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NicNicNicHS t1_j11b6if wrote

Reply to comment by Zanderax in Do no conform: Ralph Waldo Emerson's essay Self-Reliance argues that we should strive for greatness and self-reliance rather than the "meanness" of conforming to the society's dead institutions saying that "Nothing is at last sacred but the integrity of your own mind" by thelivingphilosophy

I'm not saying that people in past generations were wrong on everything.

The problems arise when there's these extremely common justifications of "well they knew what they were doing" or simply, "it's tradition/how it's always been done", which are huge issues.

A lot of tradition is either originally arbitrary, arising from social contexts that no longer exist, or basically tools of control, and I think that we keep giving tradition too much credit.

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Zanderax t1_j11c4b8 wrote

Definitely agree with all of that. Tradition is almost always a bad reason to continue to do something unless it's harmless fun like Christmas or New Years. Even then things like New Years fireworks are actually really bad for the environment and public health.

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