tolerance – Two Brothers Weblog

Greetings everyone! And for those of you who still may not recognize me… Yes, I am Mark Zuckerberg, and I’ll be your intellectual speaker this evening. First of all, I can’t tell you all what a thrill it is for me tonight, to be with all of you hard-working, down to earth, common folks… here at Martha’s Vineyard. Can we get that microphone turned up a little more please? Thank you guys. Well, I see we have the U.S. Representative for the great state of Massachusetts, Joe Kennedy and his family with us here tonight. Glad you could make it Joe! How are those kids? Alright! Can you people in the back hear me okay now? Yeh? That’s great! Wonderful… wonderful…

Well, I’m delighted to have this opportunity to address you all this evening, on the topic of peace and tolerance in this new age of ours, through digitally enhanced, thoughtful, and continuous concessionism, and how that facilitates the greatest coming together of civilized man in history, beginning right out there on Facebook… which I created. Thank you… thank you. No. Please… Hold the applause. Really… you’re much too kind.

The news for the present is far from what our generation would hope for, my faithful followers. I have hosted several conferences at my corporate headquarters this past year with the greatest philosophers and men and women in the mental and neurological disciplines of our time, and it has unfortunately been concluded that there is currently zero percent chance of achieving continual ‘peace and tolerance’ as defined by Webster, anytime, anywhere, within the confines of existing societal structures. An indication in my book that something’s gotta give.

Whether it’s peace in the real-world or the LCDs in the face, virtual world of social networking that I’ve hooked you all on, your brain’s easily pissed-off limbic system will continue to stay one step ahead of a practical lobotomy for now, and there simply isn’t enough Thorazine on the planet to knock the meanness out of every human being. In other words, I didn’t bring a magic peace potion in my pocket to send you home with tonight, so don’t post any threatening tweets to me tomorrow or I’ll ban your tukas from Facebook… unless you point a gun at me of course… in which case I’ll run like the Flash downstairs to the corporate bunker!

As for Facebook tolerance, the aforementioned experts also tell me that most of you are so buzzed on caffeine, pills, or lack of sleep from morning ’til night, that you’ve got one eye permanently trained on the ‘Unfriend’ button, with your trigger finger on the mouse, itching to click the sucker or type “WTF?!” as soon as the next opposing comment shows up. So I began asking myself, “Mark, how is the whole, ‘Why can’t we all just get along’ thing ever going to work with already perpetual offense-defense wired brains that are now on steroids?”

Folks, raise your hands out there in the audience if you truly believe you can make it through an entire year on Facebook, without either inadvertently offending or taking issue with someone by giving voice to your now ‘has to be wrong’ belief systems and refusing to surrender unconditionally to that wonderful blameless soul’s last 20 agitating comments, and so prevent the loss of yet another ‘never met before’ friend being tossed out with yesterday’s trash. I see three hands way in the back there. Well, I’m sorry to inform you three, but the timeline of human behavioral patterns says you won’t be able to do it for 365 days in a row because both you and your friend’s emotions are lurking behind the brain’s ancient amygdala, waiting to jump out and see how fast they can open or shut the door in your faces; and it only gets exacerbated in the virtual world as one habitually perceives the other as never quite up to their level of knowing and in need of being shown the real facts of the matter. Shame on you barbaric cave dwellers! Catch up with the times why don’t ya.

Now here’s an original Zuckerberg idea I came up with last month that we can all get our minds around. Tomorrow you all deposit twenty-five dollars in one of my banks, and whoever comes out walking on water after twelve months of total non-confrontation, including typing words that can be taken more than one way, to a ‘not as close as you thought’ friend, takes it all? Naturally, I’ll put a clause in the rules that states if no one wins, I get to keep the money and use it to buy up all the available stock in Apple… just because I can. I’ll come back to this idea later.

