Through my years in the public educational system, I learned a great many things. Most of them where social lessons. Things like never loan money to a person you've never seen before if you expect to get it back, and independent thought is all but absentee from 90% of the community, and of the remaining people whose brains aren't full of soda crackers, 95% are manipulative and will attempt to coax you into doing their bidding. The first one I really should have been able to figure out on my own, but the second one comes from years of "people watching". But I come to this because I would like to speak about personal psychological defenses.
I am different, and in a way that has lead to quite a bit of abuse, mistreatment, and hatred. No, I'm not black, or gay, or Jewish, or rich, or poor, or disfigured, or tainted with an incurable contagious disease. I'm a 20 year old straight white male from a middle class household with two loving parents. The different part comes from having an IQ in the high 130s and not allowing it to be suppressed by statements like "Quit using big words like 'sophisticated'!" (I actually got that once... I was very surprised... Obsfucate is a big word. Sophisticated is common venacular, despite it's size.) People like me have been classified as Gifted and Talented, or GT for short. This seemingly innocuous name actually is used to classify a group of people who, much like the gays, have been abused and discriminated against since the beginning of out academic lives.
And don't go telling me that GTs aren't discriminated against by their peers. As you read this, can you think of some nerd or geek you teased back in high school, or gave a wedgy to in middle school, or threw spit wads at in elementary school? Why did you do it? Because he was "easy" to pick on? Because he deserved it? As it turns out, most people, even people from other minority groups, spent a lot of their early years giving hell to the guys and girls who are now their bosses. The only difference between the hate that, say, the gays get and the hate the is issued to the GTs is that people grow out of heckling people of high intelligence, and grow into the mistreatment of people with more subtle differences.
But back to the point of personal defenses. Despite all of this, I, like my gay black Jewish compatriots, have managed to survive. But how is it that someone can find the strength to survive that kind of criticism? As it turns out, it happens in one of many ways. By far, the most common method is by support groups. The "Black Community" and the "Gay Community" where created almost completely out of the need for people of similar interests to band together. But with the GT's (Gifted and Talented), most of them don't have a community to join. Especially during elementary school, where things like sexual preference and color are hidden by the naivete of youth, GTs have trouble gathering. Youth removes many of the adult coping mechanisms and leaves the victims open for assault with no defenses other than parental counseling. The schools are almost powerless to prevent it (due to legal considerations) and the child's parents cannot be there to protect their child. So how do they solve their problems?
Personal integrity. Alone and defenseless, a child can do nothing but fortify his/her own will to resist the torrent of insults, and sometimes physical objects, that are hurled their way. Many of them do this by melding into the woodwork and hiding their talents, hoping that they might go unnoticed on the radar of their ruthless peers. But some, like myself, decide to say "Shove it!" and stand directly in the current. Most end up being swept away and revert to the wallflower method, and those that remain have hardened their defenses so much that they are almost unrecognizable from the youth that they where before going into school. That is where I stand. Because of my (reportably annoying) difference from everyone else, people tended to avoid me as a friend in middle school (In elementary school I had a couple of forced friends through the Cub Scouts, and that helped) and because of this, I grew naive in my understandings of society. People tended to exploit this and by pretending to be friendly to me, would try to convince me into things I didn't agree with. But time after time it turned out to be a ruse, and after each time I became less and less likely to follow a suggestion from a "friend". As the years passed on, I ended up being completely incapable of trusting anything anyone said without toughly investigating every tiny detail of their statement.
However, I'm not one of these sappy "I was psychotic, but now I'm cured" people. I still hold the same views; "Everything is false until proven true", "People, on average, would prefer to lie than to tell you what you should know", "Nothing is more prized than truth", "Good friends need only to speak their minds, soft coverings and gentle words only lead to misunderstandings and rumors later", "Secrets are only for those who have something to hide," are all points that I hold very sacred. And as an interesting side effect, this defect in my personality (Yes, despite the fact that it has been my most useful tool in surviving my youth and adolescence, I feel that this is not a desirable trait) has kept me out of trouble now for many years (Since high school). My distrust of everyone (including friends and family) has allowed me to stay on the straight and narrow, no matter what kinds of lives my most dear friends have gone on to lead. While most are drawn into drugs and alcohol when their friends get into it, I have, by shear force of will, managed to continue to live my life the way I choose to. However, this means that I end up straying from a lot of my friends. Do I consider this desirable? I'm not sure.
All in all though, I think that I am, and should be happy with this. The situational stability provided by knowing exactly why I do everything has it's kickbacks, and I'm pretty sure that those outweigh the loss of friends who have done something that I just could not follow them in doing... So we'll see.
Quiz Time!!!
The Dante's Inferno Test has banished you to the Sixth Level of Hell - The City of Dis!
Here is how you matched up against all the levels:
| Level | Score |
|---|---|
| Purgatory (Repenting Believers) | Very Low |
| Level 1 - Limbo (Virtuous Non-Believers) | High |
| Level 2 (Lustful) | Low |
| Level 3 (Gluttonous) | Very High |
| Level 4 (Prodigal and Avaricious) | Low |
| Level 5 (Wrathful and Gloomy) | High |
| Level 6 - The City of Dis (Heretics) | Very High |
| Level 7 (Violent) | Low |
| Level 8- the Malebolge (Fraudulent, Malicious, Panderers) | High |
| Level 9 - Cocytus (Treacherous) | Low |
Take the Dante's Inferno Hell Test
A glutteonous heretic. Eh... Based on the questions,my answers, and the response, it would seem likely the quiz was made by a catholic or from catholic viewpoints. Notice how there's no way to be spared a life in hell, just purgetory... (Not that I have any kind of issues with catholoicisim, it's just that they have a very distinctive "flavor" when speaking about religion and personal practices.)
Probably didn't help that I'm a bit of a philosopher and scientist... Tends to lead to "Anti-Catholic" viewpoints. Oh well.
You want terrorisim? I'll give you terrorisim! A budist walks out into the street and sets himself on fire. People say "What the heck are you doing?!" and he says "Burning until you guys get over your shit!" THAT'S terrorisim.
Mood: Eh.