There’s such a fine line between being a noodge and an optimist in my world. On one hand, I believe we can manifest our ambition to do better, while on the other I’m afraid that I’m more skilled at complaining about what’s wrong instead of offering solutions. While a radical reform of education is at the top of my list for bringing change, I also understand that humanity shifts at the pace of tar pitch. Without a systemic shock, I can hardly find a sliver of hope that we’ll recover from our willful embrace of intellectual laziness. But it’s not always dark, or maybe it must be darkest before a light turns on.

I see glimmers of potential that there are those who are trying to drag us forward toward our better selves, but all too often, I cringe at what I perceive to be sickly sweet in their approach. I have to tamp down my knee-jerk reaction to the cloyingly wholesome nature of messages where everyone wants to feel good about the situation being documented and held up as exemplary.

The conditioning of my youth was such that the collective was weak, laden with the baggage of hippy love and patchouli. Determined individualism with the lone hero who will inspire the kid, the team, the troop, or a nation out on the horizon, waiting to make his solo entry when the time is right. Did I watch too many John Wayne, Clint Eastwood, and James Bond films in my youth? Yes. Come to think about it, our current U.S. president is trying to play this tired trope yet again.

Years ago, I was a proponent of kids playing games such as Minecraft as I felt it exemplified the scenario of people cooperating across unseen borders with people who were relatively anonymous. It didn’t matter if a kid was disabled, starting to be aware of their sexual identity that might be different than the accepted norm, or had already been made to be ashamed of their race because, in the pixelated world of the game, there was only collaboration and sharing.

Today, I watched a clip from Yes Theory on YouTube where their team brought a recent high school grad with an underprivileged background from Los Angeles to Arizona for a visit to Biosphere 2. Initially, my reaction was to hit the back button and leave the apparently sappy content I’d never be able to relate to, but I worked against instinct and tried to see why these young people had garnered 5.76 million subscribers. It wasn’t long before I could get past the exuberance and appreciate that this team was celebrating the tenacity of the young lady to endure hardship. Introducing her to the idea that it only takes a minute and some determined effort to change your circumstance allowed Yes Theory’s team to share the emotional impact made on their guest. The clip ends with her receiving a $300 gift card for art supplies as she’s an aspiring artist, but then they also present her with a $10,000 check to help with the costs of college.

To a generation brought up selfish and isolated in their cubicles, witnessing the youthful celebration and gratification that comes with sharing and maybe inspiring others is bitter medicine that might as well be wrapped in unicorns and rainbows. We need to unwrap that prejudice and join the party, turning away from the I/Me generation and learning to understand that the We/Us generation is here.

Those who are still acting selfishly were effectively abused by a system clinging to outmoded paradigms that are no longer viable. Many of these people are angry that they’ve not yet had their moment in the sun owning a big house or an expensive car, going on pricey vacations, buying designer clothes, and receiving invitations to exclusive clubs. They feel cheated that a generation before them seem to have had all the luxury, and now they want theirs. How those people heal is still up in the air.

For the millions who’ve been considering what kind of normal the world might be in the future after the pandemic, one thing they do know is that they don’t want to go back to what had been. Figuring out something as massive and complex as fairness and equity in the social and economic world of hundreds of millions of people trying to soothe raw nerves created by neglect, disparity, racism, and abuse, leading to catastrophic situations for loved ones is not a solution that just springs into the collective conscience.

People such as the team behind Yes Theory, Best Ever Food Review Show, and SoulPancake, along with individuals such as Liziqi and Lady Gaga, are offering us views of our world that best demonstrate the importance of people in communities helping one another and being positive role models.

The bias some people feel about those things they are unfamiliar with is the real toxic commodity that only works to fuel great intolerance. How we overcome that hostility within ourselves is an ongoing exercise that must evolve as we are forced to confront our new reality, a reality that is still being written, thought about, recorded, shared, and invented.

To close this entry out, please do not read this as a Pollyannaish Kumbaya message that somehow some fresh-faced, bubbly internet celebrities are going to solve our problems. Nothing is that simple. This has me thinking that maybe I should write a blog entry about nuance and generalization where people I speak with face-to-face want to take umbrage with my gross generalizations, but then if I tell them something is green, I get a pass. We can distinguish between millions of shades of colors, and not a single person has ever asked me to be precise in just what hue I’m generalizing about when I speak of the sky being blue. Humans intuitively understand that there are millions of shades across the spectrum of colors that we might speak of, but quickly get caught up in a dilemma of wanting to argue when details they find pertinent to a discussion demand exacting answers to a problem that is obviously multi-faceted.

So while a particular negative force might be wreaking havoc in this and that spot and a drug crisis, racism, and poverty are exacting a toll over there, salves are at the same time being applied in the hope of contributing to partial solutions to intractable problems. Sometimes, we need unicorns, rainbows, and even a hug from a hippy.