#conventional wisdom

Digimon Beatbreak reactions - episode 31

Can it be? Am I finally getting back to making these comics in a timely fashion while they're actually relevant? ...probably not. I'm actually going to be busy with Animazment stuff over the rest of the week and just needed to get as many things done and out of the way as soon as possible. Oh well.

This lyric screwed me up. Thank you Maxton Waller.

Green and White are the conservative Colors. But why does that guarantee they would represent the status quo?

The plane of Esper is ruled by Blue, with Green suppressed and White competing with Black for second-fiddle. The plane of Jund is ruled by Red, with White suppressed and Green competing with Black for second-fiddle. The plane of Grixis suppresses both Green and White.

That is that status quo of those planes, no matter how far from conservative values they are. "Status quo" is just "who is currently in charge and setting the tone".

Black will gladly style itself as a rebel and a force for change when it finds itself lacking in power, because the nature of Black is to acquire power and dominance. But once Black has achieved dominance, it is Black's nature to maintain that dominance at any cost.

Blue is not much different. At its heart, Blue craves control and mastery and knowledge. Why would it fight so hard to claw its way out from under Green and Red, only to give up its ascendancy afterwards? Does Blue ever stop constantly watching, plotting, and counter-scheming just because it's currently winning? By no means will it allow Green and Red to plunge it back into the night of ignorance.

Conservatism

Then what is conservatism?

It is trusting in that which has earned trust. It is putting your faith in things that not only worked once before, but have worked since longer than history itself.

'Tradition' is not the worship of ashes, but the act of preserving the fire started by those who came before you.

It is also known as Institutional Knowledge. Conventional Wisdom. Generational Practice. Common Sense.

Even science, properly executed, relies on tradition. It's a terrible scientist who dismisses the laws of Cause And Effect just because someone codified it before recorded history.

Science and wisdom is about replacing the tried and failed with the tried and true, NOT tossing out everything old based on a zealously religious faith in the inherent superiority of novelty.

What's more, tradition and history record the endless scrapyard of 'new ideas' that failed.

Blue is endlessly enamored with novelty. It wants to claim it has discovered something new, in its pursuit to achieve things that no one ever has before.

But Blue's weakest subject is Green's favorite subject: History. So Blue is the least qualified to recognize when it's 'new' idea has actually been tried before. But Green remembers and tries to warn Blue.

Is Green too slow to accept change, or is Blue too quick to chase fads?

Green is far from incapable of change, but Green wisely refuses to leap without looking. If you want to convince Green that you've found a better way, Green demands that you PROVE it. Turn your theoretical future into the practical past, if you can.

Excerpt from this essay from Treehugger:

Since we have within living memory, driven cars, eaten steaks, boarded planes for vacations, poured concrete, that is what we will continue to do—that which is convenient, familiar, and acceptable. As Galbraith notes:

"Familiarity may breed contempt in some areas of human behavior, but in the field of social ideas it is the touchstone of acceptability. Because familiarity is such an important test of acceptability, the acceptable ideas have great stability. They are highly predictable. It will be convenient to have a name for the ideas which are esteemed at any time for their acceptability, and it should be a term that emphasizes this predictability. I shall refer to these ideas henceforth as the Conventional Wisdom."

That's why the premier of Alberta, sitting on the world's third-largest pool of fossil fuels, says, "It is a utopian notion that we can suddenly end the use of hydrocarbon-based energy." It's why British conservative politicians about prime minister Boris Johnson's green policies, telling The Times: “It’s a hard sell asking people to make sacrifices when the rest of the world, China/Russia etc, are carrying on as usual."

Galbraith continues, describing how the conventional wisdom eventually changes.

"The enemy of the conventional wisdom is not ideas but the march of events. As I have noted, the conventional wisdom accommodates itself not to the world that it is meant to interpret, but to the audience’s view of the world. Since the latter remains with the comfortable and the familiar, while the world moves on, the conventional wisdom is always in danger of obsolescence. This is not immediately fatal. The fatal blow to the conventional wisdom comes when the conventional ideas fail signally to deal with some contingency to which obsolescence has made them palpably inapplicable."

One of the phrases that puts me on edge a bit is “You don’t like X? What? Why not? Everyone loves X!”

I have, over the years, found myself explaining why I don’t like something more than why I do like something.

Avocados are a fine example of this. I don’t like them and never have. It is not the taste, which I don’t particularly care for, but the texture that is off putting to me. I don’t care what you add to it, it still feeds wrong in my mouth. People have tried to convince me that I am missing something awesome but I don’t see it.

I like football both college and NFL. Peter doesn’t see the point of any other professional sports except baseball and bowling. He is a football widow among other sports that I watch. He understands the fundamentals of the games but has no interest. And that’s fine.

Caroline and I like shows like Project Runway, Face-off, and Ink Master. Peter likes Face-off but doesn’t care for the fashion and tattoo shows. There are shows that he watches that I do not because it is not something I enjoy or feel I need to spend my time on it.

There are shows that we are all on the same page Doctor Who, Prodigal Son, Why Women Kill, Dragon Prince, and Good Omens to name a few. We tend to either binge watch them if a season on some platforms or watch them as they air.

Anime is something we all like but where we came into Japanese cartoons is very different. For Peter it is Astro Boy, Kimba the White Lion, and Giagantor. For me it was Robotech, Akira, My Youth in Arcadia and Vampire Hunter D. For Caroline it has been Sailor Moon, Tokyo Ghoul, My Hero Academia, and Fairy Tale.

There are comic book characters I have no interest in. I don’t care to read the books or see the shows based on those characters. There are some characters that I liked at one point but really don’t care for now. We pretty much see every comic book or graphic novel film more as a professional courtesy. Haven’t like them all.

People have tried to convince me that things I don’t like would be something that I should like. I don’t like zombies. Never have. I have seen zombie films and the like but I don’t watch or read it for the most part. Warm Bodies and White Zombie are my speed for zombie stories. More than one friend has tried to convince me to watch the Walking Dead. I have friends in the show. I tried but it didn’t appeal to me.

I like psychological horror rather than blood and guts slasher horror. I have so many friends who work on those films but I really can’t stomach the gut churring body count with blood and body parts flying ever where. Clever ways of killing teenagers just doesn’t do anything for me except give me an upset stomach. I know technically how they do all that and I have done blood and guts effects over the years for various projects. That I love to do and have a passion for. I just don’t like to watch the end product.

I have friends who love the X-men films but don’t care for the Marvel studio films. I do not try to convince them that they need to see all the films. There are Star Wars and Star Trek fans that like a specific part of the saga and that’s fine. There are people who prefer the book to the movie and vice versa.

Life is too doggone short so pick and choose what appeals to you and brings you joy.

If you want to, try things you are unsure of before dismissing them out of hand. At least then when challenged you can honestly say I tried but it doesn’t sing for me.

The pressure to like something that none of us need.