I have asked many people, do they think something is wrong with present day society? If so, how could it be fixed? I’ve wondered why I feel the need to ask others on their outlook of the world? I guess it is our way as a species to cope with our innate sense of loneliness. We try to justify our ways of interaction with each other by analyzing the animal kingdom and seeing what they do in the same situations. Similarly, how we search through other people's philosophies to try and find help with developing our own. Comparatively we rummage through the cosmos like a lost child seeking a familiar and supportive face.

While I bumble through life attempting to achieve a proper way of living, I have noticed a trend occurring throughout my questioning. When I ask my peers the same question I presented earlier, they almost unanimously say that yes, there is something wrong today in our society. Those who are middle aged generally answer by stating how obsessed the youth are with their smart phones and the kind of music they listen to, in which they describe as degenerate and meaningless. However, I receive a similar answer when I question teenagers and millennials. They also say that many people, not only those within their generation, suffer from an addiction to the things that entertain us. They describe a state in which we do not care about issues that affect us politically or even in people's daily lives. Then I ask them, why are we facing these problems? I often hear  ¨People today are ignorant and drawn to things that entertain us, rather than problems that we are affected by.¨ Granted their responses are filled with a lot more politics and are very bloated, but they end up with an argument resulting in that meaning. This answer makes me wonder, are the people giving me these answers, included in the population that is ¨ignorant¨ or ¨easily entertained¨?

The reason my puzzled brain stumbled onto this thought, is because after I have this conversation with these people, they are often the ones asking me if I saw the game last night or what I thought about the season finale of their favorite reality TV show. So their meaningful and extensive answers were immediately followed by questions that exactly portray their examples of the problems in our society. This paradox is dumbfounding.  I would assume that since they just comprehensively described what is wrong, that they would not contribute to the cancer that they said was plaguing the population. I ponder on this hypocrisy and think why? Why do people describe in great detail how absurd and brainless our civilization has degenerated into, yet they revert back the ignorant and distracted state they so passionately exposed? I observe how they intricately pick apart the strategies of sports teams, video game tactics, or the relationships between their favorite fictional characters. They also put in thousands of dollars to support these personas along with countless hours wasted on worshiping these false idols. It looks like a heroin addict, throwing their hard earned money at a dealer. Begging for another high to escape their reality into a false sense of happiness. Only to collapse right back into reality, where their problems await them like vultures hovering over a starving survivor on their last legs. These people have shown their intellect in dissecting these engineered realities, but are hopelessly drawn in as a star is drawn in by the overwhelming force of a black hole, into a fantasy world. What would happen if they used that knowledge to advance the human race like Einstein, Sacajawea, or Thomas Jefferson? These people accomplished things that propelled us even further into greatness, creating wonderful opportunities for people. Yet, we now worship celebrities who are renowned for their wealth or beauty, while achieving nothing more than their own television show or clothing line. But this admiration is expected when it is the social norm to fanatically support a culture based upon wealth, beauty, and social class.

We as humans are designed as pack animals that work best when in masses, therefore, we love and live to obtain and maintain an elevated social status. This social status is maintained by our relevancy and knowledge of current trends.  We, as all animals do, also strive to achieve the best mates so as to spread our genetics and influence throughout the world. So it is paramount to attract these mates with great effectiveness if we are to achieve our desire, thus we need to conform to the traits in which our desired mate finds attractive. If these traits are perverted into things which are weak and non-valuable to civilization, then people will stray away from those useful things and our society will degenerate. This attribute of ours can be easily manipulated by those who have the ability to control what we hear and see, and how we think about it. As I think more about the manipulation of people, I realize that people have been doing this to others since our creation. Yet we think of ourselves as “more civilized”, nevertheless our culture shares the same qualities of civilizations throughout the centuries. The only difference is, we have the cover of technological advancement and a more timid and politically correct social system. Pull this cover back and we are left with the same actions and attitudes on the personal level, that were acted out many millennia ago. Our Media can contribute to this cover particularly well here in the United States because of the monopolized system they have. Along with their close ties with government officials and their agenda’s. This concoction can lead to a massively controlled and distracted society. If all we consume is controlled by these entities, then they are able to take advantage of our instincts along with the destiny of our society.
We as free, beautiful, independent human beings need to take the reigns back from these puppeteers and use our incredible intellect to create our own fate. If we continue in our current state of ignorance, then we face a demise as a race that had immense potential to create a magnificent world, but failed to turn off the TV and do something about our problems.