Blazing Minds

Most people would agree that strawberries are delicious.

It is widely accepted that this sweet summer fruit is a delightful treat for the tastebuds. But there are people in the world who detest strawberries, who would spit them out if they ever accidentally got a mouthful. For these people the strawberry could be too acidic, they may not like the texture or the little seeds, perhaps the juice offends, or even the colour.

So how could we please the complainants? How could we get more people willing to try this already popular fruit? Let’s deal with the possible complaints one by one.

• Colour – red is a very violent colour which can put people off, so how about a nice peaceful white? In fact, let’s go even better – totally clear.
• Flavour – straight away we’ll neutralise that potentially offensive acidity, then let’s remove any sugar in case it’s too sweet, now we’re getting somewhere.
• Texture – those little seeds on the outside? Gone. Irritating juice? Drained away. Too hard? Too soft? Let’s lose that flesh.

Right, so what do we have left? A flavourless, invisible fruit that you can’t feel. To be precise, nothing.

You’ve probably figured this out by now, but my point is that it is impossible to please everybody, and if you try you will always lose something of what makes you unique.

If you want what you write to be read then you have to have opinions, and with every good (or bad) opinion there will be people who disagree. Think of the number of times you’ve read a blog or a forum post and been absolutely furious at what has been expressed. You may have fumed with rage, called the author numerous profanities, but in the end you have read the entire post and paid attention to what it says.

This is not to say that pleasing people or being popular is bad, even if you do start doing this there are people who will hate you for that. There are more than 6,000 members of the Facebook group I Hate Popular People That Think They Are Perfect.

It is in some people’s nature to take a perverse pleasure in bucking the trend, and people who become popular can often face a backlash from early supporters. This is particularly prevalent in the music community, where recent Kings of Leon albums have become bestsellers, causing some fans, including loud mouth rocker Liam Gallagher to accuse them of ‘selling out’.  In the case of the former Oasis front man this can clearly be attributed to professional jealousy, but for some people it is genuinely important that not too many people like the same things that they do.

So what have the Kings of Leon done about this criticism? The answer is nothing, they have continued to make the music they love for millions of fans who love it too. Whatever you do you will never please everybody. The important thing is that you have the courage of your convictions and you believe in what you do and say even if others don’t.

Don’t be scared to be different, you never know – you could turn out to be a strawberry!

Picture by flikr.

Tom Parnell is a writer and former journalist who is eagerly awaiting the DVD release of Toy Story 3.

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This entry was posted on Sunday, October 24th, 2010 at 9:31 am and is filed under Guests Posts. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can skip to the end and leave a response. Pinging is currently not allowed.