[X] My Assistant

[Reyo]

http://www.thefreedictionary.com/ostracism

1.
a. The act of banishing or excluding.
b. Banishment or exclusion from a group; disgrace.
2. In Athens and other cities of ancient Greece, the temporary banishment by popular vote of a citizen considered dangerous to the state.

*A poll is soon to follow to note tendencies amongst the general population*

Anyway, I had just recently attended a seminar detailing ostracism from the perspective of a researcher unbiased from the results. Basically, most of the research was having 3 people in a room, 2 deliberate, 1 experimentee where the experimentee was told "sit in here until the 'real' experiment is set up". In the room was a box of toys, amongst said toys a ball. The 2 deliberates were told to pick up the ball and throw it around, occasionally throwing it to the experimentee for a short period of time before completely being shut out from the ball tossing game. The results were observed.

Now this isn't a topic I'm hoping to start based on the research, the research is just a concrete example to base a reference point on. The real topic is social ostracism as a way to suppress a negative character trait in the victim and promote a more positive one. The premise behind it is if someone is doing something you deem "negative", you and the whole group of people complete shut the man out. No speaking to him...no looking at him...anyone living with him is to move out...he is to be treated as a ghost. The victim will notice this, inflect on himself, see what he's doing wrong, and change it. THAT is the premise of social ostracism.

I don't like it even in the slightest. Perhaps it was a bad childhood where I was berated and people were complete dicks to me for one reason or another, perhaps it wasn't...either way my view on the subject is if you or a group purposely ostracize someone from a group knowing full well you are their only means of social interaction...you are the LOWEST form of dirt on the planet and are not worth my time. All you need tell me is "I don't want you here" and I'll leave. Obviously if a group doesn't want me somewhere, I don't want to be there myself, but I find it PERSONALLY insulting if I'm making an effort to be friendly and I'm met with a lack of invitations while knowing full well you're inviting everyone else, or making plans with the rest of the group while leaving me out of it. I get it, you don't like me. If you continue this circus of sneaking around trying to avoid me going to your events you're a bloody idiot, for one thinking that I won't eventually find out what you're doing, and second for thinking that I would FORCE myself into the group. Ironically, the fact that you're ostracizing me is the main reason I'll have nothing with your group.

Now, all biased and personal venting aside, here's a look at it from a more unbiased perspective. The basis behind it is if you ignore a problem long enough, it'll GO AWAY. Now while in some cases that's true, in others it'll blow right on up in your face, which has been proven TIME and TIME again with situations that don't necessarily have ANYTHING to do with social ostracism (eg. You ignore an incoming test...there's still going to be a test). And yes, social ostracism CAN blow up in the group's face:

http://www.alfred.edu/teenviolence/whydoshootings.cfm

Now while there's a distinction between ostracism and bullying, I beg to differ...ostracism is, in the perspective of those receiving it, by all means a form of bullying. Well guess what you fucknuts, that negative character trait you just tried to suppress came back, only now it's spurting it's seed of frustration all over your innocent little faces in the form of BULLETS. Now this is getting a bit out of hand isn't it? As I said in the subtitle, I find ostracism to be a topic I find very close to my heart, that while I have very few morals, with most of them being "weird" or "what the fuck"worthy, I do find ostracism to be a bit more of a despicable act of displaying control over a situation you have, otherwise, no claim in control over, ie THE CHARACTER OF ANOTHER HUMAN BEING.

Now it's your turn.

This post has been edited by Reyo: Oct 3 2011, 08:26 PM