I thought I would share the latest and greatest from the front lines of teaching Composition to college freshmen. Their latest paper, on The Matrix, required them to define reality in their own terms and discuss it in relationship to the movie. Most of them, so very many of them, defined reality as something particular to each person and made the claim that whatever we perceive individually is real. I'm not attacking this claim--it's an argument that can be made, but I do enjoy pointing out what the argument means. I also use this as a sounding block to work out my thoughts before I begin discussing with them the implications of such a claim.

First of all, if something is only real because someone believes it then the America's were not real to the European nations prior to their discovery. Obviously the Vikings has stumbled across it, and the Native Americans knew it was real, but none of the Europeans were wise, so--does America exist in a separate place from Europe, or does the European thought trump the reality of the Native Americans'? History tells us what the Europeans believed. Second of all, racism, sexism, classism, are all very real to the people that believe them. Does that mean, then, that because Billy Bob believes minorities to be less intelligent and moral than whites that they are?

These are both fairly obvious outcomes of the discussion, and my point in sharing it is not to point out the obvious, but to show how students, when shaping new ideas, have such wonderful, marvelous insights, but just can't quite think through things all the way. In their attempt to answer a question definitively, and a concurrent attempt not to devalue anyone else's thoughts, they forget to think through what they're saying. And I find this worth noting, specifically, because I think it's a common mistake.

We are all so afraid to say that someone else is wrong (excusing those situations where people refuse to say anything but) that we never recognize the lengths to which we travel to justify other's thoughts. In an unconscious effort to support the First Amendment, and I would say a reaction to the conservative limiting politics of the time, we adopt a whatever-you-think-is-cool-man-just-don't-hurt-anyone attitude. We even take it so far as to apply it to history saying things like, well the society of the time said it was okay so we can't judge it.

What no one seems to realize is that you can understand why someone does something and still recognize it as wrong. I know why Medieval knights married twelve year old girls. It was still wrong. I know why colonizers kept slaves. It was still wrong. I know why the English slaughtered the Irish and Scottish (among others) and even attempted to breed the Scots out. It was still wrong. I understand these things; I understand the benefits these decisions offered to the society in power. But in understanding it, I don't, automatically, have to condone it.

My point then is not so much on reality and what is or is not real, but on our individual abilities to reconcile what we really, actually do believe, with what we really, actually want to believe. It's a fine line, but an important one. And I know that most of my students won't get it--they might not even get it in this lifetime, but unlike them I no longer traffic in the "that's the way it is so whatever" attitude anymore. Instead I write this silly thing and hope that if one of you ever meets someone and she says "I believe that whatever people think is real, is real" you will look her in the eye and say "No you don't. Now go figure out why."