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Never be afraid


iNow

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Fear is poison. It has, however, with remarkable consistency and perseverance helped us and our distant genetic cousins throughout our evolutionary past to survive and procreate.  

Summarized and simplified: Those who were more often afraid were more often responsive to threats and hence more often had grandchildren.

It’s understandable. It’s logical. It’s supported by fact and evidence  

But now fear is... more often than not getting in our way. Stopping us. Impeding progress. Dividing us; creating too many dehumanized thems. Too many malleable us’s...

Never. Ever. Be afraid. Have no fear. End program.

What are the flaws with this approach? Please help me to more clearly see the weaknesses in this stance so I may further fortify it. 

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I wear a warm coat to the top of the mountain, not because I hate the cold, but because I fear freezing to death.

In that vain, fearlessness is foolishness.

On the other hand, some may not swim in the ocean, not because they hate water, but because they fear being eaten by sharks.

In that vain, prudence is a loss of opportunity.

Fear is relative to the likelihood of occurrence.

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9 hours ago, iNow said:

Never. Ever. Be afraid. Have no fear. End program.

This is the approach to take when fear has been weaponized and used against us, such as in social media attack campaigns, or political partisanism. Fear still keeps us looking for safer ways to do what we need to do, and as long as it isn't being exploited it's not a completely bad thing. 

It's getting to be a tougher call. Are seatbelts in cars a good reaction to fear? What about when fear is used to suggest small, foreign cars are dangerous? 

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There so many contexts it's impossible to bring them all up...I think depending on context you're either absolutely right or very wrong or something in between. I think complete lack of fear in every circumstance would be inefficient and lead in many cases to irrational decisions. On the other hand blind, irrational fear is the reason behind so many bad things in the world that its hard not to take your line of thinking. I'd say fear is good in some cases in carefuly controlled doses but that needs training and experience and it has to work in relation with rationality.

 

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Fear is a good thing. The problem arises when we let fear make decisions for us, rather than using it to recognize a situation that requires especially vigilant thought.

When you see the snake, don't just run and possibly injure yourself or fall off a cliff. Instead use your higher brain function to quickly decide upon a course of action.

Easier said than done since fear arises from that lizard part of our brains, but we can train ourselves to do better.

"Never take counsel of your fears." --Stonewall Jackson

Edited by zapatos
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2 hours ago, zapatos said:

Fear is a good thing. The problem arises when we let fear make decisions for us, rather than using it to recognize a situation that requires especially vigilant thought.

When you see the snake, don't just run and possibly injure yourself or fall off a cliff. Instead use your higher brain function to quickly decide upon a course of action.

Easier said than done since fear arises from that lizard part of our brains, but we can train ourselves to do better.

"Never take counsel of your fears." --Stonewall Jackson

This is really true of all emotions. When you need to make decisions, it's often harder to use your intelligence before you let your feelings cloud your judgement. 

 

 

Another flaw in the NO FEAR approach is that it's often exploited by extremists to justify extreme behavior. Some of these people hope we'll simply not be afraid enough to do anything. Some embrace a lack of fear along with a lack of sympathy for those they abuse mentally, or financially, or socially. 

Perhaps we need to better delineate between fears and valid concerns. Is there a difference between fear of loss, fear of taking a chance, fear for your family's safety, fear of dying? Can I be afraid to walk in some of the most crime-ridden neighborhoods but have "no fear" of what will happen if I defend someone from discrimination? We mostly acknowledge that fear can help, but we mostly want to avoid fears that seem cowardly, or that hold us back unnecessarily. 

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Fear is not the problem, cowardice is. I have been afraid at night while walking down the street alone and seeing a shifty looking guy coming in the opposite direction. It is natural and in of itself there is nothing wrong with that fear provided a manage it without selfishly creating negative consequences for others. If in response to that fear I felt while walking I shot and killed the guy, petitioned the pass a law prohibiting people that look like the guy from having the right to walk, or etc than that would be a problem. I would be letting my fear negatively impact others. In my opinion that is cowardice. 

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