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Cynics
by Monte Wilson

CYNIC: One who not only reads bitter lessons from the past, but who is prematurely disappointed with the future.

A cynic is a man who looks at the world with a monocle in his mind's eye.
Carolyn Wells, author

A cynic is someone whose rose color glasses have been ripped from their face, and then had a half-full glass of vinegar thrown in their eyes. Cynics have no illusions from which to be disabused: they know the world is a dangerous place and that the individual who is not out to get you is probably naïve, which makes them just as dangerous.

While a pessimist doubts that things will work out for the best, the cynic goes one step further and says that the reason things won’t work out is because people are dogs who will follow their survival and pleasure instincts, no matter what it costs everyone around them. (Cynic: Greek kynikos, literally, like a dog.) All people care about is themselves…and they will stick it to you every time they have an opportunity for doing so.

All of this, for these people, adding up to the “fact” that people are basically dogs. What intrigues me about many of these people is that while they are holding-forth about the wickedness of the human heart, they always appear so smug and superior. It is as if somehow they alone escaped the human-condition that they are always moaning and groaning about.

I remember the first time I started thinking about this. I was talking to my dad about a book I was reading where the author—One of the Good Guys (i.e., a guy who agrees with me)—was taking apart the belief system of another —One of the Bad Guys (i.e., a guy who disagrees with me). While I was reveling in the carnage left by the Good Guy, my dad shocked me by saying that I needed to be careful, and needed to be more intellectually honest. “No one’s belief system is totally wrong….When someone paints his opponent in such a fashion he has exposed his own laziness and prejudices as much or more as he has those of his opponent.”

While the cynic denigrates and derides the optimist, he has the same beam in his eye as do those whom he castigates: his view of the world and the human condition is far too narrow. Sure enough, Mother Teresa was not always a Happy Camper. However, Hitler loved his dog. You get the picture.

So how do you know if you might be a cynic?

• If you believe that every member of the US Congress should be shipped off to Iran
• If you think that only the idiots and halfwits in your office are on the fast track to promotions and pay-raises
• If you think that every person who is kind to you has an ulterior motive
• If you think the world is headed to hell in a hand basket
• If you think that every Roman Catholic Priest is a pedophile and every minister with a television show is greedy
• If you think that the only person who cares about you is you
• If you admire curmudgeons
• If you are constantly deriding your leaders, followers, masculine women, feminine males, lazy idiots, arrogant ministers, churches-the Church-Christians, modernists, post-modernists, deconstructionists, strict constructionists, conformists, non-conformists, New Agers, snobs (coffee snobs, fashion snobs, health snobs, automobile snobs, etc.), spineless liberals, hard-hearted conservatives, people with so-called good marriages, people with bad marriages, people who are divorced, people who are remarried, people who are too-good-to-be-true, people who just-don’t-get-it, people who think that they Get It, websites that get more hits than yours (panderers), authors who sell more books than you (sell-outs), musicians who take political stands, actors who take political stands, fat people, skinny people, people who are obsessed with their appearance, people who couldn’t care less about their appearance, talkative people, bashful people, extroverts, introverts…

If such thoughts and words fill your mind and conversation, you just might be a cynic…but not a Total Cynic, not a Comprehensive Cynic. After all, you do love your pet, don’t you? And what about the time you gave your seat on the train to a pregnant lady? Then there was that tear in your eye when Old Yeller died. See? You were right: your glass is only half-empty!