Manufacturing Humans
Manufacturing Humans and Manufacturing Thought are two articles written by different people; bringing diversity in opinion. Hope you enjoy the reading!
Manufacturing Humans
Many of us say that time is running so fast and we don’t have enough time to accomplish everything we wanted to accomplish for the day! So, what happened during the day? Were we absent-minded?! Were we pre-occupied and running on a default mode of the brain, that we are operating our daily tasks with no awareness of what we are actually doing? I think these are all valid questions to ask. Also, we should ask, what else do we want to do?
Is it possible that we are “performing life” according to what we have been taught to do? Are we operating as manufactured humans?
The notion of “Becoming”
This is a scenario of chronological life events-that you might be very familiar with;
- The baby is born, get raised to learn a way to communicate, mainly through language.
- The baby grows, and as a kid, gets to school to learn the topics that he/she is “supposed” to learn: math, geography, history, etc. The aim is for the kid not only to gain knowledge but to be prepared to join a college for a degree.
- After a few years of college education, the person is now qualified to enter the job market – I will call it “the job factory”.
- To be successful, the employee “works hard” to get promoted by time.
- There is another part to this person’s life that he/ she needs to fulfil, which occupies the before and after 9am-5pm. This could become the entertainment time! Could it not be?!
- The person may then get into a relationship, raise a family and watch the cycle go on for another round. And the now “baby into parent” may fulfil their lives through their kids.
When did this path of life become a standard for success in life? When did we agree to live by a set of rules and steps not questioning why we do it and if we actually want to spend our lives this way? By the way, other alternatives such as the entrepreneur route could also be viewed from a similar angle. So, is any particular path a faulty one? I don’t think so.
Here there is a notion of “becoming” i.e. becoming successful, becoming loved, becoming rich, becoming this or that! So, when did we ever become not enough?! Is this the manufactured human? Is this standardization of thought? And by whom?
Standardization and Efficiency
On the physical appearance of things, and after the industrial revolution, the production-consumption rate increased dramatically. We started looking for “efficiency” in processes, to make more profit in less time. This wheel keeps rolling and with it increases our perception of time (that it is faster than before). This wheel meant we have no time to create art that requires careful attention and unique artistic skills, as we see in the buildings that became more abstract and look similar around the world regardless of their context. Our clothing moved from being unique to ones’ environment to become a global fashion trend that is supposed to fit everyone! We are expected to fit in a size S, M, L, XL, XXL or XXL with no variations. In fact, if we want to customize our clothing to our bodies and environment, we are expected to pay a high price!
Are we turning into conforming standardized humans with low resolution? Rounded up or down to the closest standardized digit or form?!
Is this linked somehow to us moving away from nature? Nature has no one size fits all! Its complexity is beyond my comprehension to be able to convey, yet it seems that the incredibly interconnected growing processes of nature is always unique and perfect!
My argument does not contradict with the notion of being efficient. I think that processes in nature are the ultimate expression of efficiency; where energy is transformed from what appears to be one form to another in the most efficient way. You may want to check this series in Netflix called “The Code” and check Season 1, Episode 2 entitled Nature’s Building Block for examples on rock formation, snowflakes and soap bubbles. You can also watch this link below on soap bubble art entitled “Soap bubble show by Dr. Bubbles”. Please notice the perfection of a single bubble sphere -minimal surface area- and how it interacts with other bubbles; sharing surface area plane.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3BV5VU8tzss
So, can humans embrace their nature as part of nature? If humans are nature, then why do we manufacture humans to fit a specific standard?
Taking Responsibility
It is up to us to take responsibility of our lives, decisions and pursuit of what we want. To be able to do that, we need to be vigilant, observe and enquire about the path we walk, understand what’s going on within our minds, observe if we are on an auto-pilot mode or we are fully aware of the present moment! This is all our responsibility.
A time shall come when we stop being manufactured humans, when one is fully aware of the present moment, when clarity is there and with it comes enormous energy to act! Not react, not live someone else’s life or someone else’s wishes! No one can find their path but themselves! No one can follow another’s! We may read, be inspired, but if we don’t take action for ourselves, we stay in the cycle! The manufacturing cycle!
IN-OUT
As a last note, I want to end this article with pictures taken for this masterpiece of Gaudi, with no interior straight lines and no angled corners. Gaudi’s Casa Batlo in Barcelona, Spain.
This is an attempt to say: we don’t have to live in boxes, thinking it is the most efficient way to build a shelter! As much as that we don’t have to think in a boxed frame of a set of rules and ideas and perform within a prescribed society in order to live.
