Why I Care, Part 1: I Don't Have To, And That's Why I Need To

Like I've said before, I really am a video game snob. I do not like the fact that games like My Little Pony: The Movie: The Game exist. (That's what I refer to all shovelware as.) It bugs me that a lot of the crap that's out there is allowed to exist. I can't stand, for example, the Twilight series, as I've touched upon before, and I will inform people that they have terrible taste if I see them reading them.

But there is one question that I am frequently asked, about many things, books, video games, movies, all sorts of stuff. And that question is, "Why do you care?". Why do I care? Why do I care? There are so many reasons, and to be honest, I find it very disturbing that anyone would ask that question. There are three main reasons why, and I'm going to touch upon each of them over the next few days.

I cannot stress the importance of caring, as an individual, and as a society. Caring is very important. So please, allow me to begin to explain just why I care so much.


1. I Don't Have To, And That's Why I Need To.

Technology is an amazing thing. Technology is progressing very rapidly, and every day finds ways to make our every day life easier. It's making our lives a little too easy, in fact.

I'm not talking about making everyone fat, or anything like that. No, the real implications are much more disturbing than that. We are the first generation that doesn't HAVE to care. We're rarely directly affected by anything. Even the war in Iraq doesn't directly affect most of the average teenagers in America.

Really, why should we care? We don't need to. We're being raised in a society where we've been taught, if it doesn't affect you, don't bother thinking about it. That's scary. Really scary. our society really has been on a decline, which I believe to be directly related to the lack of caring in America today.

Make fun of hippies and all if you will, and believe me I do, but they weren't wrong to care so much. It's important to care. I mean, protesters of war did have a point to protest. They had a right.

Think of it, we live in a free country, and while we usually associate that with religious freedom, or freedom to get any work you want, it extends to more than that. It's freedom to care. It's freedom to have an opinion. And to not use that freedom, that's wrong.

I don't have to care. I have an easy life. I don't need to care, for example, about people buying MW2, or some nut saying video games are made by satan, or even a guy who says video games ruined his life. None of those things affect me directly. It doesn't hurt me if that lady has her head in the sand. It doesn't hurt me, directly at least, if that guy is being alarmist about video games being evil.

But that's why I need to. I need to, because if no one does, then what happens? Nothing. What are you if you don't care about anything? Are you really living, or are you just existing?

There's a line I liked from Ghost Town, a decent comedy from a couple years back. "Everything matters. Maybe it only matters to us, but it still matters." How true. Everything matters. The little things, and the big things.

I look at a lot of the people I know, really great people, who don't care. Who don't realize the importance of caring. I know a lot of people who don't care as much as I do about anything. Yes, I'm very passionate about small things. Yes, I rant a lot. Yes, I'm opinionated. Since when is that a bad thing?

I would rather talk to someone with an opinion different than mine, than someone with no opinion at all, any day of the week. People who don't care are boring!

Please, if you're reading this, I beg of you, find something to be really and truly passionate about. For me, it's video games (mind you, I have a lot of opinions about a lot of things, but I'm not passionate about a lot of things like I am about video games.) For some people, it's movies. For some, it's books. For some, it's cooking. For some, it's fashion. It can be anything, the what doesn't matter, but if you're not passionate about anything... I truly think you're not really living. You may hate me for saying that, but hey, at least you'll care.

This is part one of three. For part two, click here.