Barring catastrophe, no typical American grade school kid has learned any more as a child than I did about the brain’s terrifying emotional capacity. We lived right across the street from the school when I was growing up and I first began learning about peace and tolerance at the early age of seven. There was a bully named Jimmy Decker in second grade that would corner me at recess. Every day he would knock me down, take the lunch money out of my pants pocket, and then spit in my face. My mom told me to tell him, “Give peace a chance.” I came home the next day with a broken tooth and a busted lip, and she asked me what happened. I said, “I told Jimmy to, give peace a chance”, and he said, “Give me a chance at a piece of your sister and I’ll only take your lunch money on Tuesdays.” “Then he punched me in the mouth and took my lunch money.”

That was the year of my greatest epiphany. My mom always got weekends off from work, so early one Saturday morning I took mom’s credit card from her purse before she woke up, hopped the bus over to Radio Shack and bought a pair of walkie talkies and hid them under my bed when I got back. I slipped the credit card back in mom’s purse while she was over at the new neighbors playing bridge, and hurried upstairs to my room to work out the details of my master plan.

The following Friday, mom came screeching into the driveway from work in the middle of the day after getting a call from principal Powell, wanting to know if the reason I had been absent from school all week was because I had the same flu that was sending all the other kids home sick. She burst into my room screaming, “Why have you been skipping school all week young man?!” Confidently I said, “I no longer require the physical accouterments of continuing education mother. I duck taped a voice-activated walkie talkie with a five-year battery under the teacher’s desk, and now I can do my lessons without ever leaving the house, so the solution to the Jimmy Decker enigma and your ever-growing fiscal loss of lunch money has been handily resolved at the same time.” Pretty clever huh.

I had to ride with her in the back seat to return the walkie talkies and was grounded for the entire summer for lifting mom’s credit card, but the potential of my concept of learning things remotely stuck with me like glue on flypaper from then on. Oh, I’m sorry folks. I digressed there didn’t I… It’s a Zuckerberg thing. Where was I?

Human aspirations of living in a perpetually harmonious society have remained globally elusive because even though we know what that word ‘peace’ implies, our unharnessed, emotion-driven brains will never be capable of pulling it off, twenty-four-seven… even if we all lived to be five-hundred years old! And greed is one of the biggest culprits right up there at the top of the human frailties ladder, requiring no teaching whatsoever. It just sprouts right out of the brain as a toddler. By the way, “I ate my ice cream, and now I want yours… plus that yellow Tonka truck you’re loading playsand into with mom’s tablespoon and making all those engine noises with your mouth. I can do that better than you can. That’s not even how an engine sounds. It goes, “brrrrrr…brumm brumm, chhhtt.”

The only snowstorm chance in Hades for any semblance of tolerance on this earth while clinging to our grandparents’ ridiculous ancient values, would be to continuously concede with no drugs or alcohol while maintaining that silly, “We the People” nonsense at the same time… on every topic, everywhere, continuously, which would be ungoverned chaos with unrelenting brain fire. Anyway, that’s how it was explained to me by the experts, so I’m reasonably certain about that…

Okay everyone… This is the part of the evening I’ve been waiting for. It’s time to unveil the grand ‘Mark Zuckerberg Solution’! I present for your approval this evening, my ultimate plan that will finally achieve peace and contentment in our technologically advanced time. It’s really not that difficult to grasp, but you may want to take notes so you can ask the AIs in the back questions later.

We begin this massive planet-wide undertaking by implementing some long-overdue changes. The complete agenda is much too lengthy to be addressed here tonight but here are a few of the ones that are at or near the top of the list so you can get the general scope of it. Included in the plans early stages are the following items. A merging of all independent nations the size of Israel and smaller to streamline geographical governing areas, establishing a new global hybrid form of socialism to ensure equality (hooray!), euthanizing cranky old people, required annual mood-altering vaccinations, and hopefully down the road, mandatory ‘genetic amygdala alteration’ or ‘GAA’ during infancy to eventually replace the vaccinations; and when we finally achieve the new calmer, non-argumentative peaceful order of homo sapiens that has eluded us since the dawn… well then, peace will finally reign on Earth, Family Feud and Marriage Bootcamp will be the number one rated TV shows… and my Facebook will be smooth sailing for everyone, all the time! There just won’t be any more of that nasty, ridiculous old divisive stuff hindering us and causing harmful stress and anxiety… not to mention the constant damage to the body’s antioxidants and such.

