WARP EIGHT IN THE SLOW LANE *** SOLDIERS ***
The Constitution contains an error. All men are not created equal, not to mention women. Some people are born with an excess of components. Since there is a finite number of components, it logically follows that some people are born with a corresponding component deficit. This applies to all manner of components, from physical to mental to emotional.
But the Constitution is correct regarding the component of prime importance: Humanity. Each of us comes into the world with a small glow of humanity, made up of creativity and love. Often, this glow is nurtured carefully, and made to grow. More often, it is ridiculed as aberrant behavior by our role models and by our peers, and the small glow goes out.
So considerably less than half of us reach that magical age of personal consent with our glow intact, due to no fault of our own. Shortly thereafter, that minority is thrust into the real world, with its pressures and its barbs. The reaction to this sudden overwhelming whirlwind varies.
Some capitulate easily to the dangerous eddies and currents of life, and allow the glow to die, because it is easier. Some wage a valiant war to the death. Either way, the glow is allowed to die and the person dies with it, joining those who died without consent. They form the ranks of society’s good little soldiers.
And society rewards them, for they are mediocre, and society is structured primarily for the mediocre. They are offered no true challenges, and thus need not worry about failure. The problems they face are paramount to them, but society freely offers the solutions. This is the price society pays for its needs.
Society requires conformity, from the eight-foot ceiling to the width of its tires. Included in this requirement is a perspective on members of society. Each must perform willingly as a cog in a great machine. If a prospective soldier does not fit well into the allotted slot, the soldier is ground to fit.
A very small percentage of those born into this great machine do not allow their glows to die. They answer challenge with brilliance. They respond to conformity with creativity. And they are able to respond to love with love. They learn to interface with society as it is forced upon them. They come to understand the importance of walking backwards, with class, when they are going against the grain of society.
Those few contribute greatly to humanity. They make the world work despite itself. And I have discovered that quite a few of them are right here in WITSIG.
Kermit []