Monday, March 17, 2014

Firewall words

It's amazing to me how much thought we are restricted from thinking because of how ideas have been packaged and presented to us.  Tools such as humiliation, praise, punishment, association, authority, etc are used to cause us to think, or not think a certain way about certain ideas.  There are words and ideas that create a sort of firewall around certain concepts.  Anarchy is one of those words.  When it comes up most people have been conditioned not to think beyond it because they have been told that anything regarding it is bad, etc.  So even if a very rational argument is presented, the fact that it is presented on the other side of the firewall means that the person will not even consider it, their mind unwilling to traverse the firewall and enter into a "restricted zone" of thought.  This is a way of controlling the thought lives of people and keeping their thoughts safely within what is acceptable and controllable.

I am struggling to find my own firewall words and learning to think through them and explore the ideas on the other side.  Not necessarily to accept those ideas, but at least to have a reason as to why I think they way I do about the idea.

Here is a quick list of some other firewall words I could think of off the top of my head. Some of which may trigger a mental shutdown in your mind with either a positive or negative connotation or possibly just a specific connotation, but in any case basically irrational and impulsive:

Constitution
Democracy
Federal
Anarchy
Pentagram
Muslim
Soda
Drugs
Medicine
Gay
Money
Jesus
Work
Church
Food
Democrat
Republican
Gun
Israel
Immigrant
Fuel
Country
Spirit
Authority
Law
Sin
God
School

Obviously I probably can't actually recognize the firewall words that I am currently being bound by because, well, they are firewall words and my mind won't go there.  What I am trying to do is notice when my mind does this and humble myself and at least entertain the argument, even if it is in the restricted zone.

Can you think of some firewall words?