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Understanding fear

There is something which has been bugging me for a long, long time and it's a REAL problem across the globe. Fear. It's everywhere. You may think I'm being paranoid, but trust me, paranoia has gripped the entire planet. Every day people base some very serious decisions in their lives on fear, sometimes these decisions can have effects larger than you could imagine. Fear has spread through our society like a disease to the point where many people are left unable to function as good, honest members of society. We fear everything from the person next door to staircases, holiday destinations to the devil (an abstract concept which is the creation of the human mind). We live in a world where paranoia controls us, but why? Why are we afraid?

Fear is a rational construct of the human mind, it is a reaction to bad memory. Once we have a bad experience with something, we are afraid of it. That makes sense. That is a perfectly natural, sensible reaction which helps us live our lives without experiencing the same problems again if we can help it. In some cases, particularly when small children experience something nasty, this natural fear becomes something irrational - a phobia. Perhaps a young child accidentally hurts themselves with a spoon which results in an irrational fear of spoons for the rest of their lives. While this is not really a sensible natural reaction, it is nonetheless one which can be easily explained. It may not be sensible but it makes sense, and someone with a spoon phobia can lead a very happy, productive and relative normal (if spoon free) life. Some phobias cannot be so easily explained, such as a fear of the moon (Selenophobia). However this type of fear would again not stop someone from leading a good life. It may stop them gazing into the night sky on a romantic evening out, but that's really about it. These types of fears are not what I have an issue with, my problem lies within a much greater and much more general type of fear. The fear that leads to war, hatred, persecution and a great deal of suffering. The kind of fear that keeps people ignorant. This is the kind of fear which I have a problem with.

For many centuries, people have been force-fed fear. People spread fears for their own gain, governments use fear to generate hatred and religions use fear to gain control. We have been conditioned to be naturally afraid of each other. When we are afraid, we are willing to do anything to remove that fear and we are often made more docile in the


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Understanding fear

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