Role Models
Monday, April 18th, 2005Here’s my obligatory philosophy entry - one has to be made every so often, after all! This is the beginning of a longer essay, and this is a horribly rough outline.
Anyhow, this entry is about role models. Specifically, the role models of today contrasted with the role models of yesterdays.
Just today my mom was talking about how we admire children for their honesty (to a degree) and their free spirited carefree-ness. What a sad day when children are perhaps the best role models for adults everywhere! Not to put down children, but the state they are in is not earned - it is not something tested by time or weathered by experience, it simply is what it is. This isn’t far removed from the reverance people have for beautiful people - people who were born with certain characteristics and were shown undue attention early in life simply based on their looks. The whole point being that a system of merit should be preferred over a system that disregards merit.
(the ideal of the role model of today contrasted with yesterday, adapted by a lecture by David Ciocchi in Spring 2005)
Back to the child example. A separate issue is also at play here: the nature of the role model itself. In years past, the role model was someone whose life’s actions were looked upon as good examples for what we out to aspire to be. They were the most practical models for us - not some unachievable height of fame and glory, but a practical example which we could realistically imitate. A famous example of this in the ancient world is Plutarch’s book The Lives (full title: the Lives of Illustrious Men). In each case the man is praised insofar as he has contributed to his society - to how much he has served society itself.
Today the role model is better said to be someone we are jealous of for attaining fame and glory. The famous actor or actress is admired so far as they are popular or have attained a great amount of wealth. By admiring them, even if we admire their acting, we are not actually admiring them and using them as an example for how we ought to live our own lives. A person might object - “what about people like Mother Teresa?”. Certainly we ought to admire her as a good person to follow, but in reality she is admired rather because she is the exception to the rule. Her selfless dedication to society is something that ought to be admired, and is - but is not followed as a sort of practical guide for how we ought to contribute to society.
When we come back to the admiration of traits in children, you can see how I was distrubed that we would even compare them to role models. Maybe calling them role models is a bit extreme, but nevertheless children have traits while we see as admirable, something that ought to be followed.
To put it bluntly: society today sees being childlike, content and happy - almost blissfully ignorant - as something to be desired over and above the person who has earned their way into a position that serves society as a whole, and has given their life to society over themselves. Is this bad? I definitely think it is. As I’ve often thought, maybe I was just born in the wrong time.