Saturday, November 10, 2012

Fear?

For some time now, I've been whining about how frightened Americans seem to be these days. My rants have mostly focused on how many of our freedoms people seem willing to sacrifice for "safety". I don't believe "safety" is possible. People want to be protected from terrorists, but the only way to be protected is not to be terrified. No one can prevent every possible bad thing from happening. The beltway snipers were terrorists, serial killers are terrorists, so are bullies and abusers - but no one seems to think of them that way. "Terrorists" -the word- means "foreigners" to an awful lot of people. Anyway, we're so afraid of terrorists that we've sacrificed our rights - freedom from illegal searches, unwarranted invasions on our privacy. Hell, we've even given up on the right to a speedy trial - or any trial - and all the government has to do to implement that denial is say 'terrorist'.

I think if people are willing to deny someone else the right to a speedy and fair trial, they should lose that right themselves. Not everyone should lose that right - just the people who want to take it away from others. Same with the "sanctity of marriage" group - they should forfeit the right to choose their own partners.

(Yes, I digressed a bit. I'm back on topic now...) When the shooter went wild on the Virginia Tech campus, parents went apeshit because the school didn't do enough to protect their children. Here's a news flash: They aren't children. They are old enough to vote, marry, die in war, and even to drink in some places (not Virginia). They are adults. Besides that, why would anyone expect that a murder over here would turn into a murderous spree across campus a few hours later? No one could predict that, so no one could know what to do to prevent it. Sure, after the fact, you can say they shoulda this or they shoulda that.

No one could know that some nutcase would open fire in a movie theater, and considering the volume of the Dark Knight and the amount of gunfire in that movie, who would be able to tell the difference between live fire and that playing on the screen? Theaters are soundproofed so that horrendously loud movie doesn't interfere with the horrendously loud movie playing screen right next door.

So, a few months ago, several scientific studies were correlated to pinpoint this whole fear thing. Mostly the research has to do with conservatives vs. liberals, but I think those are the wrong labels. Some people have a bigger right amygdala - which monitors fear, and others have a larger anterior cingulate cortex, which monitors ambiguity. If your amygdala is larger, you are more frightened. If your anterior cingulate cortex is bigger, you are better at handling ambiguity. People who are afraid need more controls, people who aren't bothered by uncertainty need fewer controls.

The studies explain that amygdalites (I made that up, it's shorthand for "people with larger amygdalas) are more concerned with self-preservation: what is best for ME (and mine), whereas cingulates (shorthand for people with larger anterior cingulate cortexes) are more focused on what is best for all, even if that means that the result isn't necessarily in their own personal best interest.

Cingulates pass out free water in a drought, while amygdalites hide their water rather than share it. Those who sell it for four times the usual price are probably people with relatively equal amygdala / cingulate sizing. They get the water to people who need it, but make sure they also benefit from the distribution. Yes, I do know that those sharing the water benefit, but that is more cerebral / spiritual than tangible. 

Politically, cingulates are more likely to say 'let's move forward, do things differently' and amygdalites are more likely to say 'let's go back to how it used to be'.

Innovators and traditionalists. Since not all change is good, and humans are mostly wired to maintain status quo, tradition is pretty strong stuff. But not all tradition is good, and if we didn't change the status quo, quite frankly, we'd all be cavemen. Innovation is vital. Without it, no one would be voting at all - at the very least we'd have small tribes run by the meanest dude in town. 'How it used to be'  sucked.

None of the studies discussed whether people can affect the size of their amygdalas and anterior cingulate cortexes. Can we, by practicing creativity exercises and adapting to change, enlarge our anterior cingulate cortex? By giving in to fear or worry, can we cause the right amygdala to grow?

I do know that if you fear something - heights, for example - you can learn to overcome that or you can let it take over. You can climb one rung higher on a ladder daily, until you reach the roof, or you can cling to the handrail and descend the stairs with trepidation. I know that if you don't push back against fear, fear pushes in on you.

Fear is that nightmare room where the walls close in on you. It's scary to do new things and to push yourself to do things you fear, but doing so expands the space you have to live in. Expanding your own world makes the world bigger for everyone else too. I'm not suggesting everyone throw all caution to the wind, just that we all try to do something new each day, even something tiny, so that none of feel the need to constrain others simply because we're afraid of change.