Wednesday September 7, 2005
Boiled frogs
We had a guest from Toronto staying with us. One day, we drove her around the lake. Her head kept swivelling to see yet another vista of lake and forest, of houses clustered in a bay or along a beach, of waterfalls cascading down …
“You could never get tired of this,” she said, after we got home.
No, we don\’t get tired of it. But we do get used to it.
The same way we get used to having a heated home in winter, and an air conditioned one in summer. The way we get used to eating three meals a day. Having a comfortable bed to sleep in. Driving a car. Going for a walk without fear of getting shot or stabbed.
I take all of these for granted until I have to do without them. I visit a strange city, and my view is limited to the garbage cans across the road. My bed sags. I have to depend on sweaty buses for transportation. In some places, gang wars or terrorists make life a questionable quantity.
The dangers of complacency
Increasingly, I\’m hearing a new buzz-phrase – “the boiled frog syndrome.”
Frogs are what we call “cold-blooded” creatures. Their body temperature adjusts to match their surroundings. If a frog accidentally leaps into a pot of boiling water, it will leap out instantly – wouldn\’t you? – because it recognizes a mismatch between water and body temperatures.
But place that same frog into a pot of cool water, and gradually heat the water. The frog will continually adjust its body temperature accordingly. Until it\’s too late.
The Bank of Canada applies this principle in raising interest rates. People will tolerate a series of small changes, where they would rebel against a single large increase.
We react the same way to climate change. Summers get hotter. But only a little bit, each year. And so we keep bumbling on.
Author Thomas Saunders titled his book, “The Boiled Frog Syndrome.” He thinks we have become complacent about the subtle but steady changes that keep re-shaping our society. According to the book\’s blurb, “the majority of diseases that have multiplied over the past 100 years… can be traced to the modern built environment… and the indiscriminate use of untested technology.”
Translated, we\’re boiling ourselves alive. But we\’ve grown used to it. So we don\’t notice what\’s happening to us.
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For a lighter look at ethics, faith, and life, I recommend Ralph Milton\’s weekly e-newsletter Rumors. You can subscribe to it at the Wood Lake Books home page in Ralph Milton\’s Site, or by sending a note directly to [email protected].
It\’s also worth pursuing Richard Fairchild\’s United Online site. Another site worth visiting is David Keating\’s \”SeemslikeGod\” page.
Perhaps you can get used to anything – up to a point. In the Middle East, in Asia, two generations have now spent their lives in refugee camps. They have never known anything else.
Yet it was the Exile – from approximately 597 to 538 B.C. – that unified the Hebrew people and shaped Jewish culture. Sabbath observance became the cornerstone of Jewish religious practice when the exiles decided not to blend into Babylonian culture.
They refused to become boiled frogs.
It\’s a worthwhile caution. Against taking for granted our freedoms of speech and movement, our nutritious meals, our personal security.
Even the view from our windows.
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Copyright © 2002 by Jim Taylor. Non-profit use in congregations and study groups permitted; all other rights reserved.
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