Social Pressures and Individuality

“When we tell people they are a good match, they act as if they are. Even when they should be wrong for each other.” Christian Rudder #ChristianRudder #Okcupid #Dataclysm

Christian Rudder in his book, Dataclysm: Who We Are (When We Think No One's Looking), discusses how individuals do not demonstrate their individuality when representing themselves socially. Rudder shared his perspective analyzing the results of the data  from his previously owned website #okcupid. His findings were that when men tend to indicate their interest in women between the ages 40-55 on a social forum, they are actually not viewing profiles of that age range but of 20 year old girls. His book also revealed other findings of how people act differently in social setup! #audiencecontrol

Is it social pressure?

Social pressures and individuality have always been in a constant crash!! :) Christian Rudder's book brought to my mind again the theme of categorization, human end products, individuality and different ingredients!!

Anyways, sometimes I wonder walking down the aisle of a supermarket whether I will find a product with the exact amount of ingredients that I am looking for! Would I have to add an ingredient to it? Would I have to change something about it? Was the advertisement adequate? Did the advertisement indicate what my needs are? Is the advertisement making me buy something that I don't even need?

The world is becoming a market where everyone is trying to sell something or themselves! People market their skills and talents. Resumes, profiles on social media and dating sites all are examples of it.  Navigating through some of the resumes and profiles I noticed selling strategies. I have never read anyone ever stating that they are unattractive, ugly, awful at a task or it is difficult for them to live up to a pressurizing situation. No one ever claims that under stress they get panic attacks. I mean if they do, will anyone buy them or what they are selling! I mean hire them or ask them out on a date!

Having said that, my social environment expects me to live a product life! People try to fit me in this Pakistani Christian category that I am not even aware of! I am not sure how to act for my audience! Sometimes, it is difficult to know what is expected of me. It is a shocker for people if I devotedly pray and then like to listen to pop, hip hop and jazz music. It is difficult for people to comprehend how a church going female who loves to debate on Christian theology listens to Lil Wayne ( not the cursing part/ however I love his messages). #Howtolove #LilWayne

It is unacceptable for people to have me act bold. When they see Pakistani in me. They want to see a submissive and timid woman who cannot express a word she feels. Even as an individual too, sometimes I have certain expectation from myself. I have observed how my personality changes in certain environment. For example,  raised and brought up in Pakistan and now living in United States of America, I do certain things in social settings which I would not do given I have to make an individual choice.

Furthermore, my recent obsession about the idea of categorization makes me ask the above questions and wrestle with some social theories. I feel that the need for the formation of categorization was intended for our good to store and retrieve information. However, this way of learning is becoming detrimental as it forces us to think in a certain pattern and hold certain expectations from the world, and ourselves.

We should use this formation of categorization reversely!  We should be conscious of our behavior of thinking in a pattern and accept it. Following acceptance of our behavior, we would be able to make decisions based on it.

After we stop our pattern and categorized thinking, we will stop expecting from a Pakistani, a Pakistani woman, a Pakistani Christian woman, a Pakistani Christian educated woman, a Pakistani Christian educated working woman, a Pakistani Christian educated working woman living with her parents and  a Pakistani Christian educated working woman living with her parents in United States of America.

Bertrand Russell well said! "So long as a man's spontaneous activities are such as all the tribe approves of and shares in, his initiatives is very little curbed by others within the tribe, and even his most spontaneous actions conform to the recognized pattern of behavior." ( The Role of Individuality)