Avalon

Personality

Saturday, November 08, 2008

During sociology tutorial, the topics of discussion were family, gender and sex. The interesting part came when people were called upon to give opinion. (as always) Girls say things like "guys are single-minded (whatever that means)" and "I can't accept a house-husband because I cannot allow someone to be lazier than me (oh so does that mean housewives have been having the easier way out for so long..) And to think just moments ago we were debating on preset gender roles and gender discrimination. Well it just proves that nothing has really changed, even with raised awareness to these issues that are supposed to hopefully cultivate open-mindedness.

The atmosphere was relatively subdued until the tutor mentioned foreign policy and brought in foreign talents, which leads inevitably (or maybe purposefully) to the discussion of PRCS, and you know what, the class literally exploded into hives of conversation, or rather, condemnation. From more sociologically rational reasons like "foreign talents robbing citizens of opportunities and therefore making them feel like second-class citizens" to pure prejudiced lines like "they lack hygiene" and "it's just the way they talk." (And here the tutor made a verbal comparison between 怎么办 and 怎么办儿 and proceeded to question this supposed language barrier when the meaning is perfectly understood, but apparently the mood for flaming is ) Amidst all this the most appalling thing I feel is that noone even bothered to check if there were even any foreign students present and it was only until everything was said when it dawned upon the tutor whereby she asked for a show of hands to see if anyone's feelings were hurt. (Oops.. but noone there was one) Once again it just confirms one thing: people can find all sorts of reasons and magnify them exponentially just to draw the boundaries between the "them" and "us", and you can study all about stereotyping and generalising but nothing will change.

这实在是没有个性的年代。笑容要处理，服装除了得体要流行，行为就算没有危害性也须大众鉴定。让人不禁想问：是谁规定的？追求着外观上的特立独行，个性却像是某个样本的复制品。Man are born original, but why do we die as copies? And didn't Rosseau say "Man are born free; and everywhere he is in chains."

由得我小小的叛逆，深深地呼吸。

Envoy of the Stars @ 11:03 PM
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