The Inner Ring

In this article, Lewis talked that there is always an invisible system exists in every kind of community (society). The rules of these systems are undefined. It is very hard to understand those rules if you are a so-called outsider. But once you enter into the community. The invisible rules will begin to appear. Basically, we call the community the inner ring, and its system the second or unwritten systems as Tolstoi called.
There is a clear boundary between the inside and outside. However, it is hard to define the exact borderline for the ring. “People think they are in it after they have in fact been pushed out of it. Or before they have been allowed in; this provides great amusement for those who are really inside.” Somehow, as an insider, the man will feel a sense of satisfaction and pleasure even though they were asked to do more work than the outsiders. I myself am an example. I am an international student committee member. When I told my friends that I had a meeting at 3:30 and I had to go, I felt like that I was a useful person.
If the man doses not know how to control this kind of feeling, the Inner Rings will be potential to be a dangerous thing. As Lewis said, “I am not going to say that the existence of Inner Rings is an Evil. It is certainly unavoidable.” According to the nature of human sin, a man will soon become to be proud of himself and loss his rules played in this moral society. “A thing may be morally neutral and yet the desire for that thing may be dangerous.”
I have to confess that I totally have the same feeling, which Lewis has described) that I would feel happy when people ask who I am. Indeed, most of times I wanted them to envy or admire me. There is an interesting invisible way to get pleasure from Inner Ring. One way is to make the entry test tougher. That is to be “mean” on the next entrant. Or at least, it should be harder than the previous one. Because of this, we can always see students around campus working on their resumes. The entrance interview has become harder and harder these days.
However, human is not always satisfied with what they have. Once they got the pleasure, their pleasure can barely be with them since he had already got the desire job. Human will rise up another desire to go into some other inner rings. As long as we are sinful, we may never be able to feel content. But if there is no exclusion (outsiders), there won’t be any inner rings. So don’t always bother yourself if you can’t enter into some sort of inner rings. Because without outsiders, no one can be in an inner ring.