Life is full of opposites, like water and oil constantly in a distressed mess. We live in a world of opposites, in which our differences can make us unique but can also tear us apart.
The beauty of humanity resides in our different capacities.
According to years of learned behavior and the studies of scholars, intellectuals and academics, we give sense to our world by contrasting it against what isn't. In the semiotics of language, we give meaning to a word based on the description of its opposite. I.e. We know dark isn't light, and that strong isn't weak.
However, this ancient paradigm is shifting in modern society. The introduction of new concepts, such as gender and sexual identity have opened up another dimension. A dimension in which the world isn't limited by the one-dimensional male/female dichotomy.
But why? Why do we give meaning to one thing based on what it's not, rather than based on what it is?
Humans have been around for centuries, but it has only been over the last century or so that we have evolved in a sufficient and progressive way. We (as humans) are a condensed mix of complex cultures and subcultures struggling to understand each other. Struggling being the keyword. We struggle to understand our differences, and we struggle to see beyond. More specifically, these past few months, where it seems that the racial differences brought to the Americas by the pre-founding fathers is slipping through the cracks of evolution and social conscience. Especially lately, with the wave of selfish individualism and our lack of humanity.
It seems like we have fallen in a parallel zone, an anomaly in the matrix or a black hole. Pro-dichotomy ambassadors claim chaos is needed in order to bring balance; that there cannot be light without darkness.
It is the semiotics of language the cause-effect of this dichotomy or is this dichotomy the cause-effect of language semiotics? As individual agents of the group, we construct meaning based on our own experiences. As a collective group, we construct meaning based on a mix of our own experiences and the group's experience, right? It all sounds good until we see societies making the same mistakes over time as if history never happened.
XXI century and we are still stuck in the dichotomy of race and the underlying and perceived meanings of it.
Oh, the cognitive dissonance of our collective thinking! One minute we chant “fuck the police,” the next minute we run to the police for protection. One minute we love, next minute we hate. We swing from one tree to the other: morals low, values corrupted. We are in a constant dichotomy of ideals.
But are we?
As a humanist, I cannot condemn humanity. I still believe there is good among the bad (oh, the irony. I am using a dichotomy to get my point across). More importantly, there is hope. Where there is humanity, there is always hope. There is love because where there is hope, there is always love. We just need to evolve. We need to move away from static thinking. We need to move away from the limitations of being a “rational animal” and move forward as a semiotic animal. We need to transcend the parameters of patriarchy, religion, feminism and race.
We need to evolve and transcend radical dualism. Res cogitans, a thinking thing, the idea of mental substance. Once we can move away from the predispositions of society and the rigidity of learned behaviors, perhaps we can understand the essence of consciousness (aka the mental substance). Then who knows? Maybe we can even fantasize about opening the Pandora’s box of our brain and reach full mental capacity. As for right now, according to scholars, we only use 10 percent of our brain. Ten percent! What are we doing with the other 90 percent? What could we be doing with that 90 percent?
In my opinion, the problem is not the media. The problem is not the system and the politicians. The problem is us. Humans. We are still babies in the evolutionary line. We still have a lot of evolving, learning and growing to do.
We will eventually reach our full potential, but perhaps dichotomy is right. Maybe we need the chaos before the order descends.
