Published: June 05, 2008 04:11 pm            

CHRISTY: Do you matter?

Let’s state right off the bat that every human life matters and everyone has value in our society. Having said that, we’re now in the political campaign season. The petition process began on Tuesday and will be in effect for roughly the next thirty days.

This is a time when politicians enter survival mode, and quite often turn into marketing professionals as opposed to policy wonks — if in fact they ever were policy wonks. Many are in constant campaign mode year-round, but that’s a completely different discussion for another time.

At campaign time the only people that matter are registered voters which, as we know, is usually about one third of the overall population. If you are not registered to vote, you literally fall off the radar screen for the next 6 months. You have absolutely no value to a politician who is up for election. You cannot sign a petition to help them get on the ballot; you cannot vote for them in the September primary or the November general election.

But isn’t our desire as human’s to be relevant? To matter in this world? If we are in fact driven to matter, why don’t we take things into our own hands and make ourselves relevant?

The ground-breaking book Man’s Search for Meaning, by Viktor Frankl, tackled the subject of what our species exists for. What drives us to, quite literally, stay alive when in fact the alternative to life seems, on paper, to be much more comforting.

Frankl knew his subject extremely well and was perfectly placed to describe it. He was a psychologist in Austria during the run-up to World War II. A Jew, he was rounded up and herded off to a concentration camp where he spent the next six years enslaved and near death on a daily basis. How he survived is surely a miracle, and his book is part psychology tome and part journal of his personal experience. Some higher power surely kept him alive to be able to relate not only his horror to the world, but also this exact book.

Frankl’s main finding: that man strives to survive by finding relevance in his world. That the number one desire of humans is a need to feel they make a difference. That their life is important, and that it has meaning — hence the title. Once you realize how simple the title of the book is, and what it’s about, you wonder why it is not required reading by as early as the sixth grade.

We all know the story of the holocaust, and thank god the images of mistreated human’s on that huge scale are burned into our brains so that they may never, ever be repeated in our history. But we often don’t take the time to think of why, when there was absolutely zero hope of survival, death was seemingly inevitable and constant backbreaking work, physical beatings, unthinkable humiliations and starvation greeted your every breath — why, at those times, did men and women still strive to survive? When death would seem so much better, why go on every single day?

Could it really be so simple an answer? That we all strive to have a meaningful life? That we in some small way matter? Of course, things are often that simple. Complex situations are nearly always able to be broken down to simple solutions.

Let’s get back to this point in time, in our community, and our discussion of you as an individual.

How do we matter to our community? How do we stop complaining and in some small way step up and take control of our own destiny? If, for no other reason, how do you absolutely infuriate politicians seeking re-election?

This week politicians and the marketing people they employ — sometimes on taxpayer payrolls hidden under obscure job titles in offices we seldom think about — have their lists on clipboards and have transferred those lists to their telephone auto-dialers and direct mail houses. To be re-elected, politicians need only to talk to — and promise things to — one-third of the population they represent.

If you want to be talked to, made promises to, and begged for your vote, make sure you are registered to vote. If you are, take it one step further, and find someone who isn’t registered and get them signed up. It’s one extremely small step in man’s search for meaning. You will feel better about yourself and your community — guaranteed.

Tom Christy is the founder of FAIR Government, a non-political and non-editorial educational foundation dealing with local government issues. www.fair-government.org. He encourages communication and can be reach via e-mail at aim1986@mac.com.

        

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