"From the last three lines of your post, I'm assuming you are applying the "better safe than sorry" mentality to life-rights over all of time. This addresses points 3) and 5) of my post on Wed 5/15, but does not address points 1),…"
I Power
Scientific Research & Self-Development Activism
The Need for Recognition & Reward
I got to thinking about this subject because of some recent discussions that I've had with some other members here regarding the drop in activity on the site, why it occurred, and what we could potentially do to increase it again -- because a couple of the suggestions that were thrown out involved the idea of rewarding people for their involvement here, or of granting them some kind of spotlight recognition. And although that all sounded OK on the surface, I quickly began to question it, and then later suggested that perhaps those ideas weren't so great after all.
My initial thoughts were about how so many of our members originally signed up here hoping for a chance to get close to, or to at least get noticed by their favorite YouTube celebrity, Athene; and how that was a poor reason for becoming a member. And then I started thinking about how many 100's of people that we have had here along the way who have only wanted to use I-Power as a platform to potentially increase their own YouTube subscriber count. And then I also had some discussions this week with members about celebrities, and what it must be like to be one; trolls & class-clowns, and what motivates them to act the way that they do; and also about how companies will sometimes use job titles as a reward instead of money; and some other subjects, but all of which seemed to consistently keep coming back around to the same idea of people wanting to be recognized as being special or important, and how the very chance of them receiving such recognition would often motivate them, even when other, more practical reasons would not.
Perhaps my age and maturity have caused me to lose some appreciation for all of this. I don't know. Perhaps I've become overly idealistic. I do remember, for example, that it used to be very important for me to feel important when I was younger. As I recall, that was one of the main reasons that I joined the military. And I remember how I used to love wearing my dress uniform around civilians, because it made me feel special, and important. I suppose, in the end, that this is all related to ego, insecurity, and the need for social validation. And, I guess, I've matured enough by now that I don't feel the need to be patted on the back all the time like many young people do. I like and respect myself now, whether anybody else does or not. -- but I have to admit that I wasn't always this way. :-)
How about you? Do you need somebody else to tell you that you are important? or are you able to feel important all by yourself without having the notion validated by others? Do you seek fame & fortune? want your picture in the newspaper? or a merit badge on your chest? And if so, Why?
I think that this is a very important question that relates to social activism, {and therefore to the members of this community,} because activists are people who almost always have to go against the majority opinion, or an entrenched system or ideology, and so they cannot afford to rely upon what other people think about them. They need to be able to feel that what they are doing is important in the face of opposition! And don't delude yourself about any of this, either. Getting arrested and going to jail for a cause that you believe in will not usually earn you any kind of martyr's recognition or reward. Most activists suffer their persecutions very quietly and are never noticed. Martin Luther King, Jr., for example, received some attention and status during the Civil Rights movement here in the United States back in the 1960's... but there were multiplied thousands of other people who were arrested, beaten, and killed during that resistance movement who were never noticed and whom nobody remembers. Even King was eventually assassinated, by the way. But he did get his picture in the paper. :-D
A related video and Discussion post:
Psychology 101 - The Asch Experiments
Additional Reference Links:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Normative_Social_Influence
Tags: Activism, Asch, Award, Celebrity, Character, Ego, Experiment, Fame, Fortune, Insecurity, More…
Replies to This Discussion
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Permalink Reply by Dries Spans on -
Quick contribution on how I feel about this related to IPower.
I don't need to be told that I'm important, normally I even try to avoid the situations of being in the spotlight. I get most of my validation from what I have achieved and engaging in discussions.
Whether I am able to feel important myself, well that depends on the purpose/situation. For example I can feel important by contributing a good deal to a project and seeing the end results without validation by others. Where as for example in a discussion I need to have my arguments/statements taken into account and not completely ignored to feel "important".
As for the ranking system, I have no need for such a system but I do see how it might encourage others to be more active (although maybe not for the right reasons). I rank myself by getting people motivated to engage in some of my discussions/statements or projects.
I do notice that I have to validate others efforts more (even if not in my field of interests), I have the tendency to think everyone feels the same way about it as I do, which might lead them to feel unappreciated.
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Permalink Reply by Sorlaize on -
"but all of which seemed to consistently keep coming back around to the same idea of people wanting to be recognized as being special or important, and how the very chance of them receiving such recognition would often motivate them, even when other, more practical reasons would not."
You might be talking about codependence in the context of this kind of empowerment or truth-seeking movement.. this is one of my particular 'problems'.
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Permalink Reply by March E. on -
I have a problem seeking validation from others although I'm a lot better at catching myself in acting that way nowadays. You can't please everyone and not everyone will like you, but I find that the best thing to do is to figure out what is important in life and what your values are. I believe that a lot of insecurity in people lies in not knowing what they value, which leads them to look to others for approval. That's one case, but there are many cases out there. Just stick to your values and learn to live by them. It also makes you less likely to be controlled by others.
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Permalink Reply by DAN on -
Let me first describe my spin on the two words in your title and than go a bit into the topic how I see it.
For me reward is a possitive feedback that is given to someone if some conditions are reached. As an example: If a kid has drawn something it gets a compliment from the mother"
Recogntion is more tricky to describe. I think what we can agree on here is that recogntion is part of the social interaction among people; and an additional property, which does distinguish it from reward, is that you also atomatically "give" recognition to others. Let me give an example: Many people here "give" recognition to Athene and the Crew for doing awesome stuff.
I am not sure if it good to distuingish both but it may be usefull, especially if you think to implement such systems into this site.
