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David McElroy

making sense of a dysfunctional culture

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How can I share what’s obvious when nobody will listen or see?

By David McElroy · January 23, 2021

What if you knew a secret that the rest of the world needed to know? What if you could change lives with this knowledge? Would you share it with others?

Of course you would. If you saw a tornado coming, any normal person would warn others. If you knew of any danger which others couldn’t yet see, you would almost certainly do everything in your power to raise an alarm. You would tell others what was coming — and you’d warn them to escape the danger.

But what if others didn’t want to hear your warning? What if you knew that others wouldn’t listen? What if you realized they wouldn’t take you seriously — that they might even call you crazy?

If you had that knowledge in your mind — but you found that people around you wouldn’t listen — would you doubt yourself? Would you wonder whether you’re crazy? Would you throw your hands up in frustration and maintain a sullen silence — even though the coming storm seemed painfully obvious to you?

I believe in things I can’t see. You do, too. We might believe in different unseen things. We might have different reasons for coming to our beliefs, but at the very root of what we believe, we have some assumptions we make — because somebody has told us that something is true — and we build on those assumptions.

Your beliefs about unseen things might be based on what you have been taught to call science. You’ve been taught to believe in germs and atoms and electromagnetic forces. All modern people believe in those things.

We’ve been told that these things — and a million other things — explain our universe. We were taught that educated and intelligent people trust scientists and engineers and all sorts of other people who come up with theories and test those theories and then build technologies that change our lives.

But all of that is based on our belief in the accuracy of what we’ve been taught. Those things become such basic assumptions for us that we don’t even question whether they’re true.

Other people also believe in additional unseen things which they can’t prove. Some of us believe in God, even though we can’t prove there is any person or being or whatever you want to call it which we think of as God. For some of us, the existence of God feels just as obvious as the existence of wind or rain or dirt under our feet.

There are some things that we simply know in our bones to be true, even if we can’t prove it to anybody else.

My set of beliefs are probably different than yours are. Even if we both call ourselves Christians, for instance, your precise understanding of the nature of God and the nature of what we can know for sure might be slightly different.

And other people are absolutely certain of things that contradict my spiritual beliefs. Some people hold religious beliefs which conflict with my own. Others believe all sorts of things about the nature of reality which are completely different from my own.

Some people believe the world is flat. Some believe there are lizard-like aliens living among us. Others fervently believe in Bigfoot or one of a dozen other types of strange creatures. Some believe there are bizarre conspiracies that secretly rule our lives.

I question the intelligence and rationality of people who believe those sorts of things, but I’m well aware that there are plenty of people who question my intelligence and rationality for believing in God or for believing there’s anything beyond the material world.

Not all of what we believe is true. Some of what I believe is wrong. I simply don’t know which things I’m wrong about. Not yet. I might never understand the limits of my knowledge. But if I believe I know things which others need to hear, do I have a responsibility to share that? Even if they don’t want to hear?

I’m certainly no prophet. I don’t have a pipeline to God. I don’t have special knowledge about the truth of the Universe which isn’t also available to others.

No particular person owns truth, but there are many cases in which one person — and then another and another — discovers some particular truth before others. In human history, many of those people have been ridiculed or exiled or even killed for what they have discovered. (And some of those people have been wrong about what they believed, of course.)

I believe that I see some truths that our world needs to learn. I see them more clearly at some times than others. I sometimes allow myself to focus too much on the dysfunctional culture around me — and that often makes me lose sight of some truths I’ve discovered. The closer I allow myself to become to this culture, the more dimly I understand these things.

I haven’t yet figured out how to explain the truths which seem so urgent to me. When I try to explain, I struggle to find the words and images. I see others lose interest. I see my attempts to communicate these truths fail miserably. I end up wondering whether I should just remain silent — instead of struggling to find a way to finally explain what I know and make it clear to others who could benefit.

Ultimately, you will either connect with me or the truth I want to convey — or you won’t. And the truth is that most people won’t connect with what I’m trying to somehow get across. Most people won’t understand what I’m struggling to explain or why it matters. Most people’s eyes will continue to glaze over and think nothing of it.

But somewhere, there are people who understand — at least vaguely — the things which I’m trying to understand well enough to explain. There are a few who intuitively feel the truth of what I’m trying to share — who might even be excited and energized.

Somewhere, there is at least one person who can connect with my understanding of reality and say, “What a relief! I believe this, too! I thought I was the only one who understood it! We need to talk!”

I’ve talked before about how difficult it is to find a partner who shares enough of my peculiar view of the world to match with me — and this is another part of that difficulty. I need a partner who sees enough of the truth in what I have to share that it awakens something in her — enough to make her want to share my strange and difficult journey.

Most people aren’t going to understand. You almost certainly won’t understand. And that’s OK. I just need the right someone to somehow understand enough of the same things that I do — enough to say, “I believe in you — and maybe we could be part of this together.”

I’m struggling with the frustrations of seeing the world in a way that few others do. But I can’t shake my belief that I need to share things which others don’t want to hear.

I see dangers ahead for us all. My vision is dim and cloudy. But I see something that I know is real. I see something better than what’s offered by this dysfunctional culture. I go back and forth between wanting to shout it from the rooftops and wanting to remain silent and avoid the struggle.

I’ve finally accepted that I have to build my life with someone who understands this struggle and is willing to share it. And that knowledge makes me feel more alone than ever, because I know that all I have to say about what I see — in direct words or through art — will remain meaningless gibberish to almost everyone.

