Should you erase traumatic memories?
“Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind” is one of my
favorite movies. It stars Jim Carrey as
Joel and Kate Winslet as Clementine. They’ve been in a relationship for several
years, and their relationship has been both powerful and contentious because
they are complete opposites. Joel is
careful, quiet, and timid, while Clementine is wild, impulsive, and
emotional. When they have a nasty fight,
Clementine (perhaps impulsively) goes to the Lacuna Corporation, which has a
procedure for erasing memories. When
Joel goes to her work to apologize, he discovers that she does not remember him
or anything about their relationship with each other. She’s had Lacuna erase her memories of him!
In anger, Joel goes to Lacuna to ask them to erase his
memories of her. As the procedure
proceeds, he goes backward through his memories of their time together, and he
realizes that it was a huge mistake.
Besides being a great movie, this scenario is interesting in
part because the technology to erase or at least dampen memories is currently
being developed, partly as a treatment for PTSD.
What do you think?
Should a person seek to erase painful or traumatic memories? If you could erase the worst moment of your
life from your memory, would you? Why or
why not?
No, I do not think a person should try to erase painful or traumatic memories. I think this because, in my experience, my worst memory was wrecking and totaling my new car, after only having it three weeks. At the time, sure I would have liked to erase the memory, but looking back on it I've learned to be a better driver because of it. I feel that the painful and traumatic event actually helped me to realize that no one is perfect and that we all make mistakes, but we have to own up to our mistakes and learn from them. I feel that event helped me to understand that in life not everything is going to be happy and good all the time and that you're going to have painful and traumatic memories, but you have to learn not to dwell on them all the time. By not dwelling on them, you are able to see how that event changed you and that you can actually better yourself because of it.
ReplyDeleteI think the decision to erase traumatic memories should be dependent on the person and the reason for which it is being removed. If someone is erasing a memory because it was traumatic to the point of changing this person in an extremely negative manner, then it should be considered. Now I’m not talking about a memory such as losing a loved one; this sort of memory is important for one to experience even if it may leave a negative impact on the person. What I’m referencing to is a traumatic experience such as serving in a war or watching someone get brutally murdered in front of you. These experiences could possibly leave someone with PTSD and cause them to change to the point where they’re a shell of their former self. The erasure of these experiences could allow someone like a war veteran to live life again with the same joy as the had previous to serving. These cases aren’t as common and for the average individual it’s perhaps important to keep their most traumatic experiences because theirs aren’t likely to be as extreme. Personally, I would keep my most traumatic memories because they allowed me to grow and develop as an individual in a manner that wouldn’t have been possible without having them. Of course, I don’t speak for all people. Everyone’s circumstances are different, and someone people might be better off having lost some of their most traumatic experiences.
ReplyDeleteI think regardless of the traumatic experience that the person goes through, they shouldn't be able to erase the experience from their memory because those experiences make the person who they are today. A definition of knowledge is the sum of all the experiences a person goes through. People learn from each and every experience they go through whether it is big or small. Traumatic experiences, while they are horrible during, test us and develop our human potential so we can be ready for traumatic experiences down the road.
ReplyDeleteDiscussing this movie makes me really happy, Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind is one of my favorite movies ever. When I think of whether or not erasing memories should happen, I think of one character in this movie specifically, Mary. She works at Lacuna, and eventually has an affair with her boss who is married. She then finds out that this isn't the first time this happened with her boss, but every time it did, she had to do Lacuna to forget it so work could continue like normal. Everyone at work knew of her memory being erased except her. History inevitably repeated itself. The same could be said about Clementine and Joel. Throughout the movie, you see the process of Joel erasing Clementine, and you see the regret he feels firsthand. This regret lead him to Clementine's door again, and they ended up together once again at the end of the movie.
ReplyDeleteI believe that even if you could erase certain memories, history would repeat itself and the same things would most likely happen again. Just because you erase a certain memory doesn't mean the mindset that caused you to make that decision has changed.
I would not choose to erase my worst memories simply because those memories are what mold us into who we are. Not to say that these memories are the only thing that shapes us; good memories can shape us too. However, often times, when someone has a near death or extremely traumatic experience, they have a turn around in their life. Likewise, when someone has an eye-opening, amazing experience they might experience a turn around in their life. All the experiences we have here on this Earth make us who we are. By erasing the bad parts of our lives we would effectively erase a part of ourselves entirely.
ReplyDeleteI wouldn't choose to erase my worst memory because I believe that our memories and past experiences make us who we are. Most people that are at high places in their lives had to go through many lows and get through them to be where they are. Jim Carey for example had to drop out of school at one point to work and help his family pay the bills. Now he is a wealthy comedian. I think that without having to go through his lows he wouldn't have been able to reach his high.
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