Values are internal, a part of one’s essential self. Social norms are external, a part of our communities and our society. Social norms that don’t particularly match one’s personal values instead create incentives — or conditioning — to behave in certain ways. While different people may behave the same way, conforming to social norms, their internal experiences can be very different.
It’s easy, and a privilege, to live out your values every day when your values are the norm. It is harder, and a burden, to live out your values when the dominant culture would have you do otherwise.
When values and incentives conflict, there is tension. When the tension is small, it can be a creative, the sort of thing that has us “look for the win-win” and “make the pie bigger.” When the tension is too great it becomes a destructive force. Destructive tension between personal values and external incentives leads to one side overtaking or subverting the other. This can look like self-betrayal (when incentives win out) or rebellion (when personal values flout the norms).
… some things don’t deserve our creativity, and some things do in fact deserve to be destroyed.
Please don’t conflate creative and destructive with good and bad. We can find creative ways to reconcile our positive values with negative incentives. We can also find destructive ways to resolve conflicts, for example, by telling the world “I will not submit to what you call normal, because what you call normal is not okay!” The intended outcomes and the strategies to accomplish them can have both good and bad in them, irrespective of their creativity or destructiveness. In other words, some things don’t deserve our creativity, and some things do in fact deserve to be destroyed.
Remember this: It’s easy, and a privilege, to live out your values every day when your values are the norm. It is harder, and a burden, to live out your values when the dominant culture would have you do otherwise.
What examples of privilege or burden have you experienced? Tell your story in the comments!
