Renunciation

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Who are you, anyway?

We think of our "selves" as fully-formed, fully-realized psychic wholes - changed, to be sure, by the things we experience, but still fundamentally ourselves.

Not true.

It's common for us to feel that our experiences shape who we become. We are far less likely to credit the people around us for that same level of influence.

Perhaps we're a bit too uncomfortable with the randomness of those connections; after all, you at least played a role in fashioning your experiences. You didn't have much of a say in picking your family.

The context we're born into - our parents and the way they raised us, our culture and the way it encourages pr prohibits certain behaviors, the expectations of our communities as to how we will dress and act and talk and pursue a living - has just as much, if not  far greater, of an influence on who we become.

Our experiences help us formulate answers to life's questions.

Our cultural context determines which questions we have the chance to answer in the first place.

This isn't to remove human agency from the equation - I think we have a great deal of control over who and what we become.

But it is exceedingly difficult to truly liberate ourselves from the influence of others.

Public opinion, the wishes of our parents, the tastes of our friends, the needs of our lovers...

All are ways in which our context subtly and not-so-subtly shapes our lives.

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"So be it," I hear you say. "Humans are social creatures - we weren't meant to live alone, completely free of influence. That kind of freedom would be existentially disastrous, an unmooring. Having to make every choice completely free from context would be intensely anxiety-inducing. The pressure to be pro-social and to conform to the norms of the community is largely a positive one."

Great point.

Now add Facebook to the mix.

Then YouTube.

Instagram.

Twitter.

PornHub.

4Chan.

Beheading videos. A viral challenge to eat Tide pods. Memes. The memification of memes. Then the memification of politics. Then the memification of depression. Then love. Then the Red Pill, followed by the Black Pill. Free-to-play video games with in-game-purchases on the blockchain. A live-stream of a school shooting.

Then a direct message from someone with no sense of self and an inability to believe that other people truly exist.

Put it all on a screen that fits in the palm of your hand and hand that screen to a child.

You thought that existential freedom was unmooring?

You thought that choice was anxiety-inducing?

Who told you to think that way?

Did you think you came up with that idea by yourself?

Too much choice was never the problem.

Know why?

Because:

You can't choose at all.

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The Other - the great, writhing mass of community opinion and perception - influences in two ways:

1.) By limiting what we think is possible, and

2.) By teaching us how to want.

If I control what you want -

and I control what you think is possible -

I control you.

Your personality, your likes and dislikes, your identity, your choice of allies and enemies, your political affiliations, your attractions, whom you love -

All of it flows from desire and possibility.

Certain options are open to you.

Certain options are not.

Certain options are desirable to you.

Certain options are not.

If you choose to align yourself with me, I control you.

If you choose to oppose me, I control you.

In all scenarios, I control you.

There is no other outcome.

There is no you.

Not anymore.

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"Some people get too wrapped up in it, but I see it for what it is."

Sure you do. What do you think everyone else thinks?

"I put my phone away around bedtime. It helps me sleep."

You think that's an achievement?

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I told you last week:

We are trying to lay out a framework for escaping our own narcissism.

Here's step one:

Get the fuck off social media. Now.

You cannot mediate it.

You cannot resist it.

You have to get out.

But you won't.

You will read this,

nod,

resolve to do better,

and you will do nothing.

Why?

Because:

Certain options are open to you.

Certain options are not.

Certain options are desirable to you.

Certain options are not.

If you choose to align yourself with me, I control you.

If you choose to oppose me, I control you.

In all scenarios, I control you.

There is no other outcome.