Tuesday, June 14, 2011

fear & acceptance


more distinctions need to be made here. it seems to be that, while a majority of NTs are the sort that wants to be like other people & likes other people to be like them, a smaller but significant proportion prefers to be different from other people & appreciates difference in others. i have almost always found tolerance, & often support, among the latter, who tend to be alienated just as much in their own way (cf the first group i mentioned). conformity in our pseudo-individualistic age is a serious problem, true. but it does not help anyone to look at this in an alarmist way.

the first thing that comes to mind, is the fact that the group of like-minded (i associate these with Myers-Briggs dominant Sensing, mostly Extraverted Sensing types--but this pattern is not limited to those) is susceptible to what they are told; & if they are told there is a new minority among them that needs to be respected, eventually they will raise their kids to respect them & it will not always be prejudicial to grow up as one of that minority.

another point, is that there are what might be termed healthfear-crazes, or hot topics that sweep through society, by the same media, influencing people's insecurities into taking irrational & sometimes drastic action. maybe profit lies behind these, maybe they just happen & charlatans latch onto them. the thing about childhood immunization falls under this head. basically, put the facts out & discredit the fearmongers, is the way to proceed.

finally, i have come to understand that resistance to difference is not all the same even in those who are like-minded; & autism-spectrum affects them more viscereally even than skin color or physical deformity. this may be because they cannot imagine a mind that is otherwise & not inimical. or else maybe it is not even that close to being a thought.

this last may be beyond remedy; hence the need to write protection explicitly into our laws.


religion


i have learned from Platonism, the Christian mystics, Samkhya philosophy, Buddhism, Neopaganism, Existentialism, Sufism, Lurianic Qabbalah, & modern science. what is useful to me i keep. i'm better at imagining than at believing.

i don't think any gods explain our time better than H P Lovecraft's Mythos--but that's just as a metaphor. i seriously doubt the Old Ones will be interested in eating us, when they do return.

i could be wrong.



"Flags and creeds are parasites on humanity; parasites which cause derangement."

--The Theory and Practice of Oligarchic Collectivism


chess


i took to it immediately i guess it was the year of Bobby Fischer; i was an unformed pre-adolescent & it gave me, for the first time, an area outside of school i could excel at.

i played passionately at the local chess club for a number of years, with a little bit of monetary success, & a lots of success for my ego. almost managed a master's rating, but not consistently (too many sensitivities, things that could throw me off my stride. my one out-of-town tournament was a total fiasco...)

i still play online a bit, after a long layoff in which i tried to concentrate at things i was good at that also mattered. well, i found out that talent can only get you so far, & the rest is politics. what's that, & how do i learn it?

so, i still regard chess as a kind of platonic ideal of human interaction. all the rules are there.