Well, that concludes my presentation. I love you all so much, and thanks for leaving your yachts for a while and coming out this evening! Don’t forget to pick up one of our beautiful newly designed Facebook tee-shirts at the tables in the lobby on your way out. We’ve got plenty of the new spill-proof 5X size for all you sedentary Facebook and Coke junkies, and they’re a real steal at only seventy-five dollars each. You can also buy them online anytime, and the shipping is free… when you order a minimum of four shirts. Also, we’ve set up 100 AI terminals in the back to answer all your questions. Just place your hand on the recognition pad to your right and state the last four digits of your social security number when prompted. Easy as pie!

Goodnight Everyone,
Mark Zuckerberg

Over the past couple of years I have determined two specific points. First, PEOPLE are dynamic. By design or accident we share the same DNA allele structure. We, a single ‘race’ of bipedal silicon bags of mostly water humanoids, have experienced both biological-genetic and psycho-social cultural drifts but we are still the same. These drifts bring behavior decisions that Kottak (2003, p. 13) called ‘Universals’; decisions based on human experience influences. Second, each of us IS IMPORTANT! Life really should be ‘A PEOPLE THING!’

This two-part perspective leads me to think that, boiled down to a single point, there are ‘no’ naturally occurring barriers to diversity. All roadblocks to diversity are PEOPLE-decision caused. There are many ‘detours’ that may be blamed (geography, cultural, etc), yet each detour is inter-related to PEOPLE decisions. I would speculate that these roadblocks or detours are covered by a single umbrella. Barriers are ‘learned’ behaviors. Within this thought I see three key societal influences that impact PEOPLE-decisions toward diversity.

First, some people are reared in an environment where diversity is frowned upon and sometimes downright despised. This is a society where the people do not know any different. In these cultures the normative of no-diversity is valid, not abnormal psychology. Some cultures actually euthanize disfigured babies, ‘wrong’ gender babies, and the old-folks who have become burdensome. For many years people groups of SE & SW Asia would euthanize babies of mixed tribe or cultural heritage. My interest and activities in multiple mission trips opened my eyes to these realities. This society breeds the leader who will either never accept diversity in the workplace, or may accept it under protest and then start the undertow of contention.

Second, some people are reared in an environment that realizes people are different but teaches that different peoples are ‘inferior’ or „superior‟. Similar to the warped thinking many Caucasian people felt, and maybe still feel, about people of color. This is not a Caucasian vs. non-Caucasian issue; evidence the Black-on-Black or Latino-on-Latino gang murders. This trait was evidenced by the mistreatment by U.S. citizens against U.S. citizens of Asian descent during WW II. This trait carries into cultic groups; north vs. south, Yankee vs. Rebel, inner-city vs. rural, inner-city gang vs. gang, political liberal vs. conservative. This trait lends to the ‘glass-ceiling’ within the corporate structures. This trait is akin to the first point, but the people of this behavior trait know better. This society breeds the leader who will accept and tolerate enforced diversity but will not really embrace the concept. This society breeds the leader who will accept and tolerate enforced diversity but will not really embrace the concept.

Third, some people are reared in an environment that realizes people are different but they do not know how to go about dealing with issues. Sometimes this is fear-based, sometimes based on lack of experience or knowledge.

Sometimes it takes codified action by law makers and the Courts to force the issue. These people want to do the right thing but don’t know what that is.

For example, many of the ‘Church'(cooperatively speaking) peoples of the world still do not know how to properly deal with people who make personal life decisions about personal behaviors. I offer how we see many ‘Church’ people pushing away the gay/lesbian/homosexual peoples and the ‘Church’ responses to single parents, divorced or separated by other cause, the non-traditional trend following teens, the pregnant unwed girl, and others. (CCCU Advance; IPHC Experience)

Having slapped this group, this society breeds the leaders who will embrace diversity proactively and encourage others to do the same once they understand the multiple positive elements diversity brings and the steps to follow.

All three of these influences fall under the single umbrella I see as the individual’s (the leader’s) religious perspectives. There is a pattern of thought within the religious and secular communities that understands, “We are not human beings living a spiritual experience, but rather spiritual beings living a human experience”. (cited by Mancini, 2004). This is NOT a Bible-thumping thought. The learned behavior is based on Spiritual teachings and subsequent personal interpretation of those teachings. Being a-religious is actually a religious perspective and therefore directly influences personal decision making.

It is the Spiritual aspects of our beings that make us ‘who’ we are. These aspects drive our personal and professional behavior patterns at work, play, school, where-ever. Who we are behind closed doors will eventually display who we are in public arenas. I am emphasizing the PEOPLE aspect of each of us.

Maslow followed this logic in development of the hierarchy of needs. The highest of the Maslow needs are people-behavior based.

Pavlov determined that the theory of conditioned response could be broken by decision making that followed reasonable logic. Behaviorists like Skinner and Erikson (Vander Zanden, 2000) made allowances for the Spiritual impact toward human behavior and development. Erikson even modified his human development schemes to allow for changing Spiritual development within PEOPLE. I guess Erikson understood that PEOPLE are dynamic.

I would never argue that we should all believe the same religious principles. However, all of the U.N. recognized and accepted religions have value of life and value of life and equality in treatment of people threads.

These threads, value of life and equality of treatment, cross all religious boundaries and are part of what make us ‘who’ we are. This is foundational to achieving true diversity, the proverbial melting-pot. The value of life and equality of treatment, cross all religious boundaries and are part of what make us ‘who’ we are. This is foundational to achieving true diversity, the proverbial melting-pot.

In summary, there are no naturally occurring barriers to diversity. All barriers or detours toward diversity are PEOPLE-decision based. Societal and Spiritual influences are foundational to decision making and lend to producing three types of leaders: 1) the leader who will either never accept diversity in the workplace, or accept it under protest and then start the undertow of contention; 2) the leader who will accept and tolerate enforced diversity but not really embrace the concept; 3) the leader who, once they understand the multiple positive elements true diversity brings, will embrace proactively and encourage others to do the same. The roadblocks or detours preventing diversity are PEOPLE-decisions based.

In closing, I recall that PEOPLE are dynamic. Meaning: Learned behavior can be unlearned and replaced by new learned behavior.

If we are going to continue to thrive as a Nation then we must get past any discussion of the ethnicity or gender of our political candidates?

Good, reliable, ethical leadership is not an ethnic or gender issue!

Thanks for listening.

Ref:

CCCU Advance. (Fall, 2004). Beyond Color. Council for Christian Colleges and Universities. Washington, DC.

IPHC Experience. (April, 2005) (Multiple Issues). LifeSprings Resources. Franklin Springs, GA.

Kottak, C.P. and Kozaitis, K.A. (2003). On Being Different: Diversity and Multiculturalism in the North American Mainstream. Second Ed.

Mancini, F. (2004). Mind, Body and Soul; A Common Sense Approach To Optimal Wellness. Pro-Solutions for Healthy Living. Vol. 2, Issue 3, p. 2. Mind, Body and Soul; A Common Sense Approach To Optimal Wellness. Pro-Solutions for Healthy Living. Vol. 2, Issue 3, p. 2.

Vander Zanden, J.W. (2000). Human Development. 7th. Ed.New York. McGraw-Hill Higher Education. Ed.New York. McGraw-Hill Higher Education