I am a world full of prisons.
A name is a number, number a name.
Once I know your name, I know you.
Knowing is victory.
Victory is conquest.
Conquest is overrated.
Prison is full.
Things By Name, People By Purpose
I don't actually know anybody. I have friends, enemies and acquaintances, but I don't think any of us know each other.
This is because of bad habits.
When we met, I did a cursory evaluation of your appearance, speech patterns, costume and apparent character traits. A few details have changed since then with new information, but that only means I still keep a file.
I'm a lo-tech Facebook!
I have you in a category. Like I do with everybody I meet.
Before reaching the age of reason, I reflexively and very quickly determined that I was a tiny universe, and its outer manifestation was separated into things. Later I noticed some of these things were a lot alike. So I kept them in categories.
Before reaching the age of compassion, I reflexively and very quickly determined that people were different from each other, in spite of their similarities. Later I figured out the degrees by which people were the same and different. So I started putting them in categories.
I was a very judgmental child.
Categories are for things. They name a thing not by its individual nature, but by whatever it has in common with all the other things like it.
What works with things doesn't always work with people.
You can know a thing by its name. All the other things like it have the same name, indicating its use.
Of
course, things don't generally have whole universes in them, filled
with ideas, feelings, experiences and identity, so you don't need to
name each one something different. Categories are sufficient.
That's how categories are helpful.
You can know a person by its name. Most of the other people like it won't have the same name. But you can know a person's type by its category. So you have to objectify the person first, then put it in a category.
Like this. Sort of.
So doing, you will ignore the ideas, feelings, experiences and identity you just put into a box. You keep them out of the equation, isolating the other person.
That's how categories can be hurtful.
It's a good plan if you're into racking up numbers. Keeps you focused on the goal at hand. So with advertising, policy development and telling various kinds of jokes.
Not helpful if you want to actually relate to people though.
Eye sees. Brain interprets.
It's creature with many arms and long reach. Turns everybody you meet into food or machines - consumable or useful.
On a lighter note, it probably isn't as bad as all that. We all do it, and it hasn't hurt us any, right? I mean, I've been objectified plenty of times, and sometimes it's very nearly a compliment.
Am I the only one who thinks it's weird that this is used more often to describe people than soup?
See you in another present...
No comments:
Post a Comment