2003-07-04 - 12:51 p.m.

Superiority

Why does everybody have to be better than everybody else?

One of the things that really bothers me about people is that they always want to be better than everybody else and put everybody else down. Why can't we just be nice?

It is accepted in society that you should seek rewards, and that rewards are gotten by being better than others. Our whole society is set up to teach people to put others down.

In our schools--we are given rewards when we do better scholastically. I try so hard with my schoolwork, trying to do it right, and then I remember that I don't have to do my best, nor do I have to do the assignment perfectly. I just have to do it better than the rest of the class. And we all know that social recognition can be gotten by putting others down. Girls wearing pink shirts from the Gap put down the girls wearing black shirts bought at Hot Topic, and vice versa.

In our churches--We are Christians, We are better than the heathens. We do good things, we are better than you.

In our government--We are Americans, We are better than the rest of the world.

In our businesses--rising up through the corporate structure, being better than our coworkers.

All this really bothers me, especially when I see myself doing the same thing--because of course, I want to better than everybody else too. Maybe this is why I'm writing this, to get attention, to be better than the rest of you, to make you think I'm better. I don't think I have the ability to judge who's better than who. However, even now, I am putting people (which might include you) down by saying that they want to put everybody else down.

These kind of thoughts make me want to stick my head in a hole and hide. I avoid talking to people, because I am scared that they will just try to put me down.

Is there any hope? Is there any point to my existence? I can be a nasty person and fit in with the rest of them, or I can be a nice person and feel good about myself since I'm *better.* Either way I lose. With our whole society set up to make us like this, can it be possible to get beyond it? Would we be better off if we all killed ourselves?

I say to myself that if mean people win, I'd rather be a loser and get attacked and killed. However, I suspect that when the time comes, I'll be mean and put others down in order to get ahead.

This is pointless because it contradicts itself, but I wanted to make you think.

I suspect someone will come and say that yes, my existence is pointless, but is anybody going to say that society is set up to encourage us to be good to other people for their sake and not our own?

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Note: This was originally posted on darkness.com, Nov 14, 2002. At the time there were people on that site who had a habit of telling everybody that their existence was pointless and we should all kill ourselves, although remarkably I only got two nasty comments on this post.