Truth is, You're a Jerk

During my day, I often find myself with some young guys, and we get into conversations about life. One day, we were talking about the flaws in socialism. I decided to share the deepest flaw is socialism, which is this idea that deep down, we are good people and we all what to do what's right. This is false, not just a little false, but horribly false. We are all selfish jerks. We are selfish, self-seeking, self-centered, mean jerks. I am, you are, we just are. Are you offended I called you a jerk? How dare I make a judgment about you? See, you are being self-centered again, only thinking about how I view you. We are all jerks.

Here is how I illustrate it to my young friends. First, let me ask you a question, how does a nice person react when they are cut off in traffic? Do they just smile and wave? They slow down, let the person in and forgive? Probably. How do you react when you are cut off? Is that your first instinct to smile, wave and just forgive the person? If you answered no, you just admitted you are not a nice person. Your first instinct, to get even or be kind? To assert your rights or to let the other person have their way? To stand up for yourself, or just let it go?

I can hear your excuses "I don't want to be a doormat, I'm going to take care of myself". Of course, you are, we are wired that way. We are wired for self-preservation, it's one of our traits we are born with. We cry when we are hungry or uncomfortable, no baby stops to think about mom. No infant stops to consider if mom is tired and needs extra sleep, they cry to get needs met. We are selfish, we are born that way. We stay that way. We just learn to be better at it, we learn to look better while being selfish, we learn that we need to act nice and behave well so that people will want to be around us. We treat others well, usually because we get what we want. We treat people we love well so they will be around us. Do you treat the people you can't stand as well? Probably not.

Finally, it's true that we are all jerks because we are inclined to evil. We struggle to behave, we have temptations to do bad, sometimes we resist, sometimes we give in. It's a struggle to do what's right, it's a struggle to avoid doing what's wrong. We don't struggle to do the wrong thing, that's easy. Giving into the dark side, that's easy, it's behaving that's harder. Being mean, hateful and spiteful is easy, it's forgiving and loving and kind that is a struggle. Being angry and selfish is easy. Giving and calm and patient, that is hard. Ya, it's hard to be good, because we are what? That's right, we are all jerks.

You're a jerk, but that's ok cause so am I. Let's just try to get through this together!