It's Saturday morning, 01.35 am, and as usual, after having over-indulged in the traditional Friday night Balti, consequently, I am now having tremendous difficulty in sleeping. Oh well, surely I must be entitled to let my hair down a little every now and then? OK, fair enough, so it's not just now and then - it's every weekend - I admit it! So what - I'm human, and being bad is a human condition -right?
Anyway, enough about the Balti. As I look back over the past week's events, my thoughts wander back to a little group of smokers huddled together on the edge of the footpath who I pass every morning and afternoon on my way in and out of the university. I am also conscious of the fact that it is not so very long ago, that I would have been squashed up amoungst the best of them - puffing away for England. In the immortal words of Maurice Chevalier "Ah yes, I remember it well". There I would have stood braving the freezing temperatures - and all for the sake of a few heavenly, wonderful, magnificently sensuous, drags on the old Benson & Hedges!
Anyway, that was then, and this is now. I've quit, it's as simple as that - and it was easy - I don't know what all the fuss is about - seriously - I've successfully kicked the habit loads of times!
Despite the government's continual drive to try to reduce the number of smokers in the UK, according to a report published in the Guardian dated 10th February 2010, there is an estimated 21% of the population in England who still smoke. What's more, despite a general awareness that we are actually causing ourselves harm, we as a nation, keep coming back for more time and time again. And so the debate smoulders on - sorry!)So, why do we smoke? And what makes us do it despite the fact that we are all now fully aware of the serious health risks involved? It would seem to suggest the fact that there is a much more powerful force at work than mere common sense and rational thought alone.
A recent report 'Born to sin', written by Andy Ridgeway and Paul Parsons,( BBC Focus Magazine,February, 2010), (http://www.bbcfocusmagazine.com/feature/psychology/science-siny/science-sin), suggests that nature actually wants us to behave badly, which is why we actually enjoy the things which we know are bad. Researchers at Northwestern University, Illinois, claim that the evolutionarily ancient limbic system that is buried deep within our brains fires up when we see something we take a fancy to and certain structures, such as the nucleus accumbens, involved in pleasure and craving, are at the heart of that system. This then involves feelings of lust which the researchers claim is the enjoyable face of sin, and there's an obvious reason for this - it's Mother Nature's way of encouraging us to take an interest in procreation in order to pass on our genes.
Therefore, it would apprear that being bad is an innate human characteristic, and that the ever-powerful, all - consuming force which is at play here is NATURE. In other words, as the article suggests, we are 'wired for sin' . The research might also provide the key to why so many people, such as myself, have great difficulty in sticking to their abstinence once they have quit their nasty little habits! The answer lies deep within our brains, so guess what - it's not our fault - we were born like it! And as a result, the attraction of being bad will always be there.
Then, as if this uphill battle against Mother Nature was not difficult enough, the media has done nothing over the last few decades to stem the spread of the habit amoungst society either. For those of us who are old enough to remember, back in the 'good old days' of the 1940s when everyone smoked, we all experienced the coolness and sex appeal of Marilyn Monroe who tantalizingly puffed away on the big screen, whilst sexspot Ernie Kovacs hardly ever appeared without something seductively sticking out of his mouth.
Also, in more recent times, we have drooled
over images of heart-throb Will Smith partaking in such pleasures in 'Independence Day' as a little 'reward' following his victory over the aliens in their quest to annihilate mankind. Therefore, it comes as no great surprise that we too want to 'light up' when the 'fat lady' sings'! After all, if it's acceptable for our screen gods and goddesses to do it looking like that, then what's to stop us ordinary mortals from following suit?
The fact is, although the media does little to prevent us from falling into destructive and potentially harmful behavioural patterns, scientific advances are now just beginning to shed new light on the reasons why we, as human beings, behave in the way that we do - which brings us to ask the ultimate fundamental question of whether we are, in fact, as the article suggests, 'born to sin'.
No comments:
Post a Comment