The Concept of "Island Time" and Why It Causes Extreme Culture Clash in the Modern World - Including in Hawaii
or, Why Some Insist that Math and Clocks and Schedules and Overtime are "Racist"
Some groups insist that "clocks are racist" because white people are always on the move, living by the clock, and using their time to get things done.
If your ancestors evolved in sub-Saharan Africa, or in an island paradise, food literally swims at your feet and falls off the trees onto your head. You don't have to work very hard to get it. You don't need a lot in the way of shelter, either; just something to keep the rain off and the animals out. For anything big like a major storm, head to the nearest cave for a while and you'll be fine.
It's actually counter productive to work hard messing with your environment when it's providing for you just fine as it is - not to mention working hard all day in a hot steamy climate. It works better to use patience, live more slowly, and let the food come to you. That is the concept of "island time" and it continues in those places today.
But if your family evolved in the Northern Hemisphere, you had to deal with cold and ice and snow and marked seasonal changes. You had to control your environment so it wouldn't kill you, and that meant far more work to get food and build shelter and keep warm. It would have been counter productive to live life in the slow lane, because you'd starve or freeze before the first year was over.
But this did lead to a drive to work hard and to an increased ability to invent things and find solutions to problems. That is the concept of the "work ethic" and explains a lot about why the civilized/"first" world is populated the way it is.
I'm convinced that this is the root cause of the screaming arguments, huge culture clash and "racism" between these two groups everywhere you look, and why neither group understands the other.
It's almost like separate cultures evolved for a reason and there is nothing good that comes from forcing them together.
This comment is fascinating to me. I visited Hawaii for the first time in my life last year and one of the many things that left me awestruck was how differently TIME felt there! It just felt like there was so much more of it and though there was plenty of things to do and places to go, there was just zero damn rush for any of it. It was a lovely kind of experience but really uncanny. I’m 50 years old and have been on many vacations but I’ve never experienced this strange slowing waaaay down of time, as I did there. I tried to describe it a few times to people without knowing there was such a thing as “Island time”. I could VERY easily adapt to that lifestyle lol 😂
Those used to a faster life occasionally do move to a place that's on island time and do well there. It's sometimes called "going native" and was not uncommon among some servicemen in WWII.
But you very rarely see it go the other way. People born and raised on island time usually have an extremely difficult time adapting to modern/first world time, and this causes them many social and economic problems when they try.
-But you very rarely see it go the other way. People born and raised on island time usually have an extremely difficult time adapting to modern/first world time, and this causes them many social and economic problems when they try.-
Not shocking! Going from “that” to “this” would definitely be leveling down. Being on island time just feels more in line with nature and true humanity and God. Being used to the rat race, I literally felt like I was on a different planet where they had transcended or ascended to a higher state of being.
I agree. Those of us who live and thrive on first-world time really do not have the right to go to a place where folks live on island time and try to force them into living like first-worlders.
If people are happy and content living that way, then leave them to it. We can offer to let some of their younger ones attend school in the first-world if they want to, and we can offer on-site education regarding things like medicine and construction if they want it.
but if they don't - leave them to it.
The trouble is that some of these simple, island-time cultures also routinely practice things like cannibalism and human sacrifice. That's where there is a huge clash with Western/Christian civilization and I'm not sure how that should be handled.
We ignore it and go away? We try to put a stop to it?
I don't know. It's true that the Spanish explorers of the 15th-16th centuries greatly affected the Indian tribes living in what's now central America and Mexico - often forcing the people to accept Christianity - and they're roundly hated for that.
But what the people living there now don't tell you is that Christianity was forced on them in an effort to stop the widespread practice of torture and human sacrifice of enemy tribes. That's what the Spaniards and other European explorers were trying to stop.
I went to Hawaii in 2011 & fell absolutely in love with the place & people. I mourned Hawaii for a long time. If you haven’t been you won’t get it. I followed every instagram account I could find, even the news so I would finally see it’s a paradise but also has (homeless, murder, drugs, etc) just like the rest of world. I eventually stopped following the accounts except a few photographers in Hawaii. I’ve also traveled most of my life, only in the states, and have seen some beautiful places and people. It’s just something about island time! Guess that’s why coastal real estate prices are outrageous. Jimmy Buffet sang about it better than anyone. I just spent four days at the coast and even in winter it’s a different mindset. Glad you got to experience Hawaii.
Thank you for sharing this. I’ve never looked at differences in cultures like this. Speaking of this, I’ve always had an issue with how Europeans & early Americans saw any culture that lived free off the land as beneath them. Especially calling native people savages, of many different places from islands, Africa, America. Even the British called Scottish Highlanders savages.
In some cases, they saw natives performing savage acts, such as scalping, cannibalizing, performing human sacrifice, murdering those who had surrendered to them, etc.
Yes, Europeans and Americans can be savage, too, but in most cases, I don't think they were labeling natives as savages just for living off the land.
