Post 5: Contemporary Example of Transcendentalism

Thesis: In the song "Little Game" by Benny, they discuss gender roles within society, how we are forced to be confined to these standards and this topic relates to transcendentalist ideals. 

“Play us like pawns and relentlessly confine

into living up to gender roles and having absent minds”

This is the first line of the song talks about how we are put into these boxes by society. Individualism is one of the transcendentalism that applies to this quote because it explains how we, as humans, are given these boxes to confine ourselves to. The transcendentalism idea tells us that we should not do us what society tells us to do because they should have that much control over us, which leads to my next quote. 

“The only obligation which I have a right to assume is to do at any time what I think right”(Thoreau 213)

This quote comes from David Thoreau's Civil Disobedience and in this he talks about how he did nothing wrong and got put in jail for it. Specifically this quote applies to the song because both talk/show how that we are curious creatures and that curiosity needs to be fulfilled.  This is a normal thing for humans and even though society wants us to think that it's normal. In reality, they secretly tell us that its not right to not conform to the boxes they give us and make us feel like we are doing something wrong, when all we are being is ourselves. 

“To believe your own thought, to believe that what is true for you in your private heart, is true for all men- that is genius”(Emerson 183)

This quote comes from Emerson's Self-Reliance and he also dives into the idea that society tells us to be ourselves yet they tell us that its wrong to think for ourselves. Emerson describes how he doesn't understand why this happens because we should be able to think for ourselves, that's why we were given a conscience.

"The sun illuminates only the eye of the man, but shines into the eye and the heart of the child"(Emerson 180)

In another work by Emerson so called Nature, he talks about how we need to get back to nature and realize its true beauty which applies to the theme of Optimism. He dives into this idea with this quote by explaining how we have become so used to seeing things that they have lost their beauty. Their is still hope through the lives and eyes of our children. This connects to my example because I think that this video is a warning that we keep putting children into their boxes and that crushes their individualism.