There is a public opinion/saying that runs rampant among the online society of my country (or perhaps everywhere else as well) that—well-read/knowledgeable people are humble. And when an implied intellectual lets their opinion out in a crude manner, this public saying comes up to negate their opinion, especially if they (the public) can’t refute the opinion with a logical rebuttal! The truth is, many of the artists and thinkers throughout history were not humble at all—they spoke their minds with credible authority and couldn’t care less whether they are coming across as lovable and moderate. This of course brings us to the topic of being arrogant/confident when you express yourself, may it be through words or attitude.
I think the main difference between confidence and arrogance is knowing the limit of your own ability. When you do, you’re confident, and when you’re not, arrogant. I also think there’s another angle in this—arrogance comes with some sort of insecurity and a need to see oneself as better than others. So jealousy or envy can be a source of arrogance. I don’t need to elaborate on how confidence is seen as a great quality to have, may it be in your potential partner, in your profession, and whatnot, and, we generally see arrogance as a negative trait to have. There are a couple of adjectives that get thrown in with arrogance, such as egotistical and narcissistic but these reside in gray areas.
Now, while it may not be the popular opinion and certainly most wouldn’t agree with me, I believe being opinionated, egotistical or crude is fine as long as the person can back themselves up with logic or evidence. And even when it comes to being arrogant and dismissing other people, it’s not always that simple just to discredit them. For example, Pablo Picasso hailed himself to be the king of the artistic world, where none came close, he thought. Salvador Dali also thought himself to be the greatest of his time. And funnily enough, looking back from 2023, it's hard to discredit either of them for their outrageous claims.
Let’s take another art form into consideration—cinema. Hitchcock and Welles hated each other yet both of them had something in common, inflamed ego. How can we deny them though? I mean, Orson Welles made a mini film inside another film (where he mostly mocked the entire film-going world) in the style of Michelangelo Antonioni out of spite just because he thought he could do it easily and Antonioni didn’t deserve the recognition. Now, I do love Antonioni’s films but hey, it’s Orson-freaking-Welles! And it's not always just a single artist with his/her subjective opinion. Hitchcock called the actors ‘cattle’, but if you ever read Robert Bresson’s ‘Notes on Cinematography’ you will see he didn’t see the actors not much higher than that. Hitchcock and Bresson are very different from each other, yet this show of ego isn’t merely arrogance. It has more to do with artistic puritanism. Elitism, snobbery, whatever you want to call it. And I’m fine with that.
And then there’s the other spectrum of things. There are other people in the film industry itself who are also egotistical but have no base for their arrogance, like Shea Labeouf or Michael Bay. In the end, they are just arrogant fools. Sadly for us, the world is mostly filled with this kind. In fact, the above examples of great artists who are not humble should be a tiny percentage of people, most arrogant people are simply arrogant. We see them every day all around us, and we don’t really like them. Come to think of it, perhaps the friends of those great artists were also thought along this line! Huh, something to ponder upon!
That's me, on a mini river island, among the grazing cows, being very confident with my action cam on a stick!
