I’ve been trying to get out of the habit of citing human nature as the reason that some humans do certain things. For example, I don’t believe that jealousy is human nature. I do believe that society has conditioned us to believe that our chosen mates are possessions and if they were to receive a hint of flirting from another pretty face, then ooooooohhhhhh boy! Watch out! THIS ONE’S MINE! Whoa! Calm down. That’s not human nature, that’s societal nature. Perhaps our experiences have colored our view of what generates feelings of jealousy. But, despite those moment’s when toddlers identify a parent as “mine”, I don’t think that jealousy is innate.
In a recent conversation about plastic surgery, I was asked my thoughts on the matter. If someone had asked me a decade ago, I would have had a mouthful to share about all of my myopic judgments of assumed insecurities. That was then, this is wow and I have changed a lot! The truth is, I don’t give a shit about plastic surgery or the fact that someone has gone under the knife because… Well, that’s the thing you see, I don’t know the reason. Everyone has a different because and that makes it unfair to judge everyone the same when I know nothing about their personal history or experiences in life. I live in the militantly liberal Bay Area where many people feel their opinion must be heard without knowing all of the facts (or without considering sending their opinion through the proper channels). That tends to manifest in women getting shit for formula feeding over breast feeding without the giver of shit bothering to find out if the mother is having trouble producing milk. Sorry for the digression, I just wanted to drive home the point that some shit you heard on NPR or read in a book shouldn’t give you the right to go round telling people what to do, know the facts about the individual experience.
As a friend was explaining why she’d decided to have her breasts augmented, she casually brushed past an easy argument. “Yeah, yeah. Love yourself just the way you are and all that. But, not everyone is wired that way.” Now, she didn’t need to explain/justify to me why she decided to do something to her body. It’s really not my place to judge, comment, or give a shit about what another human does with their body. (Because it’s THEIR body, not mine.) I did, however, take issue with her argument that some are wired for self-love and some are not. I took special interest because I’m taking a Developmental Psychology class and we’ve been spending hours discussing what characteristics humans are born with and those they’re not. Essentially, we’ve been discussing the wiring. I’ll spare you all the Psych lesson as if I’m qualified to school you on the matter. I will point out that a baby human’s concept of the world is limited to the child’s mother figure. Within that microplanet of mother figure and child, securities (and of course insecurities) are created based on their interactions and developing trust. The manner in which the mother figure responds when the baby human is hungry or in need will shape the baby’s scope of trust for the world. The wiring is being installed. I’ve heard different ages for when a child develops their full personality (3 y/o?), when their brain reaches adult size (7 y/o?), and other statistics that I tend to take with a grain of salt. We all have character-defining memories (some conscious and some repressed) that have happened much later than the age of seven. Some of those character-defining moments have short circuited our wiring for self-love.
I checked in with the Professor leading our lecture. I wanted to make sure that I wasn’t just mansplaining to myself that my opinion was right. What would the world of science have to say on the matter? On the matter of insecurities, we’re not born with them, we’re not wired to be insecure. The simple proof of this is the lack of evidence. They’ve tested children for every social ailment that’s a part of the human condition. There’s no empirical evidence to suggest that a baby has expressed insecurity. Societal conditioning and pressures are what create insecurities.
To be fair, some of us may be genetically predisposed to anxiety. Such predisposition, coupled with society’s nature to critique and judge one another can certainly create a shit storm of insecurities. So, I’m just saying that a refutation of self-love isn’t something that we’re either wired with or not. Instead, self-love or insecurities tend to manifest as a result of a cocktail of ingredients including, but not limited to, the love we received at home, the acceptance/criticism of our peers, our perception of images in the media, and the self-image of our peers. (If your BFF in high school, had high self-esteem and looked like your polar opposite, you may have internalized that.)
I think it’s important to reiterate that I’m not making a judgment on those that have had plastic surgery. I’m not suggesting that anyone’s body parts were surgically altered due to insecurities. Not only do I not know why people do what they do to/with their bodies, I don’t make it my business to care (unless I’m at work and they’ve asked me to care). Over the years many friends, lovers, and colleagues have had plastic surgeries. The reasons have ranged from Business Expense to Cancer to Graduation Gift to Post-Accident Reconstruction to Sexual Reassignment. This post isn’t about plastic surgery it’s about taking the time to remember what part of our thought process came from human nature and what part came from societal nature.