We Really ARE Wired Differently. Now What? How Do We Proceed?

It's nobody's fault. Really.

But it's there. Granted, it's science, with which not all would agree or to which not all would submit (part of the point to be made below). But it's provable, within the boundaries of human reason.

We're wired differently. Yeah, we are. We react to different stimuli in the universe in different ways. It's in-bred, which is to say: It isn't anyone's fault. Nobody did this to you. It's just the way your particular brain is figuring things out.

And it doesn't matter where we're from, either. If I were writing this in Bejing or Paris or Johannesburg, it would be the same.

The March, 2019 issue of The Atlantic discusses this point in an article entitled "The Yuck Factor." Summarized thus: What attracts me may disgust you, and vice versa. And there are not many things available to which attraction and disgust can be universally attached.

I say, yuck. You say, cool. I say, What? How could you? You say, Sure. Why not?

The phenomena of the universe, therefore, are inherently divisive. Whatever you like, someone else undoubtedly doesn't like it. We disagree on nearly everything. "About one-fifth of the people are against everything all of the time," said Robert Kennedy in 1964.

And the connection of one yuck to another is inevitable. "...researchers found that resistance to immigration is greatest in states with the highest incidence of infectious disease and where worry about this, as reflected by internet activity, has also been high," said the article.

Which may, or may not, have something to do with resistance to vaccination for measles, called "communist" by one legislator in Arizona, as reversed from logic as that may be. (Think and do, or don't do, what you'd like, ma'am. I've been in for a shot. I'm good to go. Got a pneumonia shot, too, though I must say my thoughts on Marx haven't changed much.)

But there is also a political dimension to this that's been discovered by scientists. They tested people during the 2008 campaign for fear of germ spreading. Those with a higher fear said they were more likely to vote for John McCain instead of Barack Obama. Across the board, they found, the higher the level of disgust, the more conservative people were, the more inclined to submit to authority, the more that religiosity governs their judgments.

Thus 45's efforts to warn people against the "invasion" of immigrants along our southern border, and his description of them as murderers, rapists and drug dealers: To raise the 'yuck' factor and remove any thoughts of accepting them as normal. If Robert Kennedy was right, he's already starting with about 20 percent of us. Raising it beyond that isn't too difficult as long as one has the bully pulpit and high persuadability--which, undeniably, he has.

So the outrage which is supposed to take place about children of unprocessed immigrants being penned up so severely that they can't even hug each other isn't universal. It perpetuates the idea that there's something wrong with these people.

Well, sure there is. They're running for their lives. They've been intimidated by gangs and drug cartels that they have, and want to have, nothing to do with.

Gin-up the populist masses, though, and they'll both condemn and ignore these folks. That's their problem. They probably haven't showered in a while, either, after a long walk in hot weather.

Yuck. Build the wall.

The farther away the sentiment, the longer it lasts. Up here, in the upper Midwest, it resonates very, very well. Never mind that eventually, these refugees will get here; they will want and need jobs; their children will fill our schools; and they will intermarry white folks. And they will keep coming, regardless of whatever's thrown in their way.

Does it do much good to recall fairly recent history, where Europeans fled from communists by burrowing under and flying over walls, and cutting the barbed wire fencing of captivity? Please tell me the vast difference. I can't stretch myself to see it.

Maybe it's me. Maybe I just don't get it. Maybe I've lost the true meaning of what it is to be American.

Either other folks believe they have it, or they just don't care. Start a conversation with them, and they end it altogether: I don't want to talk about it anymore. They cling to Fox News, they have enough (non- or anti-) information, so the situation is clearly defined for them (another inclination of non-tolerance is excessive simplification and sharp definition). You just can't get anywhere deeper with them, and there is nothing close to compromise. Done.

How should we proceed with them? Keep calling them friends when it's clear that their thinking is or has become so stolidly unimaginative? When it's so uncomfortable to hang out with them any longer because though you want to remain friendly, you can't help but push back in strong terms?

Worse, when everyone knows the elephants in the room can't be addressed, is that any way to advance meaningful relationships? Do I need to spend more than five minutes with those who take attitudes with which I disagree strongly, exchanging greetings and brief catch-ups about previous matters?

And if the answer to that question is no, is there something wrong with me? I know that I'm not the only one with this challenge.

But if I would be in a room with someone from the Conservative Political Action Caucus, who wasted their time listening to 45 prattle on with his jumbled, twisted, exaggerated, disingenuous nonsense for two hours the other day, and they start going off likewise, I'd feel that I'd have two choices: Tell them off civilly but in no uncertain terms, and/or leave the room.

Neither of which will endear myself to them, or many others.

I'll step up to confront, but I don't invite or cherish the opportunity. I'd just as soon walk away. That's the way to remain nice, but it doesn't give anyone else the chance to exchange views. I'm trying to remain polite and sometimes the only way is not to go there. And now that I know that in essence they can't help themselves, the temptation is to simply but rather condescendingly write them off as underinformed or narrow or unthinking--unattractive in any event.

Which doesn't make for a better, overall America, because there is no exchange and no trade in ideas, which is the very basis of democracy. Not only that, but if someone else is particularly strident and no one responds, it only encourages them. I know this. And yet.

If I avoid it, too, I'm avoiding something which has been much of my lifeblood for, well, years now, even decades. Trying to step around it, pretending that politics and social dynamics don't exist or aren't important, feels phony and stilted.

To which I say: Yuck.

You first.

Be well. I'll see you down the road.


Mister Mark