I think people should be allowed to get away with things based on a certain amount of crap going on in their lives. For instance, if you look like you've had an awful and exhausting day, I won't curse at you for cutting me off at an intersection. If the bank is foreclosing on your house, you shouldn't be held liable for kicking in their window on the way out - or the windows of the bank manager's Mercedes, if it's parked reasonably close to the window.
In this scheme, there should be a deluxe package for people who get seriously boned by fate. If you have terminal cancer, or you will be in chronic, unmedicatable pain for the rest of your natural life, you don't have to pay attention to stop lights, you can gas and dash all you want, and if you feel like believing something, like maybe Marxism could work out or that Mormonism nailed it, you get to believe that stuff without contest for as long as you like, with no obligation to buy and unlimited opportunity to exchange. We actually encourage you to believe as many things as possible, and to switch whenever the whim strikes. We’ll even provide message boards accessible exclusively to people with the proper entitlement passcode, so your belief will not be challenged. Instead you’ll be allowed to converse with like-minded people, at least until one of you decides to change your mind from Jainism to Freakonomics. We’ll send you a brochure every month with all the newest ideas and paradigms that you can try on, so long as you promise not to force them onto anyone else. This is all you (and the other guys at http://www.solipsism.webboards.gov/).
Healthy people won’t be allowed into this service because their health makes them cocky and insecure in ways that prevent such mental plasticity. They need to be sure their one thing is right and never goes unchallenged so that they can go on living the model life that you’re incapable of sustaining. Somebody who doesn’t have to worry about how to afford chemo can afford to be a dick to Creationists. Meanwhile, you may find believing Creationism for a weekend to be refreshing. If not, there’s always evolutionary psychology on Monday, flat earth on Tuesday, and extraterrestrial conspiracies for your spare time. I figure if the universe fills your uterus with tumors, then we, your planetary roommates, can afford to give you belief-Netflix.
I hereby volunteer to fund-raise for this program - or at least donate heavily.
ReplyDeleteActually, I pretty much try to live by the give-em-slack motto in the first place, so I'm down with this.