Does modern society have attention deficit disorder?

I saw a documentary the other night that mentioned several mental conditions that affect people including narcolepsy, tourette's syndrome and autism.  They described the characteristics of each of these ailments and how the people who suffer them are affected in their daily lives.  The symptoms all by themselves were enough to cause their suffering, but a common thread was identified through all of the cases that probably hurt them more than the condition itself.  What could possibly be worse than all of their symptoms combined?  It was the rejection, lack of attention and lack of sympathy they faced from strangers and their family.

For example, a man suffering from narcolepsy (a condition that makes people fall asleep without warning or apparent reason) had to have a person accompany him nearly 24 hours a day.  Whenever he had the courage to go outside and walk down the street, he had to deal with people's reaction to his collapses.  In the middle of the street he would fall down and sleep without warning.  People passing by did not even bother to help him, they thought he was completely drunk.

Another case was about a couple of grown men who were born with autism.  These men had similar experiences growing up.  Their families, friends and the experts treating them all assumed they did not have coherent thought processes in their brains, they all thought they had extreme retardation.  When they were introduced to a tool that allowed them to type their thoughts on a computer, they were astonished at how much they were aware of their sorroundings, sometimes even more than the "normal" people could.  Years later they went on to star in a documentary designed to help others like themselves.

What these stories reminded me is an observation I had since I was a kid; why are people so quick to judge and dismiss others?  This very same thing has happened to me, not once or twice, it happens every time I make an observation that is not easily understood by the people who are around me.  The reaction is almost always the same; first they pretend not to hear me, if I insist they will begin to ignore me.  Finally if I keep pushing to be heard, then the ridiculing will certainly start.

Why I am making such a big deal about this?  Because as a society we need as much useful information as possible, we need to change paradigms, and we certainly cannot change paradigms when we use the same sources of information that create that paradigm in the first place.

For an explanation, I use one of the most revealing and powerfully enlightening events in my life.  It was during an executive management training and motivation course I took.  The team I was a part of knew me well and learned to ignore my off the wall comments.  In a competition with another team we were losing points because everyone dove in to the activities without a good strategy.  I kept suggesting one strategy after another but no one listened, and we kept losing.  Suddenly, one of the people in my team opened his ears and ordered everyone else to follow my suggestion.  To everyone's surprise, the move allowed us to win.  We all celebrated and moved on to other activities.  I was stunned, not because my idea worked, it was due to the realization of just how closed minded and short-sighted most people really are.  Remember that the people in my team were executives of medium and large sized corporations, people who were pillars of society, decision-makers.  They were a representation of the ruling class found in most corporations, governments, associations etc.

As I recall that experience a terrifying thought came to me: if these smart and influential people ignored an excelent idea that allowed them to win a simple contest like this, what happens in their corporations, nations  or associations to all the great ideas that are suggested by people like me?  That's right, they are completely ignored, and the people suggesting them are constantly ridiculed, ignored, medicated or even outcast.  It is frightening to extend this line of thought to a world scale.  Think of how many world changing ideas are ignored because of people's closed-mindedness

What's the moral of the story?  Modern society does not seem to be able to pay attention to the messengers telling us we need to love our neighbor.  The world would be a better place if people would take the time to listen to the messages that God sends to us through people we would not normally interact with.  Give it a try and speak honestly with any of them, you'll be surprised at how much it can change you.  Everyone knows the world needs to change and hopefully these messengers will help us change one person at a time... I hope.