After seeing the movie Star Trek for the fourth time, I realized one of the things I like about it comes from a childhood experience. In the scene where Spock as a child is ridiculed and bullied for being part human. When I was in the third grade I was teased mercilessly for being like “Spock” because I have one pointed ear. Here is a webcam image to help illustrate (in case you are wondering – no the photo has not been worked or altered in Photoshop). My ear looks less dramatic now than it did when I was a kid. But it is definitely not your run-of-the-mill normal person ear. (As far as I know. If anyone else who has a similar ear would write or send a picture, that would be swell).
In the movie, seeing the fictional depiction of children from another world carrying out such taunts is a powerful reminder of just how common this is for real people. It is a frightening aspect of human nature to me. It’s both brutal and common. It reveals the primitive parts of our brains hard at work overriding the more evolved parts.
When I was a kid I didn’t think anyone knew that kids were doing such mean things to each other (or particularly, me). Of course, now, I believe that being different as a kid helped me to see difference as something to embrace and diversity as a source of strength. It probably also explains my love of sci-fi as a genre – there were alternative better worlds to live on, or at least to dream of. So, two cheers for pointed ears!
