Authenticity
Can we be authentically ourselves in a society that rewards performance? A society that divides us into groups based on stereotypes? Or is there a little part of everyone’s subconscious
that prevents us from being 100% us because of those stereotypes? Do we have the capability to be ourselves even without the societal pressures? What does it even mean to “be yourself”?
Our society puts people into boxes based on the way they act, look, talk, their education, their income, their interests, careers, hobbies, past, etc. Anything that can be judged, will be. Is it on purpose, though? Or do we as humans put people into boxes without even realizing it?
Truth is, we have been taught since we were little that these boxes exist. Whether in a positive or negative way, we have grown to be aware of these boxes. If you fit into them the rightway, it might be easier to forget about them, or even easier to disregard or belittle those who don’t fit in quite the same way. This reinforces the boxes, making them stronger and making it easier for people to be grouped. Even me writing about them right now could be subconsciously strengthening them in my own mind, and you reading about them could be doing the same in yours.
When a box is reinforced, the people within that box feel more pressured to stay in it. They start to internalize the fact that they are part of that box, and make it into part of their personal identity. For example, doing a club in school with certain stereotypes, like how people think that kids who are in football are automatically strong and can take a punch, this might make the kids in football feel as though they have to live up to that stereotype. They have to become strong, they have to be able to take that punch. If they start to slip out of the box now that it is stronger, it is much easier for people to notice. People outside of the box might find it harder to move in,or view the box as more contained. This is where groups of society seem to all “look and act the same”. The pressures have just built up over time into something that becomes very obvious to outsiders.
Another thing to take into account with societal norms is unintentionalpeer pressure. No matter what, everything that you do with someone else present is at least somewhat based on who is there. This is because of the observer effect. Anytime you are being watched or observed, you will either purposely or subconsciously “fix” or adjust your behavior accordingly. Is your teacher there? You have to act more professional, and politely. Is your friend there? You have to try to act cooler or funnier. Are your parents there? You have to act more respectful and behave. Even if you don’t think you’re falling for peer pressure, you are. And even if someone isn’t trying to pressure you in any way, they are.
Society having an impact on the way a person behaves isn’t new at all. The reason we are so susceptible to peer pressure in the first place could possibly go all the way back to the hunter-gatherer era. If you were to be rejected from a group, it would be harder to find all the resources you needed to survive alone. So the feeling of needing to fit in to protect ourselves came in handy. This feeling carried on throughout the rest of human history up until today. Fitting in today protects us from bullying, being made fun of, or just being rejected from a certain group of friends. So is fitting in necessarily a bad thing? If not being 100% ourselves protects us, what’s so wrong with it?
This question is hard to answer. Some people would even argue that certain societal pressures are beneficial. Like feeling pressured to study in class, clean your room when your parents ask you, and wanting to make new friends on the first day of school. So if there are pressures that can help us, is it still affecting our authentic selves negatively? By getting rid of all negative societal pressures are we still affected by the positive ones in a negative way?
If we have never even been 100% ourselves, how could we know what we are like for certain? Since our personalities have been changing to fit in with the norms pretty much since we developed one, that technically means a lot of us might have not even met ourselves. How would you truly act with someone if they would support you no matter what? Not just someone who accepts you as much as your mother, she still has an impact on you being able to be truly you. I mean if someone truly accepted anything that you did, any joke you made, any clothes you wear, any music you listen to, any interests you have at all whatsoever.
If you don’t know the answer to that question, you’re not the only one. Even if it truly is impossible to ignore all of the pressures ever, what would happen if we did? Hypothetically, our society could be radically different.
Societal norms go all the way from table manners, what we think it means to “be respectful”, to cultural traditions and holidays. Society has accepted us putting random gifts under a tree for kids and telling them an old man came to their house and planted them there, but only in December. We as a society behave in very odd ways, and it really goes to show how much we truly thrive off of validation from others.
What does it even mean to be truly authentic to yourself? Even the way we think has been pressured or changed in some way, from being taught that certain things are “good” or “bad” like saying a random compliment to a stranger is always “good”, or being mean to someone for something they wear is always “bad”, to being taught about religion and spirituality. So does this mean that even though we think we are being authentic to ourselves that it is actually just society making us think that we are? Even so, what even are our “authentic selves”?
Is it our choices, our personality, our looks, our background, our inner thoughts, our deepest secrets? Our authentic self could even be all of that mixed together into a big self-smoothie. Maybe authenticity isn’t escaping societal norms, but accepting that we must succumb to at least a few of them.