I never understood why people always HAVE to pick sides. I'll use politics as an example, as it is the first example that really caught my attention before I started paying closer attention. In highschool around 10th grade was when I noticed everyone picking a political side. Whether it be in conversation or political debate in class, kids were now saying things like "Republican?! PPSSSHHHHH I'm a dem, screw those conservative pricks" "Democrat?! Liberal hippies...". But for some reason, I never wanted to pick a side in that or anything else like it for that matter.
Why do people feel the need to identify with a "side"? Is it a way of classifying themselves? Or is it a way of ensuring that they have friends? People also do it with race and geographic location. I just don't feel the same desire to distinguish my heritage from another human being.
Those are my thoughts for the morning...Now I must go shave and be off to work.
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"I want to say something but I'll keep it to myself I guess and leave this useless post behind to make you aware that there WAS something... "
-Equinox
"We're like the downtown of the Diablo related internet lol"
-Winged
Good point. I guess I am taking a side by not taking a side. Look at me, I can do new things!
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"I want to say something but I'll keep it to myself I guess and leave this useless post behind to make you aware that there WAS something... "
-Equinox
"We're like the downtown of the Diablo related internet lol"
-Winged
In my opinion, it's in our blood to choose a side. I also think that the underlying catalyst behind choosing sides is to find a familiar. That's why people associate themselves with political groups or a city they grew up in; it's something that they have the ability to share with others and, maybe, allow them to connect and learn.
I mean, sure, some people can be fucking assholes about it and groups can pick battles and shit, but humans will always find a certain comfort in groups.
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I hate the way you cling to ignorance and pass it off as innocence
In my opinion, the "choosing sides" mentality stems back to when we first began to walk upright. You had to have a side, a group, a tribe, a set of people you agree with and that agree with you. Today we don't necessarily have that anymore, but the mentality is still there.
Or I could be completely and utterly wrong. *Shrug.*
I never understood why people always HAVE to pick sides. I'll use politics as an example, as it is the first example that really caught my attention before I started paying closer attention. In highschool around 10th grade was when I noticed everyone picking a political side. Whether it be in conversation or political debate in class, kids were now saying things like "Republican?! PPSSSHHHHH I'm a dem, screw those conservative pricks" "Democrat?! Liberal hippies...". But for some reason, I never wanted to pick a side in that or anything else like it for that matter.
Why do people feel the need to identify with a "side"? Is it a way of classifying themselves? Or is it a way of ensuring that they have friends? People also do it with race and geographic location. I just don't feel the same desire to distinguish my heritage from another human being.
Those are my thoughts for the morning...Now I must go shave and be off to work.
basically right there. some people are genuine and care about the sides theyre picking and the reasoning behind that. but most people in their 10th grade arnt picking because they understand, its so they fit in with a group. a sense of belonging and popularity is actually really important to people.
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Remember the String of Ears
"to the worm in horseradish, the world is horseradish."
Identifying and throwing one's lot in with a group is much easier, and you at least have some support to your claims or ideals. Play in the 'in-between' too long and one might alienate themselves. Taking a thing like politics, one almost have to choose a side otherwise there may not be an alternative and suddenly they're the bad guy for 'not voting' or being labeled lazy. People on the fence are targets that are in reach.
I never understood why people always HAVE to pick sides. I'll use politics as an example, as it is the first example that really caught my attention before I started paying closer attention. In highschool around 10th grade was when I noticed everyone picking a political side. Whether it be in conversation or political debate in class, kids were now saying things like "Republican?! PPSSSHHHHH I'm a dem, screw those conservative pricks" "Democrat?! Liberal hippies...". But for some reason, I never wanted to pick a side in that or anything else like it for that matter.
Why do people feel the need to identify with a "side"? Is it a way of classifying themselves? Or is it a way of ensuring that they have friends? People also do it with race and geographic location. I just don't feel the same desire to distinguish my heritage from another human being.
Those are my thoughts for the morning...Now I must go shave and be off to work.
I think it comes mostly from our survival instincts from back when we were a bunch of monkeys in the forest. A monkey that did not "join" a certain group or pack would simply be eaten alive by other groups that have achieved strength and success together. Success as in gathering or hunting more food, and maybe even building / taking over better habitats like caves.
Since the early stages of our evolution as mammals and later as bipedal creatures, the need to be a part of a group was an essential aspect of our survival. I think that this is clearly one of the reasons of why we live like this even today.
Now, in the times of major shifts in conciousness and nature, it is suiteable for us, human beings, to go beyond those survival instincts. Learn from them, understand them and move on, forward to a better and brighter future. I believe in our capability of doing so.
The "picking sides" phenomenon is responsible for everything that you might call "bad" today. The rich and the poor, the unjust wars, and the social overall way of thinking. People have been writing about this for thousands of years and we already know all of the solutions of our problems. We just need to open our eyes and not pick a side anymore.
