We all seem to survive quite efficiently in this septic society.
We all have some sort of education, a home, food on the table, piles and piles of ridiculous toys and electronic devices to keep us happy and less talkative. Sometimes we walk to the park and play soccer, but most of the time we're trying to decide which shirt makes Liza look more or less like a thirteen year old porn star.
Yes, we seem to be doing quite well, don't you think? We smother ourselves to be well liked, we force ourselves into this mold so that our parents will approve. People talk just to hear themselves talk, they don't care if others will be offended, if others will be hurt.
They tell us it's okay to be different, but, no, it isn't, because once you are different, they'll just keep trying to change you back again.
You won't believe what I was like when I was younger. I know I've shared too many stories, but when I was younger, all I wanted to do was fit in. And I did. I was your normal Abercrombie-loving, shallow fourteen year old. I don't know if I was happy, I can't really remember. But I do remember when I really started to come into my own, start being myself and feeling alive for the first time, no one wanted anything to do with me.
I'm okay with that, I think. I don't really care what society thinks, or how they will label me. I don't care what they think I should do, because I know myself better than anyone. Anyone.
And even as slowly I try to keep myself from the grinder of conformity and shallowness, even as I see other kids doing the same, our world is still steadily going downhill. You can tell me it's not, but really. Look what society has labeled accepted or expected, it's ridiculous.
Even if they didn't have computers or cell phones or expensive apartments and high-end fashion, I think people hundreds or years ago had their heads on straighter. They weren't confused by high-paid government officials always double-crossing themselves and trying to make things better. They didn't have as many material things to gum up what truly living is.
I know I've already used this quote in a separate article of mine many months ago, but it's so appropriate, and I'm sure none of you understood it anyways, because you didn't really care. But it's one of my favorites, because it just speaks everything wrong that's happening with our world.
"Hate humanity? Yep, sure do. There's such a lack of responsibility for one's actions in the world, a selfishness, and a great destruction in the way people live their lives. It's all instant gratification and who cares how my instant gratification affects those around me, or on a small personal level or a global level. The way people treat each other is truly disgusting and we've created an environment through advances in science and technology that allows for a very septic society to thrive. And we breed and breed and all the wrong people breed while all the right people don't want to have children because they don't want to place them in this world."
- Davey Havok
It's from him that I got the phrase 'septic society' that I seem to use so much. And as I walk down the street and see all the buildings racing to be the first to touch the clouds, the sleek cars and girls chatting on their cell phones, I wonder what time exactly the small things became unimportant. The small things that used to be so huge, like a family. God, one of my friend's father hasn't been home for a solid ten day period in four months. Another hasn't ever met her father. And it goes on and on. Then there are the small things that have become so overlooked, like the way the sun looks just before it sets completely, that beautiful color. The feeling of wind in your hair, how it feels to truly laugh and be happy, nobody cares anymore. Nobody cares about that one line of a song that turns my heart around every single time I listen to it. Personally, I used to think, my naive fourteen year old self, that everyone worried to much and didn't have enough fun. Now, I think it's the exact opposite. Everybody chases after fun and joy and being cool, so much that nothing gets done, that the serious things are taken lightly, way, way to lightly. When we learn that someone's sister dies, we feel sorry for a moment, then completely forget all about it. It's sad, and I know I can't change it. I don't know if anybody can change it now, have we gone to far? Has our society slipped that much, that we can't redeem ourselves again?
I'm sorry for anybody who started reading this and expected to find a full train of thought all the way through, one big point that would blow your brain out, because you aren't going to get one. I can never seem to do that, can I? Oh well, maybe I'll learn sometime.
I said in last week's column that there aren't enough beautiful things in the world, but I was wrong. Completely wrong. There are so many incredibly beautiful things on our planet, in each one of us, we just don't take the time to notice them. Maybe it's part society to blame, but mostly its just us. It's us, moving around so fast in this world, trying to do something important, make it all worthwhile, but it doesn't work, does it?
We aren't so efficient now, are we? We live in a world of dark desire, suicide, things so haunting, we hardly realize it. Maybe it's that part of us that tries to protect ourselves from all of the bad things we don't want to see, that we don't want to deal with. But we can't turn a blind eye anymore. That's what started this whole decline in the first place.
And even through the thick crowd of society-trained zombies, there are the few, the creative, the bold and strong that stick out. These are the people who will lead our generation, who will try to reverse the damage that has been done.
Are you one of them?
I know how hard it is, though. To be the nail that sticks out of the smooth white painted wood, always being hammered down. I know what it is like to feel like your life is being played along to that slow, melancholy piano music, and only you think its beautiful. Believe me, I know what alone is. I know what sadness and pain is. I do. But without you, all of us, who refuse to fit in with the rest of our nation, think what would happen. Individuality would erase itself.
Cheers to all of those who continue to thrive in our world, to all of those who can find beauty in this 'septic society', I applaud you. It's getting harder and harder every day, isn't it?
Glitsygrl
