I’m not depressed (at the moment, well maybe a little), just feeling philosophical.
Edit: the idea of this came to me because I was pondering why people fight so hard to beat diseases and live a few more years. What are they planning to do? Why exert effort just to be here longer when you don’t have a reason?
Just why?
Oh but you do. Unless you want the men in funny hats to take you off and put you in a funny jacket in a padded room, or place you in a room with bars instead of walls.
EVERYONE else’s idea of what your life should be is the standard, and if you deviate more than the standard deviation you will suffer the consequence of eeking out existence with very few choices.
Read “The Politics of Experience” by RD Laing.
(Not who you were responding to but…)
While this is true, it’s not an argument against doing exactly what you want provided that people understand that everyone else has the exact same liberty. We collectively tend towards certain values and people who deviate from those values too much eventually get sorted out one way or another. As one value most people tend towards heavily is safety, it’s in everyone’s best interest to find common ground with others for everyone to have safety. But it is necessarily a process with errors and learning - on everyone’s side; which begets more errors and learning. Thus we will never have a perfect solution. Of course, you “conforming” to majority is also you doing exactly what you want, ultimately. Because you value your safety.
Question the presupposed truth behind every statement.