Community

Transitioning from SF to Seoul is hard enough with the culture shock, but in addition, we have a Minervan summer where students spend 4 months scattered all over the world. As our college years progress, we make deeper connections and closer friends, but does it also mean that we make less friends? Do we close off our friend groups? Does the community become more... cliquey? And dare I say it, but how much does building a strong sense of community actually matter?

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Our last 10:01 was called "Communi-tea." It was focused on discussing the state of our community while providing a breather for everyone as assignments are hitting hard. I sat down with my empty mug awaiting hot substances, and gradually, more and more people joined the group.

"Try to talk to people that you don't normally speak to." We were casually instructed for the 50th time in our Minerva journey. "Discuss how our community has changed from San Francisco."

Part of me still thinks we're all the same annoying, commitment-averse, self-absorbed, emotionally-unbalanced, neurotic students that we were last year. After all, it was only four months, right? How much could have possibly changed?

But as I look around the room, I don't see the same people who attended events last year at this one. I don't see the same faces clumped together, in the same order, surrounded by the same familiar aura of "come-talk-to-us."

Maybe it's unfair to expect a group of people of such diverse backgrounds to rally around only one specific sense of purpose- one community. But at the end of the day, we need the community just as much as the community needs us.

First of all, what is community? How do we define it? Let's ask Google:

"1. a group of people living in the same place or having a particular characteristic in common."

Oh. That's all? People who have something in common? Who live together? I mean, we all live in the same building, but I don't feel that we're that strong of a community.

"2. a feeling of fellowship with others, as a result of sharing common attitudes, interests, and goals."

This seems more in line with what I was looking for. Not a characteristic, but a feeling of community. An emotional tie that can connect us regardless of our different characteristics and regardless of where we live. The kind of community that we can take with us after we leave Minerva, and hopefully, depend on for the rest of our lives. Isn't that what everyone wants?

Maybe that's where the contention comes from in my mind. Maybe I expect the second definition of community, while my community thinks the first is sufficient. But I don't think that's fair. There are so many people in our class who spend so much time curating activities and making clubs and organizing events at their own expense, for the sake of the "community". Clearly what they're looking to highlight is not just some arbitrary common characteristic, but something that can last past these four years of travel and studies? I know it makes me sound entitled, as if I deserve a community because I've put so much in, but is that not how it works?

I guess my question is, do we really need a community? Should people be forced to contribute to this common feeling, which I'm sure has some benefit after we graduate, but if that's not really something people want, do they have a duty to contribute to it?

In philosophy, there is this moral idea of fairness: "playing fair requires one to reciprocate specifically by following the rules of the cooperative scheme from which one benefits, just as consent requires one to act according to the terms of an agreement" (Tosi, 2018). If students benefit from a community, then they necessarily accrue a debt of fairness. Even if they don't actively consent to receiving community benefits, it would be difficult to argue that they don't anyway, thus, they should contribute to the community on principle.

I get it. You're busy. You have academics. You have an internship. Cool. Amazing. What worries me, though, is that the circle that we drew around the class of M22 in San Francisco was global. We were fresh and excited and ready to devour the secrets that the world offered to us, but now? Now I realize that we are the rule, not the exception. Actually, the M19s warned me in SF that this would happen. "Things change as you travel. People become more independent. It's all downhill from Seoul," they said. Don't get me wrong, I thrive on pessimism. It's what gets me through the day. But for some reason or the other, I chose to believe that M22 would be different. That we would be different. Because in those SF moments of fear and stress and uncertainty, we only had each other to cling to. And I thought that would last.

Honestly, I understand why people don't do more for the community. People don't want to come to events that they aren't interested in, they don't wanna hang out with people that aren't in their group. It's not too surprising. We diverged and now we're converging. We had so many options, and now we crave a little more depth, and that is a tradeoff that doesn't much exception.

Maybe it's wrong of me to feel entitled to other people's time. Maybe it's wrong of me to think that if I can do it, anyone can, should, and will too. Maybe I'm just not good at being satisfied. But what's new?

I think this anger and frustration stems from my own insecurities and growing pains. I've always wanted a "group". The two or three people who do eeeeeeverything together. The people that look for you in a crowd and stick around simply because they like your existence. Complete dependence. And I know it's dangerous and needy and clingy, and honestly if I really had that, I probably wouldn't even like it. But it doesn't change how I feel. It doesn't keep me from pouring and pouring and pouring into a community betting on the slim hope that somebody else will pour back.

Sometimes I wonder if I disappear from Minerva if anyone would really notice. Would someone take my place? Would the grass just grow over me like I was never there? Is that why I give so much? To justify my place here?

Part of me knows that this is just another lesson in growing up. We learn to lean on ourselves. Trust ourselves. We crave depth of connection, and so instead of randomly dropping lines in an ocean hoping to get lucky, we narrow our pool to a pond. We get to know the fish. We invest in what we can see. It's less risk that way. Fewer surprises.

But there's also more to loose. What if I give all of myself and get nothing in return? Why do I keep pouring myself into an ocean?