Many are familiar with the famous phrase, “ignorance is bliss”. This widely known phrase has been used, referred to, and pondered for years. Plato’s “Allegory of the Cave” challenges this idea. Plato describes and creates an image of two very different extremes. The prisoners in the cave who’s only idea of the real world are shadows projected on the wall before them. One of the prisoners are liberated from his chains, suffering sharp pains from standing and moving his neck, and nearly blinded by the light of the sun. The allegory deals with the difficult decision of living in denial, in a “cave” of ignorance, which is the more comforting way to live, or to be blinded by the light of truth and reality.
Personally, when introduced the idea of either being ignorant and comfortable, or facing the truth and possibly dealing with rejection of society or even your own family members, the idea of being ignorant to the truth and being comfortable does sound appealing. Everybody likes to be comfortable. If given the choice of sleeping on the floor or in a nice comfy bed complete with 3,000 thread count sheets and a warm down comforter, I’m pretty sure most normal human beings would prefer sleeping on the bed. Being in a comfortable and unchallenging state of mind is also a normal preference. For example, the Environmentalist lifestyle is most definitely a rising trend. The t-shirts, the canvas bags and shoes and the pencil cases made entirely of folded up pieces of magazine pages are all very cute, yet when it comes to the true responsibility, most of these so-called “environmentalists” don’t man up to the truth. For example, the most famous environmentalist of all, Al Gore.
In 2006, Al Gore released the Oscar Award winning documentary “An Inconvenient Truth”. The documentary brings the audience into the very real affect our choices are having on our world. It opened our eyes to the issue of Global Warming. Right off the bat, you believe that Al Gore is very serious about these issues, but let’s zoom in on his lifestyle for a moment. Al Gore owns many properties, the most prominent being the “Gore Mansion”. This mansion consumes over 221,000 Kilowatt hours of energy, which is twenty times the national average of most households in the United States. Aside from his house, Al Gore also has a myriad of other factors that enlarge his carbon footprint, including his decision to still eat meat, even though he has openly admitted that “It’s absolutely correct that the growing meat intensity of diets around the world is one of the issues connected to this global crisis – not only because of the CO2 involved, but also because of the water consumed in the process.” Al Gore, though well aware of the flaws in his lifestyle, still chooses to live this way.
Being ignorant and comfortable with that lifestyle is simply a choice. Living with the responsibility of being enlightened seems very harsh to me, especially if it means dealing with rejection of society and even family members. I’d prefer to live in bliss, and everyone is entitled to that. So it all goes back to that overused, yet so quotable phrase, “Ignorance is bliss”. Is ignorance truly bliss? Well, why don’t we ask Al Gore as he eats a steak in his twenty-bedroom mansion? I think I’ll have to join him at the dinner table on this one.
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