Friday, June 13, 2008
Perception vs Facts
I wouldn't call it a popularity contest, that's too serious.
However, people's analysis of situations are often clouded by the pre-conceptions of the people involved in these situations, rather than what goes on in the actual situations.
To put it blantly, when a popular person (due to his/her jovial personality, charisma, coolness) does something that is obviously wrong, he/she gets away with it. Despite all these a-matter-of-factly faults, subconsiously, people would glance past the faults, and mentally mask them under the person's huge personality. From there, the person is still perceived as 'the nice guy'.
For this person, people's mental evaluation of him/her is always "
Although he/she is like that... , he/she
still did ________ too mah, so you can't blame him/her".
But does 'the nice guy' learn anything from it, when nobody points out what he/she did wrong due to the reasons stated above? Everyone loves him/her, and he/she is happy, and will never learn.
On the other hand, when a less lovable person (due to his/her seriousness, less humourous personality, weirder character) does something that is obviously beneficial to all, he/she does not get the credits he/she deserves. Despite all these a-matter-of-factly contributions, subconsiously, people would glance past the credit, and mentally mask them under the person's 'detestable' personality. From there, the person is still perceived as 'the bad guy'.
For this person, people's mental evaluation of him/her is always "Yah,
although he/she did _____ , _____ and _____, but he/she is
still ________, so he/she must improve on it. Haiz".
Does 'the bad guy' learn anything from it then? Nope too, as while people have mountains of criticisms bitched around or kept in their hearts, the failure of pointing it out to 'the bad guy' due to the pre-conception that 'he won't listen' or 'I just can't be bothered to talk to him'. Even when criticisms are thrown directly at him/her, the failure of appreciating what he/she has done credibly makes it hard for 'the bad guy' to swallow the true-yet-biased comments.
Even when 'the bad guy' asks for sincere comments, the pre-conception of 'I don't like him' comes in, so either not-totally-honest or patronising comments come out.
As you can see, I purposely did made the sentences similiar for both cases. This is just to illustrate how for 'popular' people, it's always his/her bad things at the 'although' part, and his/her good things in the 'still' part.
For 'unpopular' people, it's always his/her good things at the 'although' part, and his/her bad things in the 'still' part.
It's just mind games we are playing with ourselves. Change your mindset and exchange the 'although' and 'still' parts for a 'good person', suddenly the person becomes bad. And vice versa, the 'bad person' will suddenly become a 'good person' too.
It's just plain stupid.
Like so many people I heard "I support Obama!" and yet at the same time, they have heard
ABSOLUTELY NOTHING of his past offices, healthcare, foreign policy, economic, environmental proposals. Do they know who are they supporting? Nope! He looks damn cool, he's the fashion, he's the trend, he seems so popular, so I support lor.
Wow these are really fantastic, logical, and rational reasons.
Sheeps.
It just further illustrated my point. Who can be totally objective when judging on matters?
Who can really understand that they are naturally and subconsiously biased, and constantly seek to remove that bias when looking at things?
"We're humans what. It's just natural."
If you want to use 'nature' to mask your own shortcomings and remain that sheep in that pool of thousand sheeps, go ahead.
Only those who can go beyond their 'natural' instincts will improve themselves.
Look at facts. Not personalities. Please.
Correct means correct, wrong means wrong. Not A do is correct, B do is wrong.
I hope it's not a popularity contest, really.
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When I say I'm holding the fort, I mean it. At this stage, have we become complacent after that initial drive and passion? Can we
lead together and at least let me feel we are indeed?
It's not a problem of attitude, it's not a problem of non-understanding. It's about putting things at the forefront of your mind despite all these crazy shit (which everyone is going through) going on, and remind each other along the way, rather than all wait to be reminded by someone.
If we become complacent, not make things happen, and instead, wait for things to happen, we will be the same as Whitley Road.
Mas Selamat will escape and it will become irreversible.
Amongst
people, there are the actives and the passives.
But among
leaders, there should only be the actives and no passives.
Simple as that.
I beg of you. Come on. Make things happen. Initiative. Remind each other constantly and early. Don't leave things til the last minute. Give one another the feeling that despite the urgent matter at hand, we still didn't forget the less urgent yet more important task. Ask. Remind. Care and concern. Proactively update yourself. Not wait for others to update you. Keep showing it's indeed in your mind.
Really. Please. We saw what happened. We don't want it to happen again. It seems far. But if the foresight does not rest on us, noone will have it anymore. Come on, We can do it. And TOGETHER we will do it.
(PS It doesn't matter whom you think I'm trying to refer. I'm covering many, many people. The subject doesn't really matter. What's most important is that YOU (the reader) read about what was just said, and think about whether YOU are like this. And perhaps, the fact that if mentally you are trying to speculate about who is what, you're already acknowledging the presence of such perceptions in your mind, so there is already something to do about it: some tuning of our minds to the objective, instead of the instinctive)
lowtide blogged @
2:43 am
