“Why would you ever read for fun?”
Answering the question that made me question our generation.
As soon as the words had processed I was sent reeling. A mixture of confusion, disappointment, and sympathy. As a child growing up I would have nervously laughed and said something like “Oh, ummm, I was just really bored and had nothing better to do, reading actually sucks.” I would have hid my introversion behind a facade of socializing and demeaned my own favorite escape just to fit in. Having grown older, hopefully wiser, and less concerned with trivial things, I no longer feel ashamed of spending so much time alone reading. But for some reason, on this particular occasion, this question hit a sore spot. It didn’t make sense. It was like being asked:
“Why would you ever go travel and see the world, for fun?”
“Why would you ever make love to your significant other, for fun?”
“Why would you ever enlighten and grow yourself, for fun?”
Clearly this line of thinking, this association of reading with something ecstatic, was not unanimous. And that’s when I realized that our generation has a problem.
What did we do as a society to create such a reluctance towards learning? How did we associate reading with something so repulsive that the pairing of read and fun confuses some of us? Why did we establish the notion that growing one’s intellect is just for school and afterwards we become “free” of this “burden”? Where did we go wrong?
Regardless of what our education system teaches us, if it doesn’t foster the ability to learn, if it doesn’t inspire the pursuit of knowledge, if it doesn’t teach the point of education itself, than it is failing. Period.
Explaining derivatives is futile if we have a desire to forget derivatives as soon as we possibly can. Teaching creative writing is a waste if we‘re not also teaching how powerful a voice can be. Establishing the habit of “learn so that you can pass the exam and pass the class” is useless when life has no exams and classes to pass. Being forced to read without being motivated as to why will only create a negative association with reading, and a bigger crime cannot be committed within our education system. Let me repeat that and make a claim that I will go to my deathbed repeating:
Creating a distaste towards reading is one of the most detrimental things that can be done to a human being.
It’s the equivalent of placing horse-blinders on someone and not telling them. It’s the equivalent of placing a glass bubble over their heads and not letting them remove it. We cringe at the information filtering that occurs in North Korea but don’t realize that associating reading with something mundane and pointless does almost the same thing, regardless of whether it’s intentional or not.
Failing to illustrate the point of reading, or even worse creating an aversion towards it, severs one of the most fruitful avenues for acquiring knowledge. And what remains after you do that is biased social media, opinionated news headlines, and the echo chamber that is our friend group. Tell me again how we’re not narrow-minded.
Reading brings knowledge. And knowledge is more than just power. Knowledge is awareness of the world we live in. Knowledge is understanding of oneself. Knowledge is objectivity and rationality when reasoning about life. Knowledge is everything. Mark Twain once said:
“Travel is fatal to prejudice, bigotry, and narrow-mindedness, and many of our people needed it sorely on these accounts.”
Replace the word travel with knowledge, and the resulting quote is all you need to take away from this entire article.
So why do I read for fun? Maybe it is just because I’m an introvert. Maybe I find too much peace in being inside my head and reading is the only thing I can do to keep myself there. But maybe, just maybe, it’s because I’ve realized something that I want you to realize as well. Reading, including the thirst for knowledge that comes with it, is absolutely essential to intellectual progression. And our generation, and our society, desperately needs intellectual progression.
Read more about my thoughts on life by checking out the rest of my blog:
