IF THE CLOTHES MAKE THE MAN, DOES THE COSTUME MAKE THE SUPERHERO? An essay on Altruism

I had a Sociology lecturer in Sixth Form who believed there was no such thing as altruism. She was also my Psychology Lecturer and in her opinion Pervo-Extraordinaire Sigmund Freud was the be-all and end-all as far as Behavioural and Developmental Psychology was concerned, so it's easy to see why I never really valued her opinion. For the sake of posterity, and also for the fact that I can't remember her bloody name, she shall remain anonymous.



We got into an argument about altruism once (coincidentally, we also got into an argument or two about Freud, but that's a different matter). As a counter to her statement about the non-existence of altruism I told her of a time I felt I had shown some. Here is that story:



One day I was in line at a cash machine, waiting to draw some money out. The Lady in front of me got to the machine and, after pushing a few buttons, began to look flustered. She moved hurriedly inside the bank, presumably to complain that the machine wouldn't pay out, and I stepped up to the ATM. I was about to place my card into the machine when a bunch of money popped out. I'm not even kidding, there must have been close to £300 there. I headed straight into the building, located the woman and handed it to her.



Needless to say the Lecturer wasn't really impressed, and started trying to pick my story apart. She said I was after gratitude, but the lady didn't thank me, nor did I expect or want her to. Thinking on it a moment she then asked whether I'd thought of taking the money for myself... Well of course I bloody did! I'm only human, but then sympathy, empathy, morals and selflessness kicked in. The Sociology Lecturer who's name escapes me called these "social conditioning". I was stumped, there's no argument for that.



I was thinking today about Altruism and it's relation Superheroes. If superpowers existed, would those bestowed with them use them for good? Greed and self-gratification are more common human characteristics than selflessness and heroism, so there'd certainly be villains aplenty, but would anybody step-up and save the day? I found myself thinking "What would I do"? That's when I remembered back to the altruism argument, and the cash machine story. I like to think that if I were super-powered I'd do the right thing; that sympathy, empathy, morals and selflessness would kick in. Isn't that what altruism is anyway? An inherent desire to do good? Plus it'd be pretty cool to have a costume, and the fame and the gratitude would be nice...



Okay screw it, altruism is a load of BS, but Freud was an incestuous freak!

THE SEAL FILLER: the most inappropriate and incoherent "first post" I could ever hope for

I had an epiphany today, and it came to me when I misread the name of a dreary Rom-Com so that it sounded more like Pinniped Pornography.

In the subtitle of this Blog I call myself a "Twenty something". This term used to stand for starting your adult life, venturing out into the "big, bad world" and other such terrifying cliche's, Young Urban Professionals and all that. Only a decade or so ago shows like Friends and This Life were showcasing people my age in steady careers, a life path laid out in front of them. Well these "Twenty somethings" are now "Thirty somethings", stuck in the humdrum monotony of real life, the survivors of a bygone era that saw becoming a twenty-odd year old as a signal for growing up.

I realised, as I sat chuckling at the thought of Interspecial lovin' for far longer than was probably healthy, that something has changed. Not long after Friends and This Life came Spaced (starring Simon Pegg of Hot Fuzz and Star Trek fame), a sitcom representing the modern Twenty somethings: overgrown kids finding it hard to adjust to real life, living in a semi-fantasy world, clutching onto the pipe-dream of having an "arty" media based job. I am very much that kind of 23 year old. Real life scares the Holy Bejeezuz out of me! Sure, I have a dream, but I have enough realist in me to know that the field I want to work in is very competitive and very hard to break. The thought of the alternative is what frightens me: working some dreary 9 to 5 I don't want to be stuck in, staring at the same Cubicle walls for 40 years.

To delay the inevitable I ran away from home. Not in a joining the Circus type way don't get the wrong idea. I took a year away from real life in the hope that, with another year of maturity under my belt I would be a Friends or This Life twenty something, certain of the rest of my life. With four months left until I go home I've been seriously considering this but, as I sit here still giggling at the thought of Sealsploitation Erotica, I realise I'm definitely a Spaced Twenty something, or at the very least Egg.