers if we ever get our way with the language laws are written in...
Dominus tecum
Dominus tecum
Perhaps I feel that the problem with "becoming an adult" is that so few people do. Simple things like common courtesy is lost on most "adults," as is being responsible with one's citizenship (e.g., voting wisely, assisting in the lawmaking process, remembering one's place in society as being integral and interactive with that society). I know nothing of their "growing up" years, but I question whether or not their psychological potty training was ever completed -- they do seem to explode their s**t randomly and without concern about who's going to clean it up (as long as it's not them).
Another problem might find its source in common literacy. It's clear to me, for example, that a great many people do not understand the words "courtesy" or "respect." It's possible that people in the U.S. consider "cooperation" to be "capitulation," and the idea of a "mutual good" doesn't fit in with the "I've got mine" mentality. Still worse, at least 1% of the population doesn't understand the meaning of the word "enough."
-C.S. Lewis, "On Three Ways of Writing for Children", from On Stories.
Getting employment that you can actually enjoy is a different thing.
1) They'll have to pay you more.
2) You are likely to leave once something better comes along.
News stories over the past couple of years detail how some graduates have intentionally worked under their college/university graduate salary expectations (one rare bird actually worked for minimum wage) for up to a year in order to bottom-line their resumes with real life job experience from real life jobs.
Of course the job candidate has to make it clear that he/she is accepting the job with all their academic credentials in order to get “work experience“ and is willing to WORK with the unspoken understanding that they will be moving on when & if they secure a better paying job.
Swallowing four or more years of ego just to get job experience can be a tough pill to swallow for most collegiates.
One has to consider the psychology of the moment. Is the person conducting the interview (your potential “boss” perhaps) someone who is working at his/her job because they are married, have a mortgage and car payments to make, and two kids who will be going to college in a few years, or because he/she considers it to be fun?
“No, Mister Ironpants, I am here to learn everything I can about this job. All the ins and outs.
I’d like the opportunity to show you just what a great worker I can be for you so that when and if I leave in a couple of years, you will be more than happy to write a glowing letter of recommendation for me about the great job I did for you.”
How safe would you feel if the air traffic controller giving instructions to the airplane you were a passenger on was doing his job because he considered it to be “fun”?
But seriously, in this economy where there are so many job applicants for every single position, the hidden personality quirks of the hiring boss play a larger and larger part in the decision as to who gets hired and who doesn‘t. And as such, there’s not much you can do about it but just keep looking.
Another journal posting will have to wait until after I take a shower, go to the mall (just to look around), and then come back. I need to write a commentary about some of the things I see there that amuse/annoy me.
You on the other hand, old friend, have proven yourself to be a critical thinker of the best kind. So instead of being very angry with you, for posting this journal; I am instead completely willing to concede that you have a valid argument, to a point. The rest, I'm totally willing to debate with you, in the hope that we both might learn some more.
This is not a “me-too” to any political movement’s agenda. Instead it is a comment regarding a social tend that dates back to the 1960’s with it’s “Youth Revolution” and ’the younger you are, the more you know about life’ phony philosophy.
I see journal entries here on FA almost daily, posted by friends of furries in trouble, asking us to help them with money, The journals are almost all the same: “please help PoopFur, he walked out of his parents’ house because they wanted to run his life for him and he could not stand that any longer. He lost his job six months ago, and now is being thrown out of his bf’s apartment and don’t know what to do next. Please Help Him.”
Playing at making one’s own decisions while being almost totally dependent on others is a kid‘s game of “House“ or a fool’s lack of a plan. “Happily Ever After” just doesn’t happen because you want it to.
If one can support one’s self (is not dependent on anyone else, even one’s bf) then that is the moment when a person can think of leaving Mom & Dad‘s nest and rules. Heh, they’ll probably give you subtle hints before then that they think you should go out on your own.
Moving out for love is grand … even the Kama Sutra of hot lust for a couple of months is nice, but eventually “something happens" (like the bumper sticker used to say) and with no “cushion money” in a bank account to fall back on….
No one is immune to the twists of Fate. They happen now and then to everyone, BUT being able to deal with them is all part of what it means to be an independent adult, not just running away from home to be with your boy/girlfriend 24/7.
Moreover, being able to be depended on by someone else when one of those "twists" affects them is perhaps the one outstanding hallmark of having reached adulthood -- not only being able to stand on your own two feet for yourself, but able to support someone else.
I know that a French author wrote and had a book published two years ago on how he managed to live and support himself completely without working by being supported by the government aid programs in France.
that money is evil philosophy still inside me, I need to change xD
I´m on hold in my relationship because of I want be independent and have money and a play to move and have my love by my side. Even now I have people I love so much, but I never say I´m love, not before I´m free. They expect me to be the alpha wolf... i need independence. This is my life now
A large part of being an adult, or grown-up, is having to work. Our work creates value for which the person we work for must give us something of equal value; money. If we work for forty hours we are “paid” forty hours worth of money.
With money we can buy what we want -- one of those things is freedom to do what we want. Because the poor do not have enough money, they are never free.
Money is not evil, even though we must do things we do not want to do (like work) to get it.
Money is more important if we want to support those we love. The alpha wolf protects and takes care of his “pack“.
Much good fortune to you my wolf friend.