Believing in Something - Or Anything, Really

By now, you have likely heard the Nike ad: Believe in something, even if it means sacrificing everything. The meme-generating machine that is the internet has already provided loads of parodies, some of them humorous, some of them not so humorous. Rather than taking that route, I want to address the wisdom of the ad itself.

Believe In Something

Joss Whedon once offered a succinct paraphrase of a popular phrase: "Be yourself - unless you suck." In other words, saying "Be yourself!" to someone might at times be terrible advice. Same with "Express yourself!" or "Follow Your Arrow." One might say these things to encourage someone who is discouraged or shy, but not all expressions merit equal praise, and sometimes we shoot the arrow over our house, and hurt our brother.

I don't think "Believe in Something" is necessarily great advice. It can be; some things are worth believing in. But not everything is. One can believe in racial equality or white supremacy; one can believe men and women have equal value, worth and dignity or that one is superior; one can believe in God or no God or many gods; one can believe in creationism or evolution; one can believe the earth is a globe or flat; one can believe space aliens and Bigfoot live among us or that they are not real; one can believe that marriage is a cultural construct or a timeless institution; one can believe gender is fluid or not; one can believe the unborn is a human being or a blob of tissue; one can believe in global warming or cooling or believe it's not worth having an opinion.

Simply saying that believing in something is admirable is the same as saying that believing in anything is admirable - and surely none of us believe that, do we?