For this week's blog, I believe it is necessary to evaluate a variety of topics including, but not limited to, identity, reality, and Catfish.
How individuals consider identity is extremely important when attempting to understand who they truly are and how they choose to represent themselves. As I attempted to articulate in last week's post, I mentioned something to the effect of all people being layered in such a way that sometimes makes it difficult to discern who they actually are. During my class's symposium, we discussed a seemingly worldwide phenomenon: people have many selves. These two points I have brought up may seem incredibly similar, but I found myself not agreeing with the latter statement. I don't believe in the idea of various selves within one, but rather one individual consciously choosing to emphasize or de-emphasize certain aspects of one's personality. For example, Dr. Johnson gave several instances during today's class to demonstrate the marvel of one person's many selves, saying you aren't the same person in class or church or even the club or with family. I disagree with this, explaining in class one chooses to utilize specific attributes one possesses in order to navigate a complex social interaction. I choose to display focus and enthusiasm in class, besides naturally feeling eagerness when learning new material, because it makes it easier to take on something initially unknown. I choose to be hushed and respectful versus noisy and energetic when I attend church or a club. I believe I am all these features and plenty others sometime or another because I am a multi-faceted human being.
Reality is a concept that the actual. What is instead of what is not. Identity skews reality in some strange sense, because if someone identifies in such a way that is in opposition of how another views them, there is a kind of deception that is felt. This reminds me of Sartre's the Homosexual Friend. In that example, a man who has gay tendencies denies that part of himself, saying he's much more than for whom he falls. His friend was angered that he couldn't just admit what he knew to be the truth. Sartre finds them both at fault; the homosexual man for denying his obviously authentic self and the frustrated friend for seeking to force an identifier on his associate. Were they right about anything? If so, who was more right? There is something unclear about the reality they both claim they have. Identity and reality form and mold together in abstract ways that have immense difficulty in untangling.
Catfish is a perfect example of this intricacy. In the documentary, a young named Nev forges a relationship with an 8-year-old artist named Abby. He then befriends her family on Facebook, specifically her mother Angela and sister Megan. Nev, a man who lives in New York City, develops a flirty relationship with 19-year-old Meg, who lived in Nowheresville, Michigan. Eventually, he catches Megan in a lie about her singing recordings. He unravels an entire web of lies fabricated by someone they don't know. He keeps up the charade with Meg and decides to take it a step further. He visits the family in Ishmapeg, Michigan. He finds the house he sent Megan's gifts to, and drives by "Abby's" gallery. He and his film crew drop by the family's house and finds a family he doesn't recognize. The mother-- a woman clearly obsesses with Nev, takes them to a beach house, where Nev meets Abby and one of her friends that don't even know Megan. They also disclose Abby isn't an artist. Nev now has confirmation that Angela has created this entire world. He confronts her about it, and she tells him everything. Admitting to all the lies, she explains how she's had a hard life, needed an outlet, and begs his forgiveness. Nev is extremely understanding and remains friends with the 'real' Angela.
Who is the 'real' Angela? Angela would say she's kind, artistic, and lively. So many would call her deceptive, mediocre, and mundane. Who is right? Which is fictive and who is genuine? Is she all these things or none of them?
7 comments:
While I do find your views on reality highly insightful I must disagree with you. Reality is something shared by everyone, for instance if someone has died that person is dead to every last person in the world, in reality he is dead. Therefore when someone brings identity into reality it is a little paradoxical. Identity is literally centered around "I" a singular. However, reality is something shared by everyone, a "We" if you will, which is "I"s opposite. I'm basically saying its a "I" vs "We" thing. I feel identity must always be separated from reality because the way you see yourself is up to opinion, just as the way I see you is up to opinion. It is like a "beauty is in the eye of the beholder" type of thinking.
While I do find your views on reality highly insightful I must disagree with you. Reality is something shared by everyone, for instance if someone has died that person is dead to every last person in the world, in reality he is dead. Therefore when someone brings identity into reality it is a little paradoxical. Identity is literally centered around "I" a singular. However, reality is something shared by everyone, a "We" if you will, which is "I"s opposite. I'm basically saying its a "I" vs "We" thing. I feel identity must always be separated from reality because the way you see yourself is up to opinion, just as the way I see you is up to opinion. It is like a "beauty is in the eye of the beholder" type of thinking.
I agree completely with your understanding of us humans being multifaceted instead of different selves as was argued in class. As you put it, we cannot navigate the complex social interactions which we take part in everyday with just one form of acting or behaving, and the different ways in which we act for example in church as opposed to a club, are actually the same person using different parts of our personality's.
While you say people choose to exemplify certain aspects of themselves in certain situations, I must say that even though there are many, I believe people have core characteristics that display them better than others. Would you disagree?
I totally agree with this! If she's lied about everything else, how can you tell the truth from the lies. Are we the sum of our truths? Do we become the sum of our lies?
I totally agree with this! If she's lied about everything else, how can you tell the truth from the lies. Are we the sum of our truths? Do we become the sum of our lies?
I'm not sure if we can comment back, but to address you, Jack Charbonnet, I would have to disagree. I don't think of people as having a single characteristic that outshines all the others. I see them as a plurality, a combination of the many attributes they possess.
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