Everyday Canvas

Suckers Are not Born to Be Suckers

Lyn asks: I read an interesting article this weekend and would like your opinion. "Honesty and greed are beside the point. We get ourselves into trouble because we're suckers for belief. What matters instead is greed of a different sort: a deep need to believe in a version of the world where everything really is for the best-- at least when it comes to us.." Do you agree or disagree? Are we born to be conned!

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No way! We are not born to be conned; even I, one of the most gullible people, do not believe that. I also do not believe in “everything really is for the best.” I rather trust in some things being a test.

Had we been given the fate of being born to be conned, we wouldn’t we given a mind, a judgment, or an intuition. I don’t think the Creator--or if you’d rather believe, the Creation or Nature—would be that cruel to let us be conned all the time.

In addition, what is wrong with trusting one’s fellow humans? I’d rather trust people than live in the claws of suspicion and feel miserable. Anyhow, there is always that little voice inside us whispering to us to watch out when someone or something is out to get us in one way or another; in return, our job is to stay informed as much as we can. For example, if I didn’t know or read about the Nigerian scam, I would be paying money to receive the inheritance I never got from the relative I never had.

Having said that, have I never been conned? Of course, I have, but only because I hadn’t heard of a certain scheme, because of ignorance, because of letting myself become brainwashed by the general trend or another uninformed person.

Not only are the crooks the ones who con us, by the way. Do we ever question the mores of the society or the family we are born in? Isn’t their ways of belief and their urging that we think and act their way a form of conning? When a medical person or a doctor does unnecessary stuff on our bodies, isn’t that another form of conning?

Yet, we go along with such things willingly. Why? Because we are not informed enough and we haven’t thought things thoroughly. Also, we have the need to belong with a family, with a group, with a community, with a nation, with a religion. Nothing's wrong with that! Yet, we should still listen to the voice inside us telling us to think, to question, to research. In short, it is our minds and intuition we should always pay heed in order not to be conned.