Three types of maturity
I’ve tried to write about this before, and couldn’t really get it out. Then I saw Katie’s post on her blog:
And I knew it was time to try and get it into words again. Here goes (my response to Katie:
I agree OF COURSE! And don’t get me started on children’s TV advertising….
The problem is closed circles of awareness. I don’t know if I’ve expounded on this before, so bear with me.
Maturity comes in three flavors. Physical, Emotional, and X. I don’t really know what to call X yet. I’ve tried calling Awareness before, and that works more or less, but it’s not the same type of thing as the others so I don’t know if it’s a good word for the set. Maybe Universal. Maybe External….
Physical and Emotional I don’t have to go into, we all know about those (regardless of how well we follow the latter). But these are either internal or related to self. Awareness is about everything EXCEPT self. Awareness means realizing how you fit into the universe, and that there is a lot out there that ISN’T YOU. Awareness means realizing, REALLY realizing, that there are other people out there that aren’t you.
Think about it in a development standpoint. Very small babies don’t even have a concept of self, their Awareness is actually at zero. Small children only think about themselves, their Awareness doesn’t go beyond their skin. Their Awareness will gradually expand to household and friends, and family. In certain circumstances their Awareness might temporarily extend beyond this. For instance, in a Little League game the child would be aware of much of his team, and probably a few people in the audience. By high school, Awareness has expanded to much of the person’s classmates, some members of the community, teachers, and a larger range of friends.
Eventually, most people get to the point where you can look at a total stranger, and if you try, you can glimpse this other life there, another entire person that has an extire existence that isn’t much different than yours, but has nothing to do with you.
But most people don’t try.
Some people go on to expand their Awareness much more. Public figures are a good example — politicians base their job on their Awareness (or claim to Awareness). Doctors are also very up on Awareness. But many people don’t progress beyond their high school years.
And THAT’S what causes problems. That’s what causes road rage! People just don’t perceive other cars as being PEOPLE. They see cars as representations of people, kind of like poll results. Some people never progress beyond the Awareness maturity of early childhood. This is part of the foundation of gang violence, rapists, etc. These people see actual PEOPLE and only see them as representations of people. They have no actual consideration for anything outside of their very small circle. Their gang. Themselves.
This is also what causes problems with musicians and other pop figures that are very poor role models. Well, there is probably some emotional immaturity mixed in as well. They don’t have a real realization of other people, only sales figures and seas of unidentifiable fans at concerts. After buying their album, or attending their concert, these REAL PEOPLE, as far as the pop star is concerned, has ceased to exist. Social responsibility is not an issue, because the entire concept of society is lost to them.
Anyway, enough of that. I’d like to hear what people think about this.
January 31st, 2004 at 11:31 am
I think you make a great case–yours is a point of view I hadn’t really thought of before. And even though Trav disagrees with me on some of my views on depressed lyrics, he completely agrees with what you’ve said. It’s sad but true that many people don’t really realize what kind of effect they have on others. Unfortunately, it’s a fact that some people just never mature past a certain point, no matter what. Also unfortunately, getting that kind of fame and yes, power, often seems to actually work against maturity–if you can have whatever you want, whenever you want it, of course you regress to some degree. I think it’s only natural…natural, and terrible. Anyway, very well said, Dave. Love you much, talk to you soon (I hope)!
January 31st, 2004 at 7:23 pm
I do agree with the theory that public figures need to be conscious of what they do and say. However, you make me think of a related problem that could come up. It was specifically the reference to songs with destructive lyrics. What do you do about artists who present destructive behaviour in their art in order to show how bad it is? You end up getting people who absorb the art at face value and decide they want to emulate such behaviour because they think it’s cool, even though the artist was trying to achieve the opposite. I believe that satire and social commentary through reenactment is a valid way to try to raise social awareness about negative behaviour. But then you get people who blame Marilyn Manson for what those two boys did at Columbine.
So who’s right? It’s all grey area. I’ve told you before how I fault parents and more immediate role models like teachers or chemical imbalances when children aren’t able to tell the difference between fantasy and reality. Similarly, I think that it’s up to the immediate role models to PAY ATTENTION to their kids to make sure that their emotional health is stable.
I do agree that many artists glorify very negative behaviour (drugs, unsafe sex, violence, self-destructiveness), but occasionally it’s not an attempt to glorify, but to villify. I think the problem there is simply the Awareness of the consumers much more than the artist.
Maybe teachers should spend more time on “satire” and “irony” in literature units in school nowadays.