The Three Sections of Cynicism

[forsythferret]

I work at B&N, as I've mentioned before. And there are four sections of the store that make me feel the most cynical. Three of them are for largely the same reason, the fourth is the politics section, since a lot of screeds get shelved there that really should go in fiction, what with how much relations they have to reality

Comments

[frustratedpilot]

In one of the Joseph Campbell books, perhaps The Power of Myth or Transformations of Myth Through Time, he related this folk tale from Africa about a god who walked around with a hat on, and the hat was a different color to whomever saw it. He wore this hat for no other purpose than to cause people to argue and fight over what color it was.

I think about this story a lot these days.

[kalifla]

I know he referenced it in The Hero With a Thousand Faces at least once. I remember a bit about that story.

[forsythferret]

I think you're talking about Eshu. He showed up in Trickster Makes This World too.

[kalifla]

It works because they believe it will work. And that's not always a bad thing.
In some cases, it saves a lot of money. :)

[forsythferret]

That's exactly my point. For some things, it's just a matter of thinking it'll work, and the book or whatever giving you a plan that you can work with, even if it's almost identical to every other one out there.

There's quite a few times though where it doesn't work, and thinking it'll work isn't the only thing that'll fix it. And many of them won't work for a lot of people, and the things convinve people they can't fix things themselves without some "system" or "expert" or whatever. So most of the books, most of the time, are a waste, was my point. And, along with the not caring if they work thing, is why they annoy me.

[dirkdada]

honestly, I don't think that hokem works for anybody. They just think it does long enough to write back enthusiastically. Kinda like faith healing. A little old lady acts healed because everyone around her wants her to be healed, she wants to be healed and doesn't want to disappoint everyone else. So adrenalin sets in and she throws away her walker.

Then after the cameras are gone, her hip gives way.

[dirkdada]

My cynicism meter broke the day I saw the book "What Would Machiavelli Do?" in the business section.