Stone The Dreamer Kill The Dream

An anti-pattern used by narrow-minded masochists who can't deal with a changing future. These people often can't deal with the present as it is. See FutureShock.

They will usually claim to be "realistic" instead of fatalistic. Often, they will also get on a high-horse and accuse you of raising their hopes in vain. Kind of "Yes, we suffer, but please don't give us any hope!"

[They laughed at Einstein. They laughed at the Wright Brothers. But they also laughed at Bozo the Clown -- attributed to Carl Sagan]

Were it not necessary to have people to run the world, these pitiful wretches should be put out of their misery.

People who don't jump immediately on any new bandwagon or who don't immediately favor any new idea for change - such people are but weeds in God's beautiful garden. It's time for the beautiful flowers to do a little weeding!

(Impending GodwinsLaw alert...)

See also: http://www.reformsociety.com/MegalomaniacalWorldview, particularly the bit about having no concept of negotiation.

Exploration of the "See also"

The "It's time for the beautiful flowers to do a little weeding!" goes way off on a tangent but at least it's relevant (and hiliarious). I don't understand how http://www.reformsociety.com/MegalomaniacalWorldview is even relevant, or how negotiation enters into it.

Here's how: the above ranting and name-calling is the result of someone who, when he has a new idea and needs to persuade people to go along with it, resorts to ranting and name-calling instead of negotiation. The thinking is, "The sheer rightness of this idea overwhelms all other considerations, like the fact that people's attention is both limited and currently focused on other things, there are lots of competing ideas, people have other concerns, a certain sluggishness about jumping on every new bandwagon is a generally wise policy, there may well be factors that I'm not aware of, etc. etc. etc."

An understanding that to get people to do something, you need to negotiate with them - meet them on their own ground in some way, present the idea in a way that is attractive and understandable to them - would cure the tantrums instantly. To put this another way, an understanding that people are all autonomous living things and that the world is bigger than your mind would cure the tantrums. A worldview that lacks even an implicit understanding of those things is generally called megalomaniacal.

The amazing thing is that as soon as he starts to negotiate, he starts getting results - often better results than he had imagined (though not as grandiose). All those years of ranting were a waste.

Notice that the GreatIdea? is never said. Notice the justification given for withholding it - the faceless troglodytes who cover the Earth would degrade it, like what happens in AynRand novels. (AynRand provides a classic example of a megalomaniacal worldview. The specific GreatIdea?s are not relevant. The common denominator is the claim that they will transform the world into a new golden age - the way things should have been from the start, and would have been if it weren't for the troglodytes.) The author proclaims to be motivated by his boundless love for the troglodytes he endlessly declares his hatred for. If the GreatIdea? were put on the table plainly, negotiation could begin, many others would indeed judge the GreatIdea? rationally and intelligently, and the author would just become one intelligent person among millions, no longer the Boy of Destiny carrying the eternal flame against the forces of darkness. Don't knock it, though: spending every day cursing Satan's evil minions for thwarting your cosmic destiny can be a lot of fun. Well, it beats TV.

I always wondered what it would be like to lock a bunch of megalomaniacs into a house for a year and film their inevitable disputes. Thank god for reality TV. At least my dream has come true, which is one for the good guys, or something. Ha!! I love it! You, sir, are a TV programming genius!

The trial

If you would like to have a trial about our impossible dreamer's greatness and whether he has been unjustly scorned and covered with scars, you're welcome to do so. However, I request that you please keep it separate, down here. Then both the trial and the above exploration of megalomaniacal worldviews and rhetoric can each be readable.

I'm not interested in any such trial. I simply think that, even if the person in question is an insane megalomaniac whose ideas hold no water, your interpretation of all statements as admission of guilt is a remarkably unfair, tactless, and dishonest way for you to proceed. You can do better, and you should. What's your motive for this conviction, anyways?

Hold on a minute, please. I am not interpreting any statements at all as any sort of admission of guilt. I'm not interested in putting anyone on trial nor in being put on trial. Nor do I think that the ideas of RichardKulisz (or indeed a great many people who spew bile endlessly) hold no water. It sounds like you and I might be in total agreement about this. If you don't want to have a trial, either, then how about we just delete this entire section?

Ok, sure. I'm afraid, then, I don't understand what it is you're about, since the only connection given between what's at the top of the page, and what was written below, was an accusation towards the author. If you could also clarify that, it would be helpful.

Sure, here's what I'm doing. I'm offering an opposing idea, and exploring a tangent related to that idea. The opposing idea is that this particular dreamer is not being stoned. The tangent is that the dreamer's perception that he is being stoned results from a "megalomaniacal worldview" (see above for link). I think the vast majority of people would not respond positively to this way of presenting an opposing idea. Trying to debunk an idea by telling someone it's an artifact of their attitude and not of the reality is not normally a way to be heard. Most people would respond by regarding it as an accusation, entering opposing testimony into the record, counter-accusing and cross-examining me, and holding a trial about themselves, their motives, and my motives. But I think RichardKulisz is one of the few people in the world who would read such rhetoric carefully and consider it intelligently and objectively. (Which is not to say that if he doesn't change his mind, that proves he's not being intelligent and objective. Enough accusations and trials, already.)

I don't think Stoning the dreamer, or killing the dream is a good idea. Dreams are a sign of hope, an acting out in the mind of what might be. What is more appropriate is to make ones own dreams come true. Nightmares are a different thing altogether, being the product of fearful apprehension. The thing that is true of both is that they need to be dealt with. Denial, repression and attempts to do away with dreams (and nightmares) by "killing" them rarely works. (An attempt to be SimpleMinded) -- AnonymousOnPurpose

The dreamer is already stoned.

Indeed very few people, probably no one on this wiki, believes that stoning dreamers and killing their dreams is a good idea. The "megalomania" stuff proposes that actually no dreamers are being stoned (at least not on this wiki, and at least not most people who level that accusation against practically everyone). Further proposed is that especially in the contemporary advanced world (much of North America, Europe, Japan, and more), if you're crying such a thing, you might do well to put accusations away and look into intelligent ways to negotiate and gain the cooperation of others.

A genuinely opposing idea is not "Nuh uh, you shouldn't stone dreamers, it's bad", but "Actually, megalomaniacs and even the rest of us might be better off if they stay in their impenetrable cognitive bubbles and paranoid fantasies, because that's one important way that amazing progress is made."

I was greatly enjoying the above rant against megalomania, so I find it sad to interrupt on a matter of substance.

Opportunities for discussion on the subject of better operating systems, this Dreamer's area of expertise, are negligeable to non-existent on this wiki. Very few people seem interested in learning about the subject. Fewer still want to understand how things should be or why they should be that way.

Now, given that a wiki is a type of attention economy, what we have here is wholesale economic starvation across the Dreamer's entire area of expertise. This dreamer was starved of attention on his single most important Dream. The unfairness of this can be experienced as persecution if the dreamer invests too much of themselves in their dream.

So if other people are not interested in talking with you, in the way you insist on talking, then you feel rejected and persecuted. Here is one problem with that idea: rejection and persecution are not feelings. Sadness is a feeling. The fact that you feel sad because you're needing more conversation and mental stimulation than you're getting does not equate to people actively stoning you, even metaphorically. I think you can see that those are just two different kinds of things.

CategoryAntiPattern