The Concept of "Island Time" and Why It Causes Extreme Culture Clash in the Modern World - Including in Hawaii
or, Why Some Insist that Math and Clocks and Schedules and Overtime are "Racist"
Some groups insist that "clocks are racist" because white people are always on the move, living by the clock, and using their time to get things done.
If your ancestors evolved in sub-Saharan Africa, or in an island paradise, food literally swims at your feet and falls off the trees onto your head. You don't have to work very hard to get it. You don't need a lot in the way of shelter, either; just something to keep the rain off and the animals out. For anything big like a major storm, head to the nearest cave for a while and you'll be fine.
It's actually counter productive to work hard messing with your environment when it's providing for you just fine as it is - not to mention working hard all day in a hot steamy climate. It works better to use patience, live more slowly, and let the food come to you. That is the concept of "island time" and it continues in those places today.
But if your family evolved in the Northern Hemisphere, you had to deal with cold and ice and snow and marked seasonal changes. You had to control your environment so it wouldn't kill you, and that meant far more work to get food and build shelter and keep warm. It would have been counter productive to live life in the slow lane, because you'd starve or freeze before the first year was over.
But this did lead to a drive to work hard and to an increased ability to invent things and find solutions to problems. That is the concept of the "work ethic" and explains a lot about why the civilized/"first" world is populated the way it is.
I'm convinced that this is the root cause of the screaming arguments, huge culture clash and "racism" between these two groups everywhere you look, and why neither group understands the other.
It's almost like separate cultures evolved for a reason and there is nothing good that comes from forcing them together.
This comment is fascinating to me. I visited Hawaii for the first time in my life last year and one of the many things that left me awestruck was how differently TIME felt there! It just felt like there was so much more of it and though there was plenty of things to do and places to go, there was just zero damn rush for any of it. It was a lovely kind of experience but really uncanny. I’m 50 years old and have been on many vacations but I’ve never experienced this strange slowing waaaay down of time, as I did there. I tried to describe it a few times to people without knowing there was such a thing as “Island time”. I could VERY easily adapt to that lifestyle lol 😂
Those used to a faster life occasionally do move to a place that's on island time and do well there. It's sometimes called "going native" and was not uncommon among some servicemen in WWII.
But you very rarely see it go the other way. People born and raised on island time usually have an extremely difficult time adapting to modern/first world time, and this causes them many social and economic problems when they try.
-But you very rarely see it go the other way. People born and raised on island time usually have an extremely difficult time adapting to modern/first world time, and this causes them many social and economic problems when they try.-
Not shocking! Going from “that” to “this” would definitely be leveling down. Being on island time just feels more in line with nature and true humanity and God. Being used to the rat race, I literally felt like I was on a different planet where they had transcended or ascended to a higher state of being.
I agree. Those of us who live and thrive on first-world time really do not have the right to go to a place where folks live on island time and try to force them into living like first-worlders.
If people are happy and content living that way, then leave them to it. We can offer to let some of their younger ones attend school in the first-world if they want to, and we can offer on-site education regarding things like medicine and construction if they want it.
but if they don't - leave them to it.
The trouble is that some of these simple, island-time cultures also routinely practice things like cannibalism and human sacrifice. That's where there is a huge clash with Western/Christian civilization and I'm not sure how that should be handled.
We ignore it and go away? We try to put a stop to it?
I don't know. It's true that the Spanish explorers of the 15th-16th centuries greatly affected the Indian tribes living in what's now central America and Mexico - often forcing the people to accept Christianity - and they're roundly hated for that.
But what the people living there now don't tell you is that Christianity was forced on them in an effort to stop the widespread practice of torture and human sacrifice of enemy tribes. That's what the Spaniards and other European explorers were trying to stop.
I went to Hawaii in 2011 & fell absolutely in love with the place & people. I mourned Hawaii for a long time. If you haven’t been you won’t get it. I followed every instagram account I could find, even the news so I would finally see it’s a paradise but also has (homeless, murder, drugs, etc) just like the rest of world. I eventually stopped following the accounts except a few photographers in Hawaii. I’ve also traveled most of my life, only in the states, and have seen some beautiful places and people. It’s just something about island time! Guess that’s why coastal real estate prices are outrageous. Jimmy Buffet sang about it better than anyone. I just spent four days at the coast and even in winter it’s a different mindset. Glad you got to experience Hawaii.
Thank you for sharing this. I’ve never looked at differences in cultures like this. Speaking of this, I’ve always had an issue with how Europeans & early Americans saw any culture that lived free off the land as beneath them. Especially calling native people savages, of many different places from islands, Africa, America. Even the British called Scottish Highlanders savages.
In some cases, they saw natives performing savage acts, such as scalping, cannibalizing, performing human sacrifice, murdering those who had surrendered to them, etc.
Yes, Europeans and Americans can be savage, too, but in most cases, I don't think they were labeling natives as savages just for living off the land.