The media is full these days of "knife crime, teenage drinking, binge drinking, anti–social behaviour," just a few of the growing list of social ills. The measures proposed to deal with these appear to only approach the problems with the intention of dealing with the results and seldom look at any possible root causes.
I watched a programme on TG4 last night that concerned suicides. It was striking how often an inability to communicate and "'social awkwardness" was mentioned as a possible contributory factor. There appears to be a growing inability for people, especially the young within our community, to communicate and there is less and less normal conversation happening amongst all age groups.
It reminded me of when I was young and it was normal as a family to go visiting an 'auntie' when the adults would spend the evening chatting. If you do go visiting today, the centre of the group will most likely be the television and conversation comes a poor second. Sad when watching the surreal inanity of 'Big Brother' take precedence over real conversation.
Remember the kids going to the 'grannies' – the five to the bed and the craic telling ghost stories and jokes. Now for the kids, it's "sleepovers". A fellow was telling me that his kids had a sleepover recently and first thing into the tent was a DVD player and the inevitable digital games. The children won't be getting much craic from conversation or social interaction at today's sleepovers.
When it comes to discussing problems or personal issues, do we suffer some national characteristics that make it difficult for us to resolve issues mutually? Both the Irish and British appear to be cursed with a 'macho' image that makes it appear weak to 'open up' and discuss their emotions, their fears, loves, worries and all those feelings we are prone to hide. Ridiculously, we prefer this 'macho' image as strong when it is really based on fear. We are afraid of being open in case we get hurt. Afraid to take the chance to show our emotions, be it with a lover, our children or our friends. Contrast the 'Latin lover' image with the image of the 'stong silent' Irish or Brit. Could I suggest the difference is that the 'Latin lover' has no fear of showing his emotions whilst our 'strong, silent' type is emotionally terrified, frightened he might be seen as weak. Our culture appears to encourage us to hide our emotions, so can it be surprising that a lot of us especially the young have emotional problems.
I quote from a book I'm reading: "A Greek friend said to me, 'You British are twisted, you have all the psychiatrists and therapists. In Greece we don't need psychiatrists – we talk to each other. If we have a problem we go and talk about it. It might take all night, all day, all week but we talk and sort it out."
When we Irish or British do have a conversation, it is usually like our legal system – adversarial. We must have a winner. Most of us on our first holiday abroad would have witnessed two continental waiters in argument, animated shouting, arms waving. We sat confidently waiting for what we thought must happen. We expected that one would 'pop' the other or one would huff and stop the argument. When the argument appeared to resolve itself and the two behaved as normal, we were surprised, because in our culture what was most likely to happen was that one would have refused to continue. There would be phases like 'you know everything,' 'It has to be your way,' 'Can't talk to you' – ironically, usually from the person who is refusing to talk anymore. On the continent, they appear to argue and debate to resolve an issue, ending up with a modified version of both sides of the argument and more importantly their anger and fears, their 'issues' eased, if not resolved.
With us we offer a statement it is met with a counter statement and that's it. It is now a question of stamina: we don't resolve the issue; we just wear the other down. We end up with the problem unresolved and two unhappy people because even the 'winner' is dissatisfied because they might have won the argument but they still haven an unresolved problem.
John Steinbeck wrote, "What I have written is not to instruct but to inform." Maybe I'm wearing those 'rose-tinted glasses' but I think we used to have that. You could have sat in a pub or at home arguing and debating all sorts of issues – social, political, personal – not trying to wear the other down, not saying your truth was absolute, but arguing hoping to be informed, trying to tease the 'truth' together. We seem to lack both the ability to openly show and express our emotions and to argue and debate, without looking for a winner.
The inability to argue and debate to resolve a problem and the fear to be open about our emotions must make it more difficult for us all to be emotionally stable. Should our teachers and those who look after the young not be given the time and the help to teach our children how to be open in their emotions and how to argue and debate to resolve a problem and not to be looking for a winner.
A long letter this but it I could impose on you I would like to quote from the same book:
"Two Wolves, an old Cherokee, told his grandson about a battle that goes on inside people. 'My son the battle is between two wolves that are inside us all. One is evil. It is anger, envy, jealousy sorrow, regret, greed, arrogance, self–pity, guilt, resentment, inferiority, lies, false pride, superiority and ego.
"The other is Good. It is joy, peace, love, hope, serenity, humility, kindness, benevolence, empathy, generosity, truth, compassion and faith." The grandson thought about it and then asked his grandfather, 'Which wolf wins?' The old Cherokee simply replied, 'The one you feed'."
Desiderata
