Self-Fulfilling Prophecy and the Good People's Prayers

It was during a car ride home, late at night on a weekday, when I first heard the comment. First car in front of a red light, my friend invited my driving friend to view the traffic lights as a colorful street ornament. This ignited a small banter as my driving friend refused the proposition. In the end, the traffic light served its purpose as we drove only after it turned green.

The comment was my driving friend’s closing argument (which effectively ended the banter, by the way):

        “Yang bener disalahin, yang salah dibenerin … Indonesia banget. “

         (“The right thing is wronged, and the wrong thing is righted. That is very Indonesia.”)

Like a search engine, my memory traveled and collected glimpse of similar scene when somebody complain on a negative attitude then associate it with being Indonesian. I was not in the car anymore. I was in the cinema, at a table in a restaurant, in a meeting with government agency, all at the same time, replaying past scenes.

        “Indonesia banget deh, ga bisa ngantri. “

        “ih orang Indonesia tuh ya, jelek banget etos kerjanya.”

        “Dasar, mental orang Indonesia banget deh, “

         … And the list goes.

The comments of course, are not without bases. We are witnessing these scenes of disrespect towards order and fondness towards exception over rules everyday. When you drive to work and a motorcycle cuts you in right before your turn. When you walk past the security post without letting your bags checked. When you queue up a centre line in the ladies’ restroom and a lady pass you by and enter the just vacant loo. When you see someone litters.

Few days later, as I brushed through my old textbook of Sociology: Day to Day Life, I stumbled into this term from Robert Merton (an American sociologist), called ‘self-fulfilling prophecy”.  Its definition was: “a false definition of the situation evoking a new behavior which makes the originally false conception come true” (Merton 1968: 477).

The concept is very simple. You view A as bad. You continuously treat A as bad. People around you who see you treat A as bad, begin to see A as bad. Then A is bad, soon becomes the truth.

This thinking method seems familiar, and my mind populated The Secret, the Law of Attraction, and Quantum Ikhlas. So far, the theories make sense. Apparently, they make so much sense that many people seems to treat these perspective as revelations. I continued to read and found that some Japanese researchers found that these prophecies stimulate ‘nocebo’ effects. So when placebo effect manipulates one to think that they are getting better, ‘nocebo’ is as powerful as deteriorating one’s health.

The comments. Theories. Research. I see the link, but they still feel rather distant. Just another cognitive knowledge. 

This notion grew into a belief though, when a sharing from a very dear person of mine came to mind. He said, being told that he was a chubby kid made him feel compelled to eat as much as he thought a chubby kid would eat. Soon, he developed a rather intimate relationship with gourmet food and the world welcomed another member to Chubby 'R' Us. (This is not a sad story for he did a good job growing up). 

But now every time I hear a negative comment associated with us, being Indonesian, I hear an ‘amen’ to a bad prayer.  And I worry for I believe a prayer from a good person is often heard.

And there are just so many of them. 

                                                                                                                                                                    1 October 2001, 1.20 AM