For the people saying birds only sing to attract mates, there was a post just a couple days ago about how an ornithologist pointed a hyper sensitive microphone at lone birds standing on a wire and could hear them softly singing to themselves at nearly imperceptible levels even when they were entirely alone.
Bring back essays. I’ll read them, I’m just so sick of decontextualized thoughts over unrelated images. If I could go back in time and kill one person it wouldn’t be Hitler it would be Jack Dorsey.
This may be why so many people are like, “I can’t do art.” I’m sure you can, even if you can’t create a masterpiece painting. You can’t become an expert without trying, but if all anyone thinks about is how they can’t make something super impressive, they miss out on making all the crappy sketches that every artist creates before they get good. It all starts with chicken scratch, and that’s totally normal. It’s the repeated practice that builds the skill.
Doodle for fun if it feels right - getting into a hobby doesn’t mean you have to shoot for the stars.
The output of the human animal’s “play” drive were commodified.
My six-year-old dances when they hear a song they like. They’re aware of money but not concerned about it since they don’t have any bills; they only care about it for occasionally buying a toy for themself. No one is paying them to dance.
I love seeing them dance and don’t hesitate at all to tell them so. There’s such unbridled joy in it. Skill isn’t even a concern - they’re just moving the way their body wants to in response to the music and I think that’s beautiful.
One of my favorite parts of the whole thing is that sometimes they’ll ask me to turn off a song so that they can stop dancing, like it’s an involuntary thing.
This is stupid. I’m pretty sure it’s still acceptable to sing badly.
I kinda agree, you are “allowed” to sing or dance or paint just because you want to and not to get good at it, nobody is going to yell at you for that.
But on the other hand I feel like a large amount of people won’t even try something for fear of being bad at it. I don’t think they explicitly think of it this way but “the only point of doing something is to be good at it” is the implication of that attitude.
(That’s not to say that you shouldn’t seek to improve your skills if that’s something you enjoy. Just that ‘trying to get better’ isn’t a prerequisite for doing anything at all. You can have fun and enrich your life while sucking at something.)
Also im certain that people have wanted to dance and sing well since the dawn of time.
But also, it’s natural to want to get better at things you enjoy doing, to push yourself, so you can enjoy doing more difficult, and rewarding aspects. Also, as bird sing and dance to attract a mate, I’m pretty sure they would all want to get better at it.
I don’t fully disagree, but the examples of non-human behavior could hardly have been chosen more poorly.
Birds singing is communication. People don’t get particularly competitive over talking.
Making a beehive is making a home or apartment complex, and we definitely expect a certain amount of skill in that from those who do it. If bees fail or do it poorly, the whole hive dies. Definitely not something they just do casually.
Human singing is also communication, and people also talk to themselves for no reason when noone else is around. I just saw a post the other day about an ornithologist who pointed a microphone at a bird on a wire that was totally alone, and he picked up the bird softly singing to himself at a near imperceptible level, so it definitely isn’t JUST for communication.
I guess you’re assuming that singing and dancing are done for no reason. They’re innate, but they also serve social and psychological purposes. Humans need these things to live.
Didn’t say or assume anything of the sort.
I was only commenting on the animal behaviors mentioned being poor examples of things other creatures just do for the fun of it.
I agree with the overall statement that people need to accept that others can and should just do things for fun without pursuing deeper meaning, skill, or compensation. People need activities like that for a whole slew of mental health and emotional reasons. Hell, just to add some color to their lives.
That said, saying humans need those to survive is a stretch. I know a handful of people who don’t dance even in private for fun, and a far far smaller number (but still non-zero) who don’t even sing in the shower or their car.
I think we’re pretty close to agreeing. When you differentiate between “need…for mental health reasons” and “need to survive”, it seems like you’re ignoring the issue of suicide and it’s connection to mental health.
If your takeaway from OP was about doing things for fun, then mine was how important fun actually is. Two sides of the same coin, I think, both very valid.
I hope that makes sense. I’m not really here for the competitive talking, I guess.
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The problem is in your head. If you do it for money you need to be skilled. If you do it for fun, no one cares, go visit a karaoke bar and have fun!
I don’t think this is a gotcha - yes the problem is in their head but it’s not like it manifested there by magic. It’s just another way social media makes us think we have to be perfect at everything for it to be worth showing to the world. Influencers try to simultaneously be relatable but also impossibly perfect, warping your view.
Social media didn’t invent it. When I had art and music class in school, why the fuck did I have to get graded? And why does my bumfuck nowhere local volleyball club have to have aspirations for some regional 17th league and do cardio and drills every meet? I just wanna throw ball sometimes to not get fat.
Add “don’t gibing a fuck about what people think how good I can draw” on the list
I often tell my patients that dogs don’t think about how well they chew a bone and cats don’t think about how well they scratch a post. they’re just behaviors they have to do to not go bonkers. humans have a fundamental need to create and we literally go crazy if we don’t.
Birds sing to compete over mates.
This is stupid.
You won’t believe what the lyrics of most songs are about
This was made by someone who wishes they were better at their hobby
Add playing ball to the list.
Nope. People still dance for fun all the time.
