Accepting Or Rejecting People
This sensible problem has raised many questions and offered different interpretations. Learn more by reading this article.
Nowadays there is, at least on the surface, a well intentioned desire to embrace all people no matter what gender, religion, ethnicity or background they have. It is a modern interpretation of the Good Samaritan. This desire also has its origin in the process of globalization that is currently taking place. Politicians, again on the surface, talk about the need to look beyond differences, to embrace the stranger in your country. In fact, they insist upon this matter. They do not want any social disturbances; especially the ones caused by racism and exaggerated nationalism. Indeed, this problem is very old. You can see it even in the language: in Europe we have no-non, ne, nein, nem, nej, nee, nu, no - and yes - qui, ja, da, aha, ano, igen, si. We can see that it appears to be easier to say "no" than "yes". It looks like when these languages were formed it was more important to have an easy way to refuse a person who speaks a different language. But what if it has deeper roots? What if it is not limited to people who are different from yourself, but to people in general?
Thanks to the information given by the mass media we know that there are a growing number of cases in which people are attacked on the streets and no one intervenes. This has nothing to do with the color of the skin or the nationality of a person. But it is not necessary to go to extremes. Just think about how many people you accept in your life and how many you deny.
Konrad Lorenz, winner of the Nobel Prize in 1973, stated that overpopulation represents a very big risk to the normal interactions between people. The argument can be basically reduced to this: put two people in one room and they will get along; but put 8 people in the same room and they will be at each other's throat. Too many individuals in a small environment increases aggressiveness. Modern cities are very crowded. On a daily basis an individual comes into contact with tenths of others and in consequence his capacity to establish social contacts gets over solicited to the point that he is forced to put some kind of barrier between him and the others. The modern man does not want to get too emotionally involved. His indifference is due to the fact that he is obligated to always adopt an attitude of non-involvement. He will therefore concentrate on a small number of people. Lorenz does not believe that an individual will someday be able to properly deal with overpopulation.
Can a human being really be able to accept all his fellow-creatures? Romanian philosopher Emil Cioran stated that a being capable of loving and understanding all humans would have to be a "monster of love". No mortal individual is capable of such an achievement. The reason is simply that man is not built that way. Man is sometimes a being of distances, meaning that he sometimes wants to distance himself from the external world. He wants to understand himself. But how tragic is it when he is unable to close the door, when he cannot find a solitary place to stand with his head in his hands. A lot of times people who spent a long period in isolation or in remote arias are thirsty for interactions with other individuals. How loving is a person when his capacity to establish social contacts is not permanently over solicited!
In conclusion, what can be said? What comes more naturally to a man: accepting or rejecting others? It is a bit of both. We cannot solve this dilemma unilaterally in favor of one or the other. Emil Cioran may have got it right, man is not a monster of love, but he is a monster of some sort. He is capable of the highest things and the lowest of actions. He sometimes tries in defiance to ignore the rest of the world, all the people and put himself in the center of the universe, and other times he is willing to concentrate on the other person, on the fellow next to him under the divine imperative "love your neighbor as yourself".
Thanks to the information given by the mass media we know that there are a growing number of cases in which people are attacked on the streets and no one intervenes. This has nothing to do with the color of the skin or the nationality of a person. But it is not necessary to go to extremes. Just think about how many people you accept in your life and how many you deny.
Konrad Lorenz, winner of the Nobel Prize in 1973, stated that overpopulation represents a very big risk to the normal interactions between people. The argument can be basically reduced to this: put two people in one room and they will get along; but put 8 people in the same room and they will be at each other's throat. Too many individuals in a small environment increases aggressiveness. Modern cities are very crowded. On a daily basis an individual comes into contact with tenths of others and in consequence his capacity to establish social contacts gets over solicited to the point that he is forced to put some kind of barrier between him and the others. The modern man does not want to get too emotionally involved. His indifference is due to the fact that he is obligated to always adopt an attitude of non-involvement. He will therefore concentrate on a small number of people. Lorenz does not believe that an individual will someday be able to properly deal with overpopulation.
Can a human being really be able to accept all his fellow-creatures? Romanian philosopher Emil Cioran stated that a being capable of loving and understanding all humans would have to be a "monster of love". No mortal individual is capable of such an achievement. The reason is simply that man is not built that way. Man is sometimes a being of distances, meaning that he sometimes wants to distance himself from the external world. He wants to understand himself. But how tragic is it when he is unable to close the door, when he cannot find a solitary place to stand with his head in his hands. A lot of times people who spent a long period in isolation or in remote arias are thirsty for interactions with other individuals. How loving is a person when his capacity to establish social contacts is not permanently over solicited!
In conclusion, what can be said? What comes more naturally to a man: accepting or rejecting others? It is a bit of both. We cannot solve this dilemma unilaterally in favor of one or the other. Emil Cioran may have got it right, man is not a monster of love, but he is a monster of some sort. He is capable of the highest things and the lowest of actions. He sometimes tries in defiance to ignore the rest of the world, all the people and put himself in the center of the universe, and other times he is willing to concentrate on the other person, on the fellow next to him under the divine imperative "love your neighbor as yourself".
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