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David McElroy

An Alien Sent to Observe the Human Race

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Hermit life looks good as world tries to make me a misanthrope

By David McElroy · July 10, 2013

Do you ever have days when you feel like ditching the “civilized world” and moving to a remote cabin without leaving a forwarding address? I’ve been feeling that urge lately — and it’s getting stronger.

The more I know and understand people, the more I dislike most of them. I wish I could like more of them. I really do. There are a few who I care about deeply, to differing degrees, but the vast majority of people seem determined to present themselves in a way intended to make me hate the entire human race.

I’ve become sick of the vicious and nasty hatred that I read and hear from people simply because others have the temerity to disagree with them. I see it more online today than in real life, but I suspect it’s just because people feel anonymous enough online (even on Facebook) to vent their real feelings instead of hiding them as they do when they’re face to face with people.

I’ve become heartsick about the almost complete inability of a large percentage of people to even attempt to understand each other. So many people lash out in anger if they even suspect that someone disagrees with them on political or cultural issues.

It’s getting to the point that I can’t read the comments on many articles. I have to read them here, and I’d say that we have a much better-behaved crowd than most places. (I appreciate that.) But reading comments on news articles and on Facebook is like stepping into a bath of mud and hate.

It’s not just about politics. People hate each other over which brand of phone or computer they prefer, for heaven’s sake. On tech sites, the nasty battles between fans of the iPhone and fans of Android are sickening. You can lose IQ points just reading their garbage. They’re like especially mean-spirited children who have joined clubs and want nothing in the world more than to hurt the people on the other side.

We like to think we’re civilized today. We look back in history and see inhumane things that people have done to one another, and we like to pat ourselves on the back about how much better we are. I think we’re fooling ourselves.

I think the civilization that we’re so proud of is just a thin veneer on some very ugly parts of ourselves that we prefer not to look at. Last year, I was listening to a podcast about history (which has become one of my favorites) and I was getting into a four-hour episode about the Dark Ages when it struck me that I didn’t see as much difference between the people of that day and the people of our day as I’d like to see.

I think we’re still a lot more similar to those “savages” who fought vicious wars with one another than we want to be. You can find examples of great heights of civilization back then. Despite the pattern of wars, the people of some places — such as Rome — lived in peace and civilized tranquility for much of their time. And then they threw it away to enter the Dark Ages.

I fear a new Dark Ages ahead for us. I sense that things are less stable here than we believe, and I can see us falling into chaos and despair — not just political anarchy, but real chaos and lawlessness. Maybe not next year or even the next decade. But sooner than later. I’d like to be wrong, but that’s what I sense. And it makes me want to hate a people who could be so stupid and selfish and blind as to thrown everything away just so they can experience the rage and hatred that are so obvious in their hearts.

Some would say that humans are simply crazy if they do this. I’m sure there could be all sorts of interesting and complex sociological theories about why it happens — assuming I’m right. But I have a simpler answer.

We all have lurking in us the core of the same people who existed thousands of years ago. If you want a simple materialist explanation, you’d simply call it genetics or you’d point to the reptilian brain that’s said to be at the core of what we use today. But I’d say it has more to do with what we Christians call original sin. Every one of us has that hate and meanness — sin — at the core. Some of us are a bit better than others, but none of us can overcome it on our own. For some of us, the Good News is that there’s a God who wants to help us overcome it.

Whichever explanation you accept, the reality is that humans aren’t much different today than they were thousands of years ago. We’re hateful, mean, vicious and nasty. Yes, we have good qualities, too, but those evil things can sometimes override everything else.

I’ve been seeing those things more in people lately. They seem calculated to make me into a misanthrope. And they make me want to escape — away from the hatred and heartache of what I see.

I won’t actually do that — not entirely, anyway — because I believe I have a responsibility to find a way to make the world a better place. I might not like most people, but I’m trying desperately to love them anyway. It’s not easy.

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Briefly

It was five years ago tonight when Lucy first rode in the car with me. She was on her way to her “forever home” with me that night, but she didn’t know it, so she was terrified. It was a much happier and braver girl who took a ride in the car tonight so we could go through a drive-through window and order a hamburger for her — to celebrate five years with me. She had a great time. If she could remember five years ago tonight, she would be proud of how far she’s come, too. If you’d like to know more about Lucy’s journey from scared dog to brave queen of the household, here’s something I wrote after her first year with me. I’m hoping this girl will have many more happy years with me.

I’ve never been attracted to skinny women. There’s nothing wrong with someone who’s naturally thin, but it’s never been my preference. What has shocked me, though, is the judgment I’ve heard from women all through my life — about themselves and others — about who’s “fat.” I concluded long ago that most women in our culture have been brainwashed to believe that skinny is attractive — and that anything other than skinny is ugly. I first assumed that I was the oddball — for preferring women with bigger and heavier bodies — but I’m coming to the conclusion that most men naturally feel this way to one extent or another. I just ran across new research by a couple of Northwestern University psychology professors that shows that women seriously overestimate how much a straight man will be attracted to a skinny woman. In a perfect world, we would all be at a healthy weight, but when it comes to attractiveness, too heavy is more attractive than skinny. At least to me — and to a lot of men, too.

Years ago, I heard a question that seemed very insightful at the time. You’ve probably heard it, too. What would you do if you knew you couldn’t fail? The question is intended to help you uncover things you really want to do, but which you’re afraid to try — for fear of failure. In an interview today, I heard the great marketing guru Seth Godin give a different point of view. He said the better question is to ask what you would do even if you knew it would fail. That struck me as far more insightful than the original version. We ought to be doing what we know is right, not what will maximize our success or praise from others. There are some battles that are worth fighting even if you believe you’re doomed to failure. Those battles are often for love or important ideas or our children. Some things are simply worth fighting for — and the truth is that you might win anyway. Do the right thing. Take the chance.

The more I understand about myself, about human nature and about the nature of reality, the more I realize I’m a radical by the standards of both Modernism and Postmodernism. Seeing the things which I’m stumbling toward makes me an enemy of many of the core ideas upon which contemporary culture is built. It exposes the culture as a monstrous lie — like a dangerous infection that’s slowly destroying what human were created to be. My “inner observer” has always known that truth was found in the ideas of the Enlightenment, but I’m slowly finding words to explain what has merely been instinct until now. The Enlightenment was humanity’s great leap forward, but shallow and arrogant thinkers for the next two centuries threw away the fruits of that achievement. We can’t go forward as a species until we go back to correct this intellectual and spiritual error — and part of that is acknowledging that our collective attempts to do away with our Creator will always fail.

I’ve come to believe that some of us — including me — aren’t very good at knowing how to be happy. I don’t mean that in the sense that happy talk and positive thinking should be able to make us happy regardless of the circumstances. I mean that some of us had so much experience with being unhappy when we were young that we were trained to be unhappy — and that being happy is an unconsciously uncomfortable thing. When I look at times in my past when I should have been happy, it rarely lasted. I believe now that I found reasons to be unhappy — and caused real problems for myself — because being comfortable and happy felt so foreign to my programming. If I’m right, this means that some of us have to do more than just change our circumstances. It means we have to learn how to accept the happiness that we unconsciously fear we don’t deserve.

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