Writer's Block: It Is What It Is
Aug. 26th, 2009 02:43 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
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Anything citing Destiny as a reason for anything happening.
Especially when something bad's happened which is in fact something that the Destiny-citer could have halted or avoided but were too crap to do so. Attributing some sort of celestial predestiny to your own balls-up - beyond bollocks. Even generally, claiming that something was 'destiny' is utterly wet, half-baked pseudo-Spiritualism. If somebody is Religious and claims that something happening was the doing of the God of their choice, well as an Atheist I believe they're wrong, but at least they're consitent, their belief in an outside force shaping events is part of a larger set of beliefs that great minds have pondered over for years, but namby-pamby 'Oooh, it was just meant to be' thinking really annoys me. There is cause and effect. That's it. I didn't meet Hubs because it was pre-ordained - due to a long string of circumstances, I found myself at University at the same time with someone who I found attractive, who felt the same about me and with whom I shared many common interests & a sense of humour. Everything else was down to how we reacted to one another. If we'd never met, both he and I may well have found other Loves of our Lives - we weren't hand-picked for each other by some faceless love-god.
There was a buzz on Twitter a few months ago about a poor woman who'd missed the AirFrance plane that crashed, who was killed in a car crash a few weeks later. So many idiots claiming this proves the existance of their vague, Hollywood-fed concept of Destiny and that death can't be cheated. It made me want to reach through the internet and slap them all. Final Destination is a fictional franchise. Lost - fictional, again. RomComs heavily reliant on a concept of Destiny, drawing the lovers together - again, fiction. Destiny is a good narrative device, but it's about as real as expecting a Sad Trombone to play magically from nowhere every time you tell a rotten joke. Maybe some people watch too many films. Maybe some people hate the idea of a chaotic universe so much that they have to rely on the idea that destiny stands between them and the void, or absolves them of the culpability of free will. But it's the worst kind of bollocks and it infuriates me.
Anything citing Destiny as a reason for anything happening.
Especially when something bad's happened which is in fact something that the Destiny-citer could have halted or avoided but were too crap to do so. Attributing some sort of celestial predestiny to your own balls-up - beyond bollocks. Even generally, claiming that something was 'destiny' is utterly wet, half-baked pseudo-Spiritualism. If somebody is Religious and claims that something happening was the doing of the God of their choice, well as an Atheist I believe they're wrong, but at least they're consitent, their belief in an outside force shaping events is part of a larger set of beliefs that great minds have pondered over for years, but namby-pamby 'Oooh, it was just meant to be' thinking really annoys me. There is cause and effect. That's it. I didn't meet Hubs because it was pre-ordained - due to a long string of circumstances, I found myself at University at the same time with someone who I found attractive, who felt the same about me and with whom I shared many common interests & a sense of humour. Everything else was down to how we reacted to one another. If we'd never met, both he and I may well have found other Loves of our Lives - we weren't hand-picked for each other by some faceless love-god.
There was a buzz on Twitter a few months ago about a poor woman who'd missed the AirFrance plane that crashed, who was killed in a car crash a few weeks later. So many idiots claiming this proves the existance of their vague, Hollywood-fed concept of Destiny and that death can't be cheated. It made me want to reach through the internet and slap them all. Final Destination is a fictional franchise. Lost - fictional, again. RomComs heavily reliant on a concept of Destiny, drawing the lovers together - again, fiction. Destiny is a good narrative device, but it's about as real as expecting a Sad Trombone to play magically from nowhere every time you tell a rotten joke. Maybe some people watch too many films. Maybe some people hate the idea of a chaotic universe so much that they have to rely on the idea that destiny stands between them and the void, or absolves them of the culpability of free will. But it's the worst kind of bollocks and it infuriates me.
