More lessons by X on Human Worth

Right! Finally get the computer to myself. Yet even so I'm typing in the dark because my cousin's sleeping on the bed behind me. But who cares, I'm bored and if I don't get this in soon I never will.

Let me first address Vhemt's stand-the statement I ended my previous post with. You may have seen Strider's comments (see his site http://www.estelazure.blogspot.com/ for more) on how this is an unfair comparison-true, I'd say. But there is anther point Vhemt seems to have conveniently left out-that you WILL have SOME control over what your child turns out. And as a parent, YOU are the one to make sure that when your family has a child, you do NOT have it when both of you are 16+ and that when you have it, you ARE ready for the responsibilities that comes with the hectic task of bringing a new life into this world, need not have a foolproof formula on how to turn your child into the next Nobel Prize-winning president, but at least are willing to put in as much effort into it necessary so that he gets as close to that pinnacle of success as he can. Sure, it'd be well unfair for one to blame parents for people turning out as criminals, but don’t you think they’d have some control over their child's morals? It'd be easy enough for a parent to say oh, my son turned out bad because fate/genes (their genes)/etc made it so. But to follow the first rule of "Highly Effective Teens" by Sean Covey, YOU are the force, and should be willing to do as main things as possible in your circle of control (upbringing) to nullify those that are in your circle of no control (child’s innate character etc.) In other words, to use Vhemt’s statement as a reason for not having children is A DELEGATION OF PARENTAL DUTY.

Now I do not think there is anything wrong with this at all. It signifies that you know that a baby isn't just for Christmas. So what if one of our main instincts is to reproduce? Some of us have brains and you probably do. After all, as many parenting magazines would proclaim, motherhood ain't for wimps. Your parents probably had a right job to make you clever enough to be able to read and understand this, and giving you an internet and computer at your disposal as well at that! Not everyone will have the physical, emotional and temporal resources necessary to raise a child even to such a level and if you don't, do us a favour and don’t and let those who can and want to take over-for now.

On to the case of the Humboat Squid. Let us first examine how a typical animal would behave if placed in the fishermen’s position. It needs food, so it hunts-except the fishermen would hunt for cash. The squid are probably the most profitable to catch-large creatures with lots of expensive meat that is a delicacy in Japan so the animal bends over backwards to try to catch them. And this, my friends, is where the dividing line seems to be drawn.

The average animal, possessing the strength and agility of humans, would probably find the Humboats impossible to catch. Thus they either turn to another source for prey and leave the Humboats alone. Humans, however, have their defining weapon with them-their intelligence. They invent jigs-a brutal fishing method that makes the catching of them deadly efficient, and the story thus turns out as it is today.

You would by now have realized how the behaviour of a human is so similar to that of a normal animal. It would be unfair to blame the fishermen for hunting the Humboats to the best of their ability, yet say a lion hunting a deer is OK. The fishermen behaved exactly how their instincts told them to behave and any other animal would have behaved in the same way. There’s valuable prey, you try your best to catch it. Except the fishermen would prove more capable because they could invent jigs and thus be able to catch them more efficiently. This will reveal 2 main issues.

First, we realize how similar man is to animals. The immediate reaction to this is that it's a cynical view point that states that man is a lowly, animalistic life form. Whether or not this is true is now irrelevant, because I am going to ask you-why this assumption? Are you saying that all non-humans are lowly life forms? Seriously now, why all this prejudice against animals? From your backyard in your own little dog, at the zoo with monkeys that learn sign language or even with the normally surprisingly intelligent Humboats, animals aren't all as such! In other words, it doesn't seem that much degrading to realize that one’s behaviour is similar to an animal. The desire to thrive is not animalistic-it's motivation. Following intelligent instincts is not animalistic-it's intuition and from what I hear women find it a most useful tool. Neither is the desire to try your best to stay ahead-that's common sense! I mean, no one will deliberately lose in the Olympic Games, is (s)he?

OK, moving on. Just saw Ms Beautifuk's post on the tagboard made some time back, which alerted me to the fact that Vhemt's claim actually des not revolve around the well-being of the environment, since cancer and rape of human beings isn't the earth's business. However, I still feel that the same arguement applies-people want to get ahead, become comfortable etc, they bend over backwards to do that. Only thing that stops other animals from acting the same way is their limited intelligence, which brings me to my second point.

The fact that humans are the smartest creatures to walk this earth is exactly what has caused the environmental destruction. Perhaps Spider Man's cliched "With great power comes great responsibility" would come to mind here. We have a obligation to preserve the earth and the excuse that we are following our instinicts when we destroy it does not apply because we are well aware of this destruction. So as prevously established the smallest daily action further accentuates the fact that this responsibility has been delegated by many.

Vhemt's option of human extinction seems much like a suicide note by some frivolus teenager- "Oh, I am so damned the world has no use for me so farewell!" You nut-that's an even further delegation of your responsibility! Unless you're convinced you are unable to nurture your child into an environmentally-conscious indvidual, that is obviously still not an excuse. It is the humans' very intelligence that causes them(us?) to be in the best position to help with environmental restoration.

So I think its important to remember here what is within our circle of control. Idiotic and selfish corporate bigshots who dump toxic waste into oceans are not. Unfortunate it is that a few of them are all it takes to make an entire company of people guilty. The way you nurture your children and the time that you choose to have them, however, are, so control them wisely.

A 17 year old tallking about family planning and nurturing of children-now that IS weird!!!