Downfall of being Authoritative

Authoritativeness

When I was really young, around the age of 6, I remember getting hit by a thin narrow piece of stick on my hands for not being able to do something in class. It was a long time ago, so I don’t remember specifically, and this was in Bangladesh. But it was standardized for a teacher to have the sticks as a form of authoritative control. This was so to ignite fear into the students that disobeyed. So today, I feel like discussing the authoritativeness of systems that still exist throughout the world. I want to specifically discuss why this is killing creativity and how it’s developing the wrong mentality for people that exist in less affluent societies.

Creativity

The notion that telling kids to do stuff rather than teaching them is something that troubles me. By using physical pain as a method of deterrence, kids are still taught in some countries to follow orders rather than how to think independently. Being authoritative works to calm down a group of people, as a leader. Which is understandable, since people trust an authoritative voice when they’re unsure about what to do. But when it comes to the individual, without empathy, authoritativeness just attracts miscommunication. When individuals follow laws just cause they know otherwise there’s punishment is a fallible philosophy. The existence of laws is something that’s needed in today’s society. But I think they should be rules that people should follow because they understand what it means rather than it being a form of punishment. 

Creativity is lost

By having a strict authoritative figure, I believe people in general lose creativity. That’s because of the existence of mirror neurons. I discovered mirror neurons while reading Ramachandran’s Tell-Tale Brain. I was very intrigued by the idea of neurons, cells of the brain, reacting to something that’s happening to somebody as if it’s happening to oneself. It made me question all of reality to an extent. I realized babies learn by modeling the world. Baby’s look at their surroundings and mimic everything they see. The sounds, the actions of their parents, and the actions of others. So in this case, it seems like babies have very high reactive mirror neurons. But, it seems to me, that mirror neurons don't diminish as we grow older, but rather, we are desensitized by society based on what we are exposed to. 

I still react very badly to blood when I see it, but I think my extreme reaction is a result of the pain that I endured because I broke my leg 3 times. So seeing blood, is mentally traumatizing for me. So my mirror neurons are still very active in that regard because I have a specific memory that I go back to. But in our current society, people are exposed to everything because of tv. Some of the worst things that happen nowadays are amplified because you can visually see it in front of the tv. But I don’t think mirror neurons are highly reactive, in this regard, because we’ve been desensitized by the concept of tv that everything in tv is foreign to us. When we can personally relate to an event, then the mirror neurons act up. So personal related memories are crucial for the activation of mirror neurons. Which means mirror neurons are specifically activated and grow based on experiences.

Now back to the topic of creativity, I believe when we are young, the more authoritative of an environment we are raised in, the more desensitized we become to the idea of exploration. Our mirror neurons value the authoritativeness to the point where we stop questioning the validity of authority. Our mirror neurons grow to the point where fear is embedded based on what we were exposed to as a child. So having a fear based authoritative figure actually hinders our ability to grow as people. I’ve come to the conclusion that it actually lessens empathy. Because if fear is embedded into our minds, then the ability to creatively take the perspective of another’s mind is also hindered. Our ability to question authority disappears and we become followers because fear has made it possible for our mirror neurons to not react.

Empathy

Empathy

Empathy happens because of mirror neurons. At least, from my understanding of cognitive neuroscience. I believe empathy occurs when we can relate to another’s action. When somebody does something, we can realize what they're doing because we’ve gone through similar situations. It doesn’t necessarily mean that we had the exact same situation. But it means that we can creatively think through what the possible scenario is. Empathy requires listening to the other person. It requires understanding emotion. Mirror neurons are activated at a higher rate when specific emotions are detected. So it makes sense why people remember the happiest, saddest, angriest, and all the other emotionally enhanced memories more than memories when we are content. By empathizing with people, we learn to cooperate more. And as the world becomes a big forum, it'll be interesting to see how the cooperation of different nations proceed. I think ultimately, the people who are creative and can empathize will be the people who initiates the cooperation. People who are desensitized by authority probably will have the hardest time cooperating. Because they will have a harder time understanding other people's point of view. Because they have been exposed to the harshest authoritative people. Change thus becomes something that they fear because creativity was under-developed from childhood.

Resources used during writing:

Creativity

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CGLUzYUKhTs

Ramachandran

http://greatergood.berkeley.edu/article/item/do_mirror_neurons_give_empathy