What Is Culture?

What is Culture?

Culture is a powerful word with endless definitions. What culture is to me, is not the same as what it would mean to anyone else, anywhere. Our culture forms the mold for who we are, and how we view the world we live in. By that I mean is makes up everything about us, especially if you are unaware of culture's influence on you. It helps form what we believe in, what we eat,our religion, when we sleep, how we treat others, how we dress, what we do in our free time, who we interact with, and simply how we live our lives on a day to day basis. From the moment we are born we are influenced by the observation of others actions such as our friends, parents, teachers, preachers, and political leaders. You can even be influenced by people that you have minimal contact with. We all have beliefs. Have you ever stopped to think about why you believe what you believe? Most of the time it is because of a cultural influence that you might not even be aware of. Why do we drive on the right side of the road in America, yet in many other countries they drive on the left side of the road? We don't ask questions about it, we just take part in it because thats just the way it is. Lets say that someone did a scientific study and determined that driving on the left side of the road was safer, and would result in less accidents. How difficult would it be to make such a simple change in our culture? In my opinion very, because the majority of people in our culture genuinely like routine, and fear change. On the other hand what if nobody ever questioned our culture? Then there would be no room for improvement. Things would always remain the same, untouched, and unquestioned. A few things come to mind when talking about untouchable culture such as religion, and politics. Our nation has one of the oldest standing set of laws known as the constitution. Of course we are not the same nation we were in 1787 when our nation adopted our constitution, yet it remains as our set standards of living. Why is that? Why is it such a hectic process to get something changed in our constitution even though it was written for a different generation of people with a very different culture then you and I? Once again it is because the general population fears change. Lets take a look at Christianity. This could be viewed from many different angles. Christianity gives people the answer to the question we all need to know, what is our purpose? Christianity also can be viewed as a governmental control factor of our citizens. In this scenario you have to ask your self such questions as why would anyone just make up a religion? Well one reason is to give people a moral boundary of right and wrong. If you do good in life you will get to go to Heaven. Another aspect of religion is the use of fear to control people. If you "sin" you will burn in hell for eternity. This fear aspect is used in our culture in more then just religion. Remember after 9/11 all of the terror alerts? Ever notice those terror alerts always seam to pop up right about the same time our nations administration was being veiwed in some sort of negative way? Fear is constantly being used by our media to direct our attention. Next time you are watching television, pay attention to the commercials we use to promote the news. The stories they brief you on will just about always be fear based. IT might sound something like this, " tune in at six o'clock to see what doctors are saying could be the next black plague." But when you do tune in you will surely be disappointed to find out that it is just something mundane. But you are watching it, and therefore making that news commercial successful. We are influenced every day by our culture without even thinking twice about it. There are literally millions of people out there who's job's are to try and come up with ways to influence us into believing that they have what we need. Television is a powerful weapon in these peoples hands. Overall I believe that in order for us to change the ways our culture influences us, we first need to recognize how it sways us, second we need to determine who originally formed that particular part of our culture, and last we need to try and figure out why anyone would want us to be a part of it? If we all followed these steps before standing behind something, I think our world would be filled with independent thinkers which would be more likely to allow for a huge change in our culture. Less premeditated influence.