I was listening to a TED podcast today, about violence and the influence of imprisonment. I quote “They put them in humiliating uniforms, with numbers on them. We take away their individuality, they are noting but a number” “The whole point is for the authorities to take away their freedom” And this shocked me, not because it is a shocking act to be done, but because they call taking away individuality humiliating, And it reminds me of myself, especially my times in jr. high school. Im asian, and in my country, there’s no school without uniform. We have to sew a series of numbers on our uniforms, the year you’re in, the class you’re in, and your “seat number”. Seat numbers have nothing to do your seat, but are what teachers (and some classmates) refer you as. If you are good enough or memorable enough, they might call your real name, or they will just look at your shirt and call your number. I often got the number 42 for some reason. “No.42, come get your test sheet.” "No.42, go empty the bin and clean the floor" There’s on average 40~50 people in each class, and everyone looks a same. My jr. high school has a style regulation. Male, flattop no longer than 1.5cm. Female, hair no longer than the lower edge of one’s ears. No piercing. No makeup is allowed. No dyeing unless your hair isn’t black. Everyone should have black hair, and according to the authorities, as a normal person would. During my high school times, the principal often reenforces how normal people with regular rise loose grey pants, no make up, and black hair are the good ones, how everything else are for deviants, and how abiding by the authorities will give you a bright future. There’s no wonder how every kid in Taiwan want’s to be a doctor, every kid in India want’s to be a engineer, and every kid in China want’s to be a lawyer. We are told to look like, act like, be like what was expected. We want to become these socially respected people not because it’s our dream but because it’s what society values. We all heard about our moms saying how her friend’s son is a lawyer, makes so much money, and made his family proud. I’m not that proud of my culture, for how much control we live through. That control creates a gap between expectation with reality, because everyone in reality is inherently different. If you discourage individuality, how can people develop a healthy way of thinking in a clone factory? I’m not a kid by definition anymore, and I value self actualization more than society expectation. These are my thoughts inspired by a talk, not really LGBT related, hope you find it interesting.
Societies that encourage the stripping down of people's individuality are, in my opinion, amongst the most dangerous in the world. It opens to door for groups of people to be influenced, exploited, and hampers their ability to make rational and critical thoughts.
In general, the asian countries have a very much "for the greater good" ethos.. ie, the individual is sacrificed for the success of the family/nation. I believe this is a good way to run an efficient machine, but a terrible way to service freedom and emotional development. mind you, it's the same everywhere really.. they are just more obvious examples.
That sounds absolutely horrifying. I'm a rather strong believer in individualism, so... for me... just imagining a place like that is High Octane Nightmare Fuel. Aside from some type of physical or emotional abuse, I can't really imagine something more damaging to children psychologically speaking. To be stripped of your individual identity is... just... insanely inhumane. Really, I'm not sure what else to say.
I've experienced something like this, though far less extreme that what you describe. It sounds horrific. Society is a group of connected individuals, but there's no point to it if it forces everyone to be the same.
I think it's more a case of the extreme conservatism in those countries. Most of those same countries (I assume that by Asian countries you mean China, Japan, the Koreas, rather than somewhere like Iran, Pakistan or Turkey) have had a history of extremely conservative political control (Japan was, until last century, under the rule of an emperor-worshipping war cult), and this is reflected in society. For example, in South Korea, this rank-and-file stuff usually comes on a dinner plate with other forms of discrimination - sexism, racism (ever heard of 'pure Korean blood' or 'pure Malay blood' before?), draconic family values and economic discrimination. I think we should also ponder what 'individuality' means, before people get accused of robbing it. Individuality could be used to describe being oneself, but it could also be to do with denying others equal opportunity (e.g. banning non-white people from stores - something also done frequently in South Korea).
