Holland was born wild on the southern Outer Banks of North Carolina. He is one of the greatest horses that I will ever ride. He goes through whatever I ask him to, whenever I ask him to, in whatever weather I ask him to, and for as many miles as I ask him to.
And to my eye calling him unattractive would be an extreme compliment. His feet appear pretty. That is about it for my assessment of his appearance. Many people cannot understand how I can admire a horse so much, while recognizing him to be ugly.
The weakness and shallowness in our culture jumps to the forefront when shocked people exclaim, " How can you say that he is ugly? He is a great horse."
Think about the implications of that knee jerk reaction. It says everything about what we value as a culture. It glorifies appearance over reality.
For the overwhelming majority of people, and for nearly all of the established horse world, it is appearance that matters most. Think how often one hears, "That is a fine looking horse", or "That horse looks beautiful."
Our obsession with appearance creates a culture in which reality does not matter. When reality does not matter, truth does not matter.
This toxic perversion of the concept of beauty saps our culture of virtue while at the same time directly harming individuals, particularely adolescents who come to believe that society's approval of their appearance is the measuring rod for their worth. Physical anthropologists tend to agree that certain concepts of beauty are cross cultural and that we are hardwired to be attracted to those with physical traits that that seem to be associated with strong immune systems and a tendency toward passing on healthy genetics.
In short, what we came biologically to define as appearing strong and vital is, in reality, an indication of strength and vitality. Instead of teaching practices that cause young people to actually become stronger, healthier and more vital, we live in a world that only insists that they take steps to appear that way.
We do not teach young people to seek the extraordinary, life improving benefits of exercise and healthy consumption of food, but we do send them off into to life with a fierce drive to find the ultimate life improving device--jeans that do not make their butts look fat.
Like the slaves chained in the cave of Plato's great parable, most people only see how things appear with no understanding, and no drive to understand, the realty of how things are.
When we have guests visit this time of the year their utterances generally announce loudly and very clearly if they remain in the Cave or if they can perceive reality . There is a world of difference between those who look at the variety of livestock and natural life around them and enthusiastically exclaim, "This place looks beautiful!", and the more thoughtful minority that look upon the same sights and exclaim, "This place is beautiful!".
No comments:
Post a Comment