Acknowledge the fact that everything is relevant. No more "white > black". White is great and black is great. White resembles death and black resembles death. Both the Ying and the Yang are relevant sides of the same coin which are total opposites, but form the same truth eventually.
The one truth, the infinite one, has infinite ways of manifestation that could be portrayed by thinking creatures in many ways, even "good and bad" but, are all relevant and are all part of the infinite.
Open your mind. The truth is there to find.
@Edit: and about this "I just don't feel the same desire to distinguish my heritage from another human being" - I would say that there is a high probablity that your existance as a light being, on the soul level could be "new" to this particular reality and planet. Your soul might have come from a different dimension / plane / planet / density in order to experience certain things. Maybe this "picking sides" phenomenon is one of the experiences that you came to live and see for yourself, just so you can continue your conciousness evolution.
Everyone has really good points. I'm glad so many decided to respond. It was on my mind.
However, good points all, I think maybe we can go a bit further. I think the most basic reason we do this naturally(without reflection and self awareness that we do this, when we don't actually have to), comes down to how our brains function with "logic".
Logic says, there is a reason for everything. Logic tends to scale things. Likewise, we like to put things on "scales". The grey area lies in the completely neutral center. The likelihood of someones opinion lying on the center, is unlikely.
I like to think it manifests itself something like an X axis graph:
So, in most all cases, the persons "opinion number"(opinions represented by numbers on the x axis) will lie somewhere beyond or before 0.
From that point, depending on how much of a sheep you are, determines how easily swayed you are, how much you want to fit in, and several other social factors that swing your opinion even further in that direction.
This is basically the same concept that Simpy7 was talking about.
Rollback Post to RevisionRollBack
"I want to say something but I'll keep it to myself I guess and leave this useless post behind to make you aware that there WAS something... "
-Equinox
"We're like the downtown of the Diablo related internet lol"
-Winged
Everyone has really good points. I'm glad so many decided to respond. It was on my mind.
However, good points all, I think maybe we can go a bit further. I think the most basic reason we do this naturally(without reflection and self awareness that we do this, when we don't actually have to), comes down to how our brains function with "logic".
Logic says, there is a reason for everything. Logic tends to scale things. Likewise, we like to put things on "scales". The grey area lies in the completely neutral center. The likelihood of someones opinion lying on the center, is unlikely.
I like to think it manifests itself something like an X axis graph:
So, in most all cases, the persons "opinion number"(opinions represented by numbers on the x axis) will lie somewhere beyond or before 0.
From that point, depending on how much of a sheep you are, determines how easily swayed you are, how much you want to fit in, and several other social factors that swing your opinion even further in that direction.
This is basically the same concept that Simpy7 was talking about.
um... think about this
if we didn't always pick sides:
why would we Vote?
how would we find a hero among villains?
how would we play sports?
would there be different nations?
... pretty interesting stuff, i wont argue no more since i already picked my side
i think they pick cause it's easier than not to. way of less resistance and you don't feel that alone behind your monitor. for some minutes. or less.
I don't want that chart thing to be confusing at all. Think of one side having a maximum of 5 and the other side -5. Those numbers represent the farthest to a side someone can be. Hence why I believe the political terms far left or far right are used to describe how politically affiliated someone is with a particular side.
It's not complicated at all. I'm probably just explaining it poorly. In any case, my main reason for using that, was to show that being truthfully neutral is rather unlikely in any scenario. However, I don't believe everyone is as extreme as they think they are. I feel that instead of everyone being 5's or -5's, they're more like 2's and 3's. But, due to our social nature( a point brought up by many folks here), we tend to follow the crowd on average, and swing our opinions to an extreme left or right.
We have an exploding psyduck emoticon??!?!?!?!?!?!
@Titanrew- We wouldn't. Logic controls our brains. Logic likes to "know" everything. So, it sets boundaries between the left and right, the up and down, the black and white.
Really, those boundaries do not exist. But..that's for another time.
Rollback Post to RevisionRollBack
"I want to say something but I'll keep it to myself I guess and leave this useless post behind to make you aware that there WAS something... "
-Equinox
"We're like the downtown of the Diablo related internet lol"
-Winged
That is why I respect individual thinkers enormously, but at the same time realize that they're the minority of people making up our species.
This is me. I just try to have an open mind about things and form my own opinions. They may or may not be similar to other opinions but i thought about these things for myself and i try not to delibirately associate myself with other groups, well, at least concerning political, philosophical and religious (spiritual) things. Hobbies and interests however are a different thing.
Why do people feel the need to identify with a "side"? Is it a way of classifying themselves? Or is it a way of ensuring that they have friends? People also do it with race and geographic location. I just don't feel the same desire to distinguish my heritage from another human being.
Those are my thoughts for the morning...Now I must go shave and be off to work.
-Equinox
"We're like the downtown of the Diablo related internet lol"
-Winged
Take THAT society!
