Just like animals, animals, like animals…

If there’s one thing I get constantly reminded by in the real world, it’s that most people act like animals. As in, mostly everyone operates on survival instincts and whatever social conditioning they’ve received throughout the years. It manifests in people doing the most borderline stupid things without a second thought; almost as if they are a programmed NPC with the sole objective of reminding me the stupidity of most of the population.

I myself am not above this. I don’t have the urge to care about every single thing outside of my own life and will only take actions that I myself choose to care about. Even though I do my best to make things easier for everyone like holding a door open, it doesn’t excuse the times I am ignorant of my surroundings like cleaning the sink in my house. There’s a certain selfishness that I still hold but at least I am self aware of it.

Self awareness. This almost feels like a skill that’s deceptively hard to come by sometimes. I liken it to how someone can play a team based game, but playing it so suboptimally that they believe they are doing what’s best when in reality they are delusional. I think self awareness goes hand in hand with being able to question yourself and your surroundings. If you are able to question why you take specific actions, you would be surprised how simply directed your mindset can be.

Survival is at the forefront of most people’s mindsets I’ve learned. Maybe not in a life and death sense, but in the idea of just trying to get by. “I’m just trying to get home soon so I’ll put my cart in the wrong area”. Or more accurately, they don’t even think these things consciously and are on autopilot.

This is what truly irks me. This sense of ignorance of your surroundings and the consequences of your actions. No care for how a certain action may affect the overall scope of things. Sure, maybe you won’t encounter the results of your actions immediately, but I believe all these little things build up and turn into sort of culture structures that are apalling and shouldn’t even exist.

I will say this, my short time as a cart clerk has made me convinced that job should never even exist. If only people would actually understand how much they are not only inconviencing me, but to everyone else and in the long run, themselves. That is not the case. It brings out a quiet but a growing anger towards the general population. I know it’s wrong, but even I still have times where I wished something forced them to change.

Unfortunately, I’ve found a little solace in seeing these people as animals. They shouldn’t hold too much of the blame when really it’s culture and whatever circumnstances they come from. I know the infinite potential of the human race though. I refuse to believe that each of these people did not have several opportuniities to change and become more conscious of their own lives. With what little opportunities they have, they are unimaginably more plentiful than someone who lives in an abysmal situation like the poverty that occurs in the Philippines.

At the end of the day, I can only control myself and how I react to these things. I am writing a story and the antagonist of it is someone who believes these types of people need to be forced to change. This is true, however, this line of thinking often refuses to acknowledge that everyone should have the opportunity to make that choice for themselves. Calling the populace a bunch of sheep may be true, but it may be just how these people are supposed to live. I hate to give into determinism, but it may be that their lives were made to be a follower rather than a leader, or really someone that enacts change.

From that perspective, they should very well do their best to fulfill that role to the most beautiful extent. Now the real question is, are you also one of these people? Are you willing to ignore all of the opportuninities laid out before you? Are you willing to risk everything to try and take hold of your agency as a human being?

You are alive right now to see this post. That is an infinitely small and improbable situation to occur when you realize just how unique the present moment is. There will only ever be one of “you” forever, so live such a unique life that you don’t seem like just an animal, but a real and actualized human being.

On another note, I do my best to always see the other side and be more understanding of the situations of other people. Classifying people as animals is a very wrong way of thinking and to take that to a literal extent may cause me to start looking like an anime villain. I’d like to not be a literal embodiment of Frieza with this post…