18 December

Work Christmas party today. Hundreds packed into an inside space. I’ll be the only one there in a mask, which many will find weird. Because we now live in a culture where what you think and how you act is shaped entirely by your imitation of what everybody else is doing. Only that appears ‘right’ or ‘normal’. High school culture. Christmas is a week away. If you want to spend it in bed with Covid, it’s an unusual present, but each to their own. Imagine working a whole year to spend your holidays in bed, sick. I see so many Christmas parties online, because sharing them on the socials is a major link to the whole social process. We treasure nothing more than social events. We think sociality makes us happier and healthier than anything else. I’ve shared many times here how wrong that is. Sociality is an addiction, creating the greatest stress and violence in societies. It’s driven by social comparison, by a desire to ‘fit in’ and have a status and identity in a social group. Many families fight at Christmas, but will maintain the image of it being healthy ‘get-togethers’. Family violence on Christmas Day is 45% above the usual average. At New Years that jumps to 80%. The irony is Christmas celebrates a man who above all else asked humans to abandon social status games. Who went against even his closest group of friends, to act in a way that horrified and alarmed them. He horrified and alarmed them because he was rejecting the sociality that was their whole existence.