Note: I realize this is a serious departure from the things I typically write. I usually try to share things that can be useful or meaningful to others, but this was simply something I needed to say for myself. This one is more like publishing something from a personal journal. I hope you can forgive me for indulging my need to share this with the world, despite knowing it’s not for most people.

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It was too cloudy last night for me to take a phot It was too cloudy last night for me to take a photo of the lunar eclipse, so I missed the beautiful red image that I saw from others. But the sky overhead tonight is crystal clear — and the moon seemed especially bright — so I snapped a shot anyway. I don’t really have the right lens for this since I have to blow it up massively when I shoot at 240mm. Surprisingly, this image was made at 1/250th of a second at f/6.3 and ISO 250. I’d like to have a longer lens for such a shot, but it’s not worth the money since I’d rather use it. #nature #naturephotography #sky #moon
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The Saturday evening sunset punches through the he The Saturday evening sunset punches through the heavy clouds sitting just over the horizon, just enough to create a spectacular orange show as the world spins toward another night of darkness. #nature #naturephotography #sky #colorful #clouds #sunset #birmingham #alabama
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I just caught the very end of sunset, but I loved I just caught the very end of sunset, but I loved how the fading colors looked behind the evening clouds. #nature #naturephotography #sky #colorful #clouds #sunset #birmingham #alabama
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For “throwback Thursday, let me introduce you to For “throwback Thursday, let me introduce you to Sam. In 2009, I took in a young feral cat who I named for the early American revolutionary Samuel Adams. He was one of the most confident — downright arrogant, in fact — cats I’ve ever been around. He had an amazing personality and I immediately loved him. He was no more than 8 or 9 months old when he suddenly died for reasons that my vet couldn’t explain. Even though I had him only a short time, he was one of my all-time favorites. #tbt #cats #tabby #feral #birmingham #alabama
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On a live awards show Sunday night, one man made a joke about a female celebrity. The husband of the celebrity was offended and hit the man who made the joke. Or maybe it was staged for entertainment. Who knows? Who cares? Social media is full of discussion — and even arguments — about this idiocy today. This baffles me. Let’s assume for a moment that the event happened as reported. People have been having such idiotic fights ever since there have been humans. Half the bars in the world see such brief dustups regularly. It simply doesn’t matter. The fact that so many people believe they need to talk about this — or even need to have opinions about it — is more evidence of the bizarre media brainwashing that convinces many to care passionately about brain-dead trivia. Your life will be happier and saner if you focus on yourself, your family and your friends, not on whatever scripted (or spontaneous) bilge that the media wants to pipe into your home.

I’m in the middle of migrating this website to new servers this week. This means you might encounter some unexpected behavior until I get all the bugs worked out. Clicking on my links (including this one) might cause your browser to give you the message that it’s a site without a current security certificate. It’s not actually unsafe, but there’s something which isn’t yet set up for the security certificate. I apologize for any such errors you might encounter while the process is going on. If you notice any problems with content which didn’t migrate properly, I would appreciate you letting me know the details at davidmcelroy@mac.com. Thanks for your patience.

I often wonder what animals think when they look at us and consider the society we’ve created. Yes, I know this is fanciful and unrealistic, but what if they could? Would they be astounded at how we treat each other? Would they be disgusted by the ugliness and pettiness which fill so many of our daily interactions? The truth is that I’m feeling pretty disgusted with humanity tonight. I made the mistake of reading some online interactions that I should have avoided — and it sickened me. The people involved appeared to be vile and stupid and arrogant. I wish I could pretend they’re a tiny minority, but I know better. It’s times such as this when I most need to escape much of “civilization” and disconnect from their world. If humans are going to be worthy of “ruling this planet,” we have a lot of growth to do. And I fear that growth is nowhere in sight. So my buddy Thomas, above, and all of his friends would be right to judge us harshly — and to think, “Why do you folks get to be in charge?”

I should have expected this, but I honestly didn’t. The article I wrote last week about disagreements over treatment for autistic children brought me angry emails. You could almost call it “hate mail.” Of the five emails about it so far, two have been to tell me that I’m wrong to even listen to critics of the most popular therapy for autistic children — and the other three tell me I’m wrong for not condemning the treatment as the “obvious” abuse it is. If you read the article, you know I didn’t take a position on the issue, because I simply don’t know enough to have an opinion. But by talking about the issue, I stepped into a heated controversy. The emails from the two sides convinced me of nothing. But they did give me even more empathy for the unfortunate parents who have to figure out for themselves where the truth lies for their children.

Have you ever had what you thought was a new idea — and then discovered that “old you” had the same idea years ago? I had that experience tonight. And it’s been wonderful. I came up with an idea tonight for a very short satirical film that would be a promotion for a fictitious college. The point is to make the college promote — as good things — everything which is actually terrible about most modern colleges. Then I remembered a fake college that I invented back when I was in college. I had created student recruitment brochures and various newsletters back then, so I decided to call my “new” college by the same name I’d invented years ago: Ochita College. As I searched my computer for any old material I might still have about Ochita from the past, I discovered an email I sent to someone in 2009 — outlining essentially the same idea which I came up with tonight. Since I didn’t remember writing that, it felt like magic. So my next film project just might be this one instead. If all goes well, you might soon see “Ochita College: Your Future Starts Here.” This should be fun.

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