Disappointment.14:35 Jul 12 2006
Times Read: 1,309
One of the things which I hold to in my life, my outpourings, rants and interactions with people, is my expression of genuine thought.
I say what is in my heart and on my mind at the time. I give opinions which I believe and I state my positions with honesty, though they may make me look a fool at a later date.
VR is a hard slog. I can't deny that I get a little stressed when I constantly have to delete such crap as the standard 'That’s interesting' posts. Not only that, but it took less than 15 minutes of being back, for someone to complain about my closing their thread. This person then had the gall to re-open the thread and send a complaint about it via the 'Request help' option.
This for me, is indicative of the attitude from many of the newer members. I don't appreciate teenagers that want to try and do my role, especially when they don't know what they are doing. But I do understand that this is all new and shiny and that they want to 'get involved' and perhaps falsely interpret the status system as a means to achieving true status within this community.
It's unfortunate that one of the defining factors of VR's success is that of the 'game' aspect. It's addictive, no doubt about that. But how are we to manage these people? Bully and cajole them? Offer them sweeteners?
To be frank, my patience is at an end with the bullshit that seems to be infecting the forums with greater purpose than it ever has. Were I a suspicious man, I'd say that there was a plot to undermine the fabric of VR members integrity of knowledge and experience.
I know I can be a dick and an ass. I act like a 'skinny pussy' sometimes, as one long gone member once called me. But these things are in contrast to the effort which I put in to keep the discussions free of inane commentary and flamings. Not to mention my own attempts to further the understanding of a myriad of topics.
I don't and can't know everything, but I am the type of person to try and understand that which is confusing, beguiling or even frightening.
This is why I am disappointed. At the sheer lack of effort from many, who seem to think that knowledge ought to be handed on a plate. It's pointless being spoon-fed. Unless one takes the time and effort to, perhaps driven by necessity, to learn for themselves, it really is a waste of energy to chase those that are unwilling to open their eyes and act for their own benefit.
Not only that, but when I attempt to engage many on a level of intellectualism that satisfies my own need, it is most often overlooked. Perhaps I am using too many big words, but I don't think so. I believe that this is due to a lack of participation, by those that have the depth of experience and understanding to impart, but refuse for whatever reasons.
A while back, before all this stupid psyche shit from Delphi, I approached a number of people, with ideas and offers of help and indeed, requests for help myself. I have given as honest an account of my opinions and situation as it was possible to.
What I have found is largely hypocrisy. Self-involved and self-styled 'experts' who have nothing better to respond with, than sweet nothings and vague assurances.
The more I learn about myself and this community, the more I find that those who propagate themselves as elders and teachers, fail to deliver on the responsibilities of the position of which they have been invested authority by their peers.
I have, on several occasions in the past year, extended my hand and opened my heart, stating what I understood to be the case at the time, only to be met with fierce reprisals, ignorance and at times, ridicule.
Add to this the extension of friendship which I applied to a select few that claimed to be honourable, with integrity of purpose, only to show me their true colours when they were faced with the difficult discussions.
The strangest thing is, that I am not bitter. Though this rant may seem as though I am wallowing in my misfortune, it is not. I simply wish to vent some frustrations that have built up over the past few months. I know who reads my journals and I also know that many of those which this is directed at will never read it, so it's purely a relief from grinding my teeth in private disconsolance, knowing that people who actually care and have similar opinions will be able to empathize.
The major disappointment, was being given the impression that I had made new and trustworthy friends, but instead finding that I was merely a tool for someone else to acheive their agenda.
I dislike being treated like a fool. But as a pacifist, I fear that perhaps my aversion to creating conflict leaves me open to manipulation. This is ok, because my eyes, or rather, my mind sees more than is probably realised.
This does remind me of an old friend from when I was a teenager. A curious story this.
Back then, we had a fairly chaotic social group, many of us into the bad shit of drugs and the like. A lot of backstabbing betrayals went on.
One of these friends went out to rip me off, over a period of months. I'm not stupid and I notice it straight away, but I care about this guy and while I am on my out of this depressive and addictive state, he is fully submerged and in a place that I wished to avoid.
So I let it slide. It's no biggie for me. But for him, it levelled a guilt which brought him to tears. Why was this? Why should a smack addict care a damn about ripping off a mate?
Probably because I fed and clothed him and offered a roof when he had nowhere to run to after robbing his parents. I could see that he was in trouble, but with my own situation and young age, wasn't really capable of doing anything more than offering a free hand of friendship, no conditions, no bullshit and only genuine concern for where he was headed, where he already was.
Later, he came to me after a few beers and couldn't get the words out to apologise. He knew that he was a fuck up and he clearly was sorrowful at betraying someone that he trusted.
While it wasn't a great situation for either of us, I still felt a desire to help him, even though I knew the terrible things he had done to me.
And they were terrible, personal hurts on occassion. Some of these things got us in trouble with the law and others left me physically and emotionally scarred.
But still, with all that, I could see the real person in there, the one that exists behind the illness, subsumed by a weight of psyche that he was unable to find a way out of. And with social workers and parents bearing down on him with constant criticism and little constructive efforts to help him break this cycle, he kept running away, not just from society, but from his own self. His demons were to strong for him to disperse himself.
I can see all of this at the same time as he was abusing our friendship. People would tell me what an awful shit he was and why I should stay away from him.
But who is the better person here? The one that punishes the person for a sickness and does nothing to try and resolve his issues? Or perhaps the one that suffers in order to hold even a small light to his darkness? Or is it himself, struggling to cope with a physical and psychological need, without a support structure sufficient to his real needs? One who has been cast adrift and left to work it all out for himself.
Maybe this is the right tactic. Sink or swim. Survive and get cleaned up, or die a junkie. Me, I made it out. He didn't. Why was that?
Because I reached a point where I could no longer support someone on a path to self-destruction. I had my own circumstances which dictated that I move away. After I left, he robbed his parents again and got sent down. I have no idea where he is now.
Don't get me wrong, I don't have any guilt complex over his fate, but I also do wonder if there was something more that could have been done to help him, since, for all his faults, he was little more than a boy facing a crazy fucked up world on his own.
Is there a moral to this rant? Perhaps the only one I can think of, is that people are never, ever as they originally seem, nor are they monsters because they want to be. People are brought to an attitude by their life events. Unfortunately, some of us suffer worse childhoods than others and for this, we should feel sympathy, perhaps even pity, as it is only humane to do so, despite whatever failings these people have.
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