Real
vs. Fake – or “Keep asking yourself a question and eventually you will answer
it”
by Boxers
Branahin
What is ‘real’ and what is ‘fake’?
Something has been bothering me lately - it’s superficiality. People are superficial.
So why does one choose to present a façade to the world? Can such people
be truthful even with themselves? I think not. Superficiality is a
lie. “How are you?” “Oh I’m fine and how are
you?” – Bullshit. “I’m not OK, and neither are you, and I don’t even
really care how you are. But I’m good at pretending like I care; I’ll
even gasp if you tell me something bad happened and say, ‘Oh, I’m so
sorry.’ But I’m not fucking sorry. My emotional attachment to your
existence isn’t even comparable with my attachment to this week’s football
game.”
But this isn’t me. Not any more at least, I’ve given up
superficiality. I’m not fake and I’m not
pretending to be interested in anything fake any more. “Damn she’s
gorgeous.” No she’s not, she’s a fucking moron,
shallow, conceited and vastly limited. Limited, how? Limited as in
I can’t discuss an interesting movie with her or comment on the beauty of
sunset without her figuring I’m reciting some shit I got from a magazine.
I can’t ask her what a painting means to her. I
can’t look into her eyes and see an understanding (“Is he horny?” she
wonders). And why not, is she mentally incapable? No, she’s in
denial, she’s willingly superficial. Oh well it must be our society then,
right? – it’s society’s fault that we are
pressured into acting this way or that. I don’t buy it. That’s
confusing the cause with the effect. A superficial society is a product
of superficial people. It’s a mass, tacitly approved, denial of everything
real. And so what is ‘real’? What makes one sit back and say “damn,
man, that was fucking real!”
Death comes to mind. There’s nothing like death to put things into
perspective, to draw us out of our self-absorbed superficial mockery of an
existence. When faced with death people sit back for a moment and live in
reality. Then they get in their cars and they go home and they try
desperately to forget. They watch a mindless TV show or lose themselves
in their job, or they go to Starbucks and read the new entertainment weekly.
Everyone knows that there is a “real” world existing just behind the
superficial one. They hear songs and see movies that remind them of
this. But do they really understand the songs and get the movies; do they
comprehend the underlying messages or do they just get an uncomfortable feeling
in their gut and tell people “Oh yeah, it was a great movie” just because
that’s what they’ve learned to say when they see a movie they don’t really want
to understand.
Is death the only thing that’s real? No, in a way everything is
real. Denial is what is fake. Denial is
creating a fantasy world to ignore what is really going on. The world is
very easy to understand, or at least would be if it weren’t for the idiotic
generalizations, simplifications (which are usually complications) and flat out
lies that pervade society.
I mean, Politics – what the hell is this?
I just can’t talk politics with people; it hurts my opinion of others too
much. Politics is an excuse to say the most idiotic things and feel
justified because they are supported by a “party”. What happened to the
individual? “Oh our party is all about the individual.” You’re full
of shit – become an independent; a party is a mob. I can’t respect anyone
that can’t think for themselves and has to hide behind party propaganda.
Don’t recite horse crap to me; put your brain between your ears and your
mouth. I never make the arrogant assumption that I can understand every
societal problem to the depth necessary to make an intelligent decision
regarding its resolution. These things are complicated, they take
research – impartial research – and the truth is most of them don’t have a solution. Basically, more people need to
learn to deal with reality. You can’t deter criminals with a prison
and you can’t nurture deadbeats into model citizens. This is reality and
politics are just something to argue mindlessly about instead of doing any real
thinking.
So what is real? Life is real. Learning is
real, change is real, acceptance is real. It’s
all related on such a fundamental level. Talking on your cell phone with
Amber about
It really isn’t difficult to distinguish.