That said I think both recogintion and reward are important for all self developement activities and paramount for every kind of activism.
Let me explain why I think it is important for activism, since thats easier to do (for me):
Simply think about what Athene achieved simply by being a good player and a hilarious person. Do you think it would be possible withouth him beeing famous and havind the kind of social recognition and influence? I dont think so.
I think folower and recognition are a crucial part in such kind of activism. You might can argue that it may not be good at an individual level but I realy wonder how you can move something in this world withouth recognition. Thus my hypothesis would be: If beeing an activist and changing the world is your aim you need recognition, whetever you want it or not.
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Permalink Reply by The Shiznit on -
Some good points; and very akin to some of what I've been hearing recently from Nathan Davies about how the lack of inspirational leadership around here is a serious problem that we have to overcome in the absence of the Belgian Crew. One person even went so far as to say that he thinks it is a natural human tendency to "always look to one man as an embodiment of their totality." Which I think is just a fancy way of saying that people need somebody that they can point to as an embodiment of what they believe in.
A figurehead?
A Representative?
Definitely something to think about; because I know that all great "Movements" have had this.
And you're absolutely right, of course, that Athene could never accomplish things like his recent Sharecraft project without his "army" of followers -- and he wouldn't have that army unless he continued to "play the role" of a celebrity entertainer. So, I suppose that it's not always a bad thing to seek the spotlight; but I do think it would be important to be consciously aware of why you are seeking it, and to not be doing so for the wrong reasons. Ego? Insecurity?
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Permalink Reply by Nathan Davies on -
I think you hit the entire point here. What is your motivation for seeking the spotlight. To pet your ego? Or to change the world for the better?
I think it takes a disciplined mind to stay on the right path with that, but it is possible. Like the old saying goes, "Absolute power, absolutely corrupts." I give props to the belgian crew for staying true to their original values in spite of their fame. I think that if someone has similar values/reasoning, that the spotlight can be used in a very positive way. On the other hand, it can also be used for ill.
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Permalink Reply by Sorlaize on
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As long as you learn from what you do, I think that's good. In politics someone else can always take the reigns.. (I'm thinking of a scene in Starship Troopers about politicians..) like, literally step forward when the other figurehead steps back, and it's a very human thing to feel like you've started afresh with a new leader.
If there was a 'leader' in this community it would feel better for me I think, yeah, why not.
But then I look at what Athene's doing and I get the impression he's tied down a lot *by* the process of making consistent videos, as opposed to making videos of new insights and philosophy if they happen to be so good.
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Permalink Reply by Nathan Davies on
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You raise a great point there. Athene is very, very busy just maintaining his audience. I really believe that's why he has surrounded himself with people who want the same thing he does, so that the workload is spread around efficiently.
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Permalink Reply by Bart on -
i think we should have some more moderators to help relieve shiz of some of the workload, especially if we actually succeed in increasing traffic.
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Permalink Reply by Sorlaize on
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What kind of activism and changes in the world are you talking about? Charlie Chaplin didn't need these things for his famous speech to be effective. He needed to be an effective communicator, know the nature of the problem he was addressing, and be troubled enough by it to deliver a good speech (perfectionism & creativity).
If you are talking about activism for wildlife for exmaple, it may be that you need influence & an internet identity to pull off something big.. but wouldn't the core problem be that people don't care enough to do things as it is? In reality we have all these ongoing issues like bees, whales, and other species in danger, and in place of something *effective* like infographics which COMMUNICATE things really well, we have news organizations skimming the surface each time. Well, part of the inherent problem of anything human can be said to be that we don't have the mental capacity to care, or in simpler words we're doomed by design to be intolerant of caring about all these issues [each of us, with all the details in our lives as well] period.
Well, it's pointless making or arguing against a point like that, anyway.. the general gist of what I find myself talking about all the time is that our world and our reality is far too complex for us to only be concerned about insights like this, like insights of today's political climate... it's not often very useful information (and then, even if we had all the information in the world we'd fear that a government would use it against us)
my god, what a sorry state the world is in today.
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Permalink Reply by Nathan Davies on
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What did Charlie Chaplin not need? Recognition? He had to have had an audience to listen, which implies some sort of recognition.
I've read some on the "circles of empathy" idea that humans are not capable of empathizing with more than a certain number of people/ideas and are thus mankind is doomed to always destroy itself and the planet. I don't agree with this at all, because the number of ideals you have to sympathize with are very limited and few to make large changes. We simply aren't sympathizing with the right things as of yet.
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Permalink Reply by Sorlaize on
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He already had a film career, but today that's irrelevant because if you were to upload a speech that hard-hitting and that relevant particularly about today's society, it would get attention. Videos do exactly that today, for entertainment but also for 'feels'.
>about empathizing with lots of views
Well, I'm talking about fundamental limits of mankind's psychology. So, yeah what you said would seem to make sense; exactly the same thing I'm talking about. If we are born into a world that teaches us to only love the culture and nation we happen to be located in, and then our psychology is also incapabple of empathizing will all cultures unless we make a significant conscious effort individually. (I would say that such a psychological limitation [and as I write this I remember I've seen a good American Politics example somewhere..] has (psychologically) driven the emergence our ideas of nationalism and xenophobia, period. )
I'm not limited by a number of ideals I can identify with, myself. I understand the world somewhat, so I identify for example with the poverty and the hate in some countries of America & the west in general.
>We simply aren't sympathizing with the right things as of yet.
Not quite sure what you mean
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