When I was a child growing up, I saw an advert on the tv that promoted buying a particular breakfast cereal. It’s selling line was that 9 million people ate it in Britain therefore we should buy it because 9 million people just couldn’t be wrong! ( It may have even been 19 million, I can’t be sure now, but the precise number doesn’t really matter, because it is the principle that counts!) I remember thinking , ‘ Well there are about 55 million people in this country that means 46 million people don’t eat it. So why not say 46 million people don’t eat xflakes and 46 million people can’t be wrong, therefore don’t eat xflakes!’
The point I am making is that the number of people who believe something has got nothing to do with whether it is true or not!
In years gone by the majority of people believed that the world was flat and that if you sailed out to sea eventually you would fall off the edge! Millions of people in different belief systems believed that the sun was a god! If you had believed or said differently you may have been perceived as mad or evil and probably would have been victimised and ostracised or even worse!
The history books are of full of brilliant people and geniuses who were persecuted, mocked, bullied, ridiculed and even killed for their beliefs or their works at the time but were subsequently found to be correct or visionary with great insight. Many great writers, dramatists and poets spent time in prison. Van Gogh couldn’t sell a painting in his lifetime and Socrates spent much of his later life under arrest, eventually being forced to commit suicide. Newton and Darwin were derided as heretics and Walt Disney was sacked as a journalist because he had ‘no imagination!’
The moral of tale is that if you have a considered belief or point of view, do not abandon it because of the hostility or criticism of others, because you may be right and the others wrong! Remember that at one time everyone thought that the world was flat and that it was impossible for people to fly!
It is my serious, considered point of view that people who are really, genuinely talented, original, intelligent or good at something will inspire derision and mockery from others not capable of seeing the light. Brilliant or perceptive minds will look at things in a different way, from a different perspective; they will see trains of logic in places that others don’t notice; they will see different ways of solving problems or managing issues. They will often see complicated scenarios in very simple terms and they will have their own way of achieving their ends that are mocked by others. These qualities are common to talented people in all walks of life including:- artists, writers, scientists, teachers, politicians, musicians, managers, healers, sportspeople, engineers, technicians, philosophers and thinkers generally.
Equally it is no coincidence that so many really talented people seem to be followed by controversy and exhibit behaviour that is often condemned and ridiculed by society at the time. Look at Oscar Wilde, Wordsworth, Shelley, Van Gogh for example and more recently well-known figures such as George Best, Freddie Mercury, Jose Mourinho, Kenny Everett, Maradonna etc. The list goes on and on. Having real genius or talent often has other manifestations that don’t fit into the core behavior patterns of their peers.