-Equinox
"We're like the downtown of the Diablo related internet lol"
-Winged
That's the spirit!
Rebel against the system!
Choose the side of RIGHTEOUSNESS!
I mean, sure, some people can be fucking assholes about it and groups can pick battles and shit, but humans will always find a certain comfort in groups.
I hate the way you cling to ignorance and pass it off as innocence
Or I could be completely and utterly wrong. *Shrug.*
"to the worm in horseradish, the world is horseradish."
People always want to be part of a social tribe with people who have things in common. It's where a lot of gangs come from as well.
As for me I'm on the side of truth and justice.
"to the worm in horseradish, the world is horseradish."
I think it comes mostly from our survival instincts from back when we were a bunch of monkeys in the forest. A monkey that did not "join" a certain group or pack would simply be eaten alive by other groups that have achieved strength and success together. Success as in gathering or hunting more food, and maybe even building / taking over better habitats like caves.
Since the early stages of our evolution as mammals and later as bipedal creatures, the need to be a part of a group was an essential aspect of our survival. I think that this is clearly one of the reasons of why we live like this even today.
Now, in the times of major shifts in conciousness and nature, it is suiteable for us, human beings, to go beyond those survival instincts. Learn from them, understand them and move on, forward to a better and brighter future. I believe in our capability of doing so.
The "picking sides" phenomenon is responsible for everything that you might call "bad" today. The rich and the poor, the unjust wars, and the social overall way of thinking. People have been writing about this for thousands of years and we already know all of the solutions of our problems. We just need to open our eyes and not pick a side anymore.
Acknowledge the fact that everything is relevant. No more "white > black". White is great and black is great. White resembles death and black resembles death. Both the Ying and the Yang are relevant sides of the same coin which are total opposites, but form the same truth eventually.
The one truth, the infinite one, has infinite ways of manifestation that could be portrayed by thinking creatures in many ways, even "good and bad" but, are all relevant and are all part of the infinite.
Open your mind. The truth is there to find.
@Edit: and about this "I just don't feel the same desire to distinguish my heritage from another human being" - I would say that there is a high probablity that your existance as a light being, on the soul level could be "new" to this particular reality and planet. Your soul might have come from a different dimension / plane / planet / density in order to experience certain things. Maybe this "picking sides" phenomenon is one of the experiences that you came to live and see for yourself, just so you can continue your conciousness evolution.
However, good points all, I think maybe we can go a bit further. I think the most basic reason we do this naturally(without reflection and self awareness that we do this, when we don't actually have to), comes down to how our brains function with "logic".
Logic says, there is a reason for everything. Logic tends to scale things. Likewise, we like to put things on "scales". The grey area lies in the completely neutral center. The likelihood of someones opinion lying on the center, is unlikely.
I like to think it manifests itself something like an X axis graph:
So, in most all cases, the persons "opinion number"(opinions represented by numbers on the x axis) will lie somewhere beyond or before 0.
From that point, depending on how much of a sheep you are, determines how easily swayed you are, how much you want to fit in, and several other social factors that swing your opinion even further in that direction.
This is basically the same concept that Simpy7 was talking about.
-Equinox
"We're like the downtown of the Diablo related internet lol"
-Winged
i think they pick cause it's easier than not to. way of less resistance and you don't feel that alone behind your monitor. for some minutes. or less.
if we didn't always pick sides:
why would we Vote?
how would we find a hero among villains?
how would we play sports?
would there be different nations?
... pretty interesting stuff, i wont argue no more since i already picked my side
I don't want that chart thing to be confusing at all. Think of one side having a maximum of 5 and the other side -5. Those numbers represent the farthest to a side someone can be. Hence why I believe the political terms far left or far right are used to describe how politically affiliated someone is with a particular side.
It's not complicated at all. I'm probably just explaining it poorly. In any case, my main reason for using that, was to show that being truthfully neutral is rather unlikely in any scenario. However, I don't believe everyone is as extreme as they think they are. I feel that instead of everyone being 5's or -5's, they're more like 2's and 3's. But, due to our social nature( a point brought up by many folks here), we tend to follow the crowd on average, and swing our opinions to an extreme left or right.
We have an exploding psyduck emoticon??!?!?!?!?!?!
@Titanrew- We wouldn't. Logic controls our brains. Logic likes to "know" everything. So, it sets boundaries between the left and right, the up and down, the black and white.
Really, those boundaries do not exist. But..that's for another time.
-Equinox
"We're like the downtown of the Diablo related internet lol"
-Winged
This is me. I just try to have an open mind about things and form my own opinions. They may or may not be similar to other opinions but i thought about these things for myself and i try not to delibirately associate myself with other groups, well, at least concerning political, philosophical and religious (spiritual) things. Hobbies and interests however are a different thing.
anyways. a lot of things are just genetic!
"to the worm in horseradish, the world is horseradish."