Uncommonly Common

roamcare
13 hours ago
3 min read

What do you think of when we say “common?” Common sense. Common law. Commonwealth. Commonplace. Most people would think common, without any additional information, as something ordinary. The first thing the Merriam-Webster dictionary thinks is “generally met with and not in any way special.” That seems to be the common refrain among the other big dictionaries. In short, common is pretty blah!

Common is blah the same way vanilla is plain. We have all heard vanilla’s almost disrespectful story. A flavor, or spice depending on your viewpoint, derived from the pods of the vanilla orchid which must be hand-pollinated and only the first bloom bears the vanilla pod. A lot of work for something so” plain.” Likewise, there is more to “common” than what meets the “not in any way special” eye.

Another definition of common is “shared” as in how a common border is shared by two countries. All the examples at the start of this post harken to this definition - of or relating to a community, belonging to or by all members of a group. This is the common of common law, commonwealth, and even common sense.

There are certain people who embrace their lack of formal education by claiming they live by their common sense. No one person has a common sense. It is a contradiction. The sense is derived from the lives and experiences of many. Common sense is another example of how we are all together. A common corps of people who have a common understanding of what they want, what they think, and what they expect.

Some say a common person is one who lacks sophistication, one different from others, a commoner. We say the common person instead is member of a community, one out of many, common man, one who participates in the community and contributes to the common good.

The most important common element of the community is the common good, that which is beneficial to all members of the community, shared by all who respect other community members and their rights and freedoms, and recognize their obligations and responsibilities. Common good eschews privilege, respects the individual, and is shared by all. You can think of the common good as what you would choose if the only things you were aware of were rationality and fairness.

Our friend common sense isn’t much different. We may consider it something that is organic to ourselves, something we think of as being fair and rational. Indeed, it is fair and rational. More than that though, it is borne not of the knowledge we experience but of the knowledge we share, the knowledge we add to the common experience for the common good.

Common sense - the ability to think and behave in a reasonable way and to make sound judgments about everyday situations without needing special knowledge or experience. Thomas Paine argued for American independence from Great Britain, advocating for a central government to protect the rights of the people and famously called it “Common Sense.” A perfect example of behaving in a reasonable way to make a sound judgement about every day life.

No matter how you think of it, you’ll never think of common as plain and unsophisticated again. It’s much more exotic than that. Like vanilla. Like uncommon.