Confessions of a 'social deviant'

By David Runger

My name is Dave, and I'm a social deviant.

It's not what you think. I'm not a pedophile, a rapist or even a communist. The thing is, though, that I eat bits of leftover food from the racks at the exits of Market Square, sometimes even making a meal out of somebody else's half-eaten burrito and another's unfinished cereal. Gross, right?

I wish that were my only problem. Alas, I find myself frequently walking around campus barefooted. Not to mention that when I need to wake up early, I sleep in my dormitory hallway. Occasionally, I draw aboriginal designs on my body with Sharpie markers, experiment with bedsheets as formal wear and almost always wear sandals with a suit.

I'm "bi-curious." I need at least one hand to count the men whom I've French-kissed and more digits than I have for the times I've felt spontaneous erotic feelings for another male. Most find my sexual interaction with females to be "deviant" to say the least, but details will be omitted here.

I am an atheist -- a rare and, in fact, much-hated specimen in America. According to a 2006 study conducted by the University of Minnesota, atheists are the most distrusted minority group in America -- even more so than Muslims, recent immigrants and homosexuals.

I'm also an egoist. So-called psychological egoists believe that every person has but one ultimate aim: his or her own welfare. Personal experience has shown egoism to be a minority position and also a very negatively received philosophy, criticized as both false and morally depraved.

By this time you might be wondering why I'm sharing an extensive list of my (sometimes disturbingly) "deviant" behaviors and beliefs with the Santa Clara community. Is there a point to all of this? And, last but not least, why am I so weird? What exactly is wrong with me? Why don't I just act normally?

Herein, my friends, lies the heart of the matter: Quite simply, I reject social norms because blindly following the infinity of unwritten laws that pervade our every experience benefits neither me nor anybody else.

I scorn arbitrary and valueless limits on what constitutes "appropriate action." Of course, societal prescriptions can sometimes be beneficial to individual members of society and/or society as a whole.

However, acting "normally" often just doesn't make sense, and, when it doesn't, I choose to deviate. What's more, you might find (or have found already) that critically analyzing social conventions appeals to you, as well.

You, too, might enjoy saving $300 each year by paying only for Bon Appetit's smallest meal plan. You might find that you also enjoy the tantalization of warm grass between your toes as you walk to your next class. Upon questioning and overcoming your socialization, you might find that you enjoy physical interaction with both males and females. (The existence of past societies in which bisexual interaction was commonplace seems to indicate that this is probable.)

Nobody knows what truths you might choose to exhibit when undertaking a rational and skeptical analysis of cultural conventions. However, escaping from controls that are harming you and others (and surely there must be at least one rule you'd like to do away with) requires awareness, skepticism and courage.

Being aware of conventions usually taken for granted is hard, but can be done with applied, conscious effort. Being skeptical can be difficult, too, because our aesthetic preferences provide an easy excuse to accept ideas we'd really do better to reject. For example, I was once uncomfortable with eating Market Square leftovers and admitting my bi-curiosity, thinking of these behaviors as "gross." But, to be a successful deviant, one must have the courage to form new patterns and -- far more challenging -- face possible reprobation from less-enlightened peers.

Finally, even if you don't see a reason to embrace a policy of acting on cultural skepticism, you can try to understand, tolerate and respect those who do. At least you might better understand why a bunch of people seem to have suddenly started rifling through the leftover trays in Benson.

David Runger is an undeclared sophomore.