Conformity

I just happened to be sitting in front of the TV last night after my bath to just stone and let my hair dry for a while... and that was when I was captivated by the movie "Little Red Flowers" on Okto's FilmArt.

The movie was about a boy called Fang Qiangqiang, who was a rebellious and naughty boy, who fails to adhere to the rules in the kindergarten he attends in China. His rebellious may not be by nature; he wanted to fit in with the rest of his classmates and have fun with them, but he does not follow the rules set by the adults and as a result, gets shunned away by the adults and other children in the end. Although I felt sorry for Qiangqiang throughout the movie, I also understood the headache the teachers in the kindergarten had as well.

I hate rules as well. This might be the reason why I feel for Qiangqiang, and think that the adults might have been too harsh on him. Yet, now that I'm so much older, I hate to admit but I stick to rules too. There are certain social rules that I "enforce" on others too, like if someone else is not "nice" I'll do the cold treatment just like the teachers in "Little Red Flowers". Could I be too harsh as well? Of course I could always argue that, hey the people I'm facing now may not be children like Qiangqiang, children still do not understand the workings of our world so we could excuse them. But this movie just made me realize that like how Qiangqiang interprets the world differently from the other children and teachers in school, so do I and the others I meet and face. Just because someone else is "different from the norm", does that mean that person should be shunned away as well...?

That's a really good question.

There's a reason why certain social norms are in place. And those who do not understand this will appear different from the norm. However, if others shun away from you, perhaps there really is a good reason behind it; yet it is just human to think of other people being at fault rather than we ourselves being at fault.