Public speaking is such a common fear, but why? I suspect evolution holds the answer.
Wikipedia reckons that the “most common fears are of: ghosts, the existence of evil powers, cockroaches, spiders, snakes, heights, water, enclosed spaces, tunnels and bridges, needles, social rejection, failure, examinations and public speaking.”
Even thinking about it can cause some people's heart rate to rise
Now doesn’t public speaking make a strange addendum to that list? Apart from the first two – which are imaginary – the rest seem like perfectly rational fears of things that could result in physical harm.
[You might claim the the fear of rejection is not a physical harm, rejection could be: Romantic rejection, which reduces your chances of procreation; and social rejection, which to a pack animal would be a very dangerous situation. Both may lead to the gene's inability to continue to replicate itself, which is why we enjoy other people's company]
So how does public speaking arouse so much fear? Most things we fear, like spiders and rejection, are things that sneak up on us and shit on our happiness. But public speaking is, for most people, totally avoidable. But we don’t. We do it, we just get scared of it and do it anyway.
The danger with emotional beliefs is that they are rarely questioned with reason, and yet they are defended with passion. Their hidden value is their demonstration of how wonderful we humans are.
The point of the campaign appears to be: “Just because I watch this channel doesn’t mean that I’m a reprobate.”
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