SO WHAT

Shana 2022-09-20 10:33:07

"He was never truly in my head. I went through times away from my family, my home during the Unabomber case and it made things difficult for me on a personal level. But I wouldn't say I was obsessed with identifying, arresting, and convicting the Unabomber."
-- Quotes from "How Accurate Is Fitz In 'Manhunt: Unabomber'? Here's What The Real James Fitzgerald Thinks Of His Fictionalized Self" by ALANA URQUHART-WHITE
"We may not share his approach to airing a grievance, but the grievance itself feels familiar."

What is more exciting than crawling into the head of one of the most notorious serial killers in history is the mystery of the obsessed detective trading his life for the thrills of lifelong, intellectual hunting. Even though Det. Fitzgerald, the revered agent on whom the charater was based has clarified that the portrait in the show of the BAU agent was more of a composite and metaphorical represtation, it has almost been a cliche to see in similair literary works images of dedicated profilers who have to "think like a serial killer to catch one", while in most cases ending up wrecking their personal life beyond repair. It seems only logical to position yourself in a world void of meaningful human connections to walk in the killers' shoes, which I can't say is a completely ludicrous assumption. However, the drama aside,what does it take to shrink a person's head? It is a requirement of intellectual equivalent, emotional connection or simply the innate psychological and cognitive pathways that are hardwired in our genetic makeup and shared with every single member of this species? If human minds are potentially predictable despite certain levels of variation, how much of this knowledge can help us live a happy life or the opposite?

"It's because they know that I'm right. I'm awake. They are asleep. They are afraid they will have to wake up one day, and turn off their TVs, video games and cell phones and face themselves the way you and I did."

The perception of the humankind having fallen slave to the modern technology is highly subjective. Even if the premise is accepted that modern technology has transformed people's life so profoundly that free will is restrained, it is a rather hasty conclusion that this kind of dependence is irreversible or doomed. On the other hand, to believe that regression to a more primitive lifestyle guarantees meaningful human connections may also be too idealist.

"You can't eat your cake and have it, too."
"He thought it was about being powerless, but he was simply lonely."

The ideas were "half-baked" because it only scratched the surface of the ultimate truth of life but not understood in such an extremist way. What is ultimate is also what comes most naturally, to all the lives that have ever existed on this planet , the truth that means everything but also means nothing. It is the destined extinction of human race, just like what has befallen all our predecessors that have been wiped out from this planet. It's just what we have set in motion is accelerating this process and driving us towards the endpoint faster than it should. However, maybe this is also a part of the evolution that is meant to be, just like when our ancestors came down from treetops and crawled out of caves.It is possible that our survival instincts that are designated to improve the chances of individual survival have been exponentially minimising our needs to depend on one another to a point that poses the risk of isolation. Is it this to say we have been driven to the opposite direction of happiness? Would it be just as simple as the basic contradiction between proliferation of life and individual happiness?

Belonging and boundaries coexist and neutralise each other to an equivalence point that creates healthy social relationships. In this light, it is clear that either element not of the equivalent amount will tip the balance over and leads to the collapse of social connections. The sense of belonging, or what I recognise as simple as love, is very often the element in lower volume, which makes the boundaries part of a relationship seem overwhelmingly restricting even suffocating.

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