Mob Development

I set myself a bit of a writing challenge. I read Charlie Brooker’s and David Mitchell’s column and decided to write something based on what they wrote ending up talking about something else entirely. I have no idea how that’s going to pan out.

Charlie wrote about the Ground Zero Mosque wondering what, according to the protesters, would be acceptable. David talked about the school/Uni system and how that is valuable for life experiences. I agree on what Charlie said, I have trouble with David’s column, though I can’t really put a finger to what I have a problem with.

How scary can mobs be? I’m seriously freaked out by a lot of them. Brainless violent protesters throwing around irony in their actions and accusations. Who are these people and where did they come from? Where and why did they pick up such contradicting ideas and opinions? Where does it stem from?

I remember in school, everybody was trying to fit in, except for me. It naturally resulted in me being an outsider and sitting alone during the breaks with the backs of others as my view. It gave me the opportunity once more to observe. I just don’t understand. I learnt to think for myself resulting in turning my back on certain ideas and finding new ones and the contacts according. It took me high school and college to get where I am now; still reasonably alone, but with more inspiring people than ever before.

I forgot a lot about my teenage years. I only remember them being uncomfortable. I feel like, when looking back, I could have missed classes more than I have. I do know I couldn’t talk nor write English properly at the time. Or so I thought. I graduated on my good grades for English; without I would have lost another year in high school. As if it mattered, there was not that much substance to pick up. Now I am wondering what would have happened had I left for a year to travel the world. I would probably have myself killed. I’m not a survivor; I’m a twat. I know I wouldn’t have it in my heart to join a radical group, but in the year loose, I might have changed so much, anything could have happened, that made me think foreigners are weird, dangerous and most of all, wrong about their convictions and therefore should die.

To me it seems, youngsters living in some sort of community have the bigger chance to end up in a radical group. Their minds are constantly fed with the foul information, especially outside school. If there’s anything or anyone who could steer them back to a more respectable and less violent life, it would be school and its teachers.

Allowing some A-list kid to go travel with her A-list famous movie star mom might seem innocent, but don’t you think it may wreck the world from its current axes and swirl into another path of destruction? It sure didn’t do Paris Hilton much good. What you have then is another brainless idiot contaminating society with its out of control life and views trying to convince the people that is what life is and their behaviour is the model to live by. That scares me to no end.

I’m sure Emma Thompson, the A-list movie star mom, has sense and will teach her daughter the goods of life in all its diversities outside of school. I just hope to god the young kid won’t meet the angry mob trying to kill everything with a darker tone of skin than theirs. She might see something in it. She might also understand how dangerous that is, but do children of 10 really? Have they lived long enough to make certain sensible choices, or should they rather go through their puberty first and get a bit more acquainted with how life also can be in a more controlled and graduate pace? All I know is, most of those kids are still so impressionable, it’s dangerous to force certain life lessons onto them already. You never know which way they will turn.

I know there will at a certain time in future again be another mob threatening society. I’d just rather not feed them with my offspring. I’ll probably keep my kids in school till they’re 18 and can consciously make their own mistakes.

Sources:
David Mitchell's "It's the only way to train for life"
Charlie Brooker's "The reality is less provocative"
I don't mean to abuse their titles, but they tend to be too long.