“Aren't people sick of this yet!?”
I want to make a distinction between “observing” and “self-righteously indignant.” To illustrate, let's take an issue like Black Lives Matter or police violence. You can watch a cop throw a girl around a classroom. You can read each day about someone dying unjustifiably. You can load one fallacious argument on top of another in support of your “side.” But why do we seem incapable of finding the distinction between talking about something honestly, and pinning it to the ground with the weight of our feelings and personal experience?
The observer counts. They count the number of lives lost. They count the years of oppression. They count the number of cops who aren't doing a poor job. The count their own tacit acceptance or points of resistance. They count the oppressive laws on the books. They count the number of friends with personal horror stories. They attempt to account for where people are coming from in a constantly swirling soup of experiences and statistics.
The self-righteously indignant person makes statements like the opening line. As if with enough huffing and puffing and throwing up of their arms we'll all coalesce to their perceived feelings about a ropes end. They aren't engaged. They aren't seeking to empathize. They're “above it all.” Instead of being an out-and-out racist or advocate of violence, these are the people who write articles that frame one-sided issues as two equally opposing and worthwhile stances worthy of debate. These are the people who get thousands of up votes on reddit for their cliches and paltry pandering to white elitism.
I think these people are the worst. A flat racist, for example, is usually fueled by what I'll call “simple” racism. In a sense, they don't know any better. A person who throws up their arms like they're above it all, in my estimation, is fueled by an active denial of things they refuse to speak honestly towards. These are people who invent all the excuses that attempt to equate levels of struggle and pain. These are people who blow the fog of confused and misused words over an issue that's been settled. These are the people who reflexively equate indifference to progress.
You can see it across topics. “Oh they're all corrupt!” when they refer to politicians. This, the person who's incapable of telling the difference between a Warren or Sanders and a Trump or Ryan. “Well I'm not a rapist!” when they downplay the perpetual pressure women feel around men. I heard a guy in the bar the other day say, “come on and smile!” like the bartender owed him one, as she quickly voiced the location of her boyfriend on the other side of the room. My favorite is the kind of bleeding ignorance from something like “teach the controversy!” when it comes to evolution in schools. Can you get a more direct piece of evidence about the tools that fog gives the know-nothings?
It's not enough to be sick. It's barely enough to be aware. You have to work as actively as the culture is working against. That's the black struggle. That's the woman’s struggle. That's, if you were honest and not a lazy fuck, your struggle if you cared to show any respect for your fellow man. And yet habitually we reduce all potential for understanding to these fly-bys of angry shouting matches that resolve to all-but “fuck yous” and silence by the end. We disappear behind empty euphemisms and wash our hands of any responsibility. As many problems as there are for translating language and experience, to go on a morning news show and signal that the conversation is stuck at that level is to work backwards.
You're never going to be as sick as the person who can't escape. You're indignant tone doesn't carry the weight of the person who lives it. You're not better than them because you lucked out and escaped a kind of shadow. Moreover, you're not better than them because you understand your own, maybe negative, experience as somehow “worse” or “equally worth attention” as if to diminish what it is someone else has to say. The best cop in the world is not an argument against historical racial oppression and fear resulting in unnecessary violence. The gentlest giant on the planet won't stop the hair on a girl's neck from rising when he shows up to buy something from her on Craigslist. The culture and the consequences don't disappear because you're either distracted or feel like it doesn't concern you.
I want to make a distinction between “observing” and “self-righteously indignant.” To illustrate, let's take an issue like Black Lives Matter or police violence. You can watch a cop throw a girl around a classroom. You can read each day about someone dying unjustifiably. You can load one fallacious argument on top of another in support of your “side.” But why do we seem incapable of finding the distinction between talking about something honestly, and pinning it to the ground with the weight of our feelings and personal experience?
The observer counts. They count the number of lives lost. They count the years of oppression. They count the number of cops who aren't doing a poor job. The count their own tacit acceptance or points of resistance. They count the oppressive laws on the books. They count the number of friends with personal horror stories. They attempt to account for where people are coming from in a constantly swirling soup of experiences and statistics.
The self-righteously indignant person makes statements like the opening line. As if with enough huffing and puffing and throwing up of their arms we'll all coalesce to their perceived feelings about a ropes end. They aren't engaged. They aren't seeking to empathize. They're “above it all.” Instead of being an out-and-out racist or advocate of violence, these are