Josh’s growing list of differences with mainstream American culture

February 15, 2012 by Joshua
in Awareness, Blog, Freedom, Leadership

I’ve noticed many of my values differ from what I see in mainstream American culture. See how yours differ too.

What I call mainstream may differ from what you call mainstream and at times I deliberately overstate the mainstream American view to parody it.

Category “Mainstream” American view (oversimplified)
Josh’s view (oversimplified)
Jobs Horrible way to waste your time. A necessary evil we have to endure. A source of challenges to overcome and people to collaborate with.
Exercise Torture. You inflict it on yourself for a few weeks after New Years, then forget about it. Fun way to pass times with friends. Rewarding source of discipline that gives to everything else in life. Maintains appetite, focus, sleep, mood.
Science No idea what it is, but people who do it are weird. Often dangerous. Exploration of nature based on curiosity, experimentation, and honest reporting of results.
Cars Freedom! Dirty, pollute, congest cities, isolate people from each other.
Disney Creators of cute, family-friendly animations. Control hungry, mean to employees, devoid of taste, teaches kids myopic values.
Vegetables Annoying things we’re supposed to eat for some reason but we don’t like. Delicious!
Sugar Delicious! The unhealthy part left over when you take the healthy parts out of food.
Gays Weird people with threatening behavior. Why do they have to get in our faces? Neighbors.
Consenting adults in private Should be regulated. Not my business.
Religion Foundation of morality. Foundation of everything. Not my business.
Alcohol Dangerous destroyer of lives Scotch is a pinnacle of civilization, wine a delicious accompaniment to a meal, beer a delicious beverage. In general, a pleasant way to bring people together.
Free market Foundation of American business. Interesting ideal, unrelated to much practiced in American business.
Sex Dangerous, life-threatening activity. intimate, enjoyable, often fun way to interact, share vulnerabilities, get closer.
Entrepreneurship Far-off dream. Would love to do it if only came up with that perfect idea. Amazing first exposure to business. Ideas worth pursuing are everywhere.
Copyright How else can artists be paid for their work? Constitution balanced creators’ interests with society’s. Corporate interests have shifted balance toward themselves. Now used to make creators into gravy train for corporations at the expense of culture.
Obesity Normal Imbalance between eating and exercise.
Obesity epidemic People are lazy. Inevitable result of allowing meat, dairy, sugar, drug, advertising, and other industries to control government regulations and subsidies.
Microsoft Paragon of business success, enabler of personal computing. Multiply-convicted monopolist that thwarted otherwise faster growth of personal computing through anti-competitive behavior and lobbying.
Apple Paragon of beautiful design. Makes computers that make you creative. Designers of planned obsolescence. Wants to be like Microsoft in business.
New Age [Is there a mainstream view of New Age? I only know it makes a lot of money] Feeble minded
Money Must get it! Determines your value as a person. Medium of a type of social exchange. As long as you earn more than you need, not that big a deal.
Stuff Must have more! Try to acquire less and get rid of non-essentials.
Nutrition Huh? Foundation of delicious and healthy diet.
Population growth Most important goal of humanity If unchecked, one of main dangers to civilization as we know it.
Discipline What’s that? Foundation of personal development and rewarding emotions.
Meat Food! Not food.
Chocolate cake Why on earth would I not eat it if it’s there? Unhealthy but tempting. Effective place to practice exercising discipline.
Patriotism Good and right. We’re the best! Like racism.
Recycling Why don’t those self-righteous do-gooders stop telling me what to do? If you can’t reduce your consumption or reuse something else, your most effective alternative to polluting other people’s environment.
More versus less More Less
Physics What’s that? Basic understanding of how our world works.
Energy Woo-woo mysterious stuff we’re all made of. Force times distance.
Conservation of energy Huh? One of the most fundamental principles all laws of physics follow. Related to everything we do all the time.

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1 response to “Josh’s growing list of differences with mainstream American culture

  1. Pingback: What I learned from football ads | Joshua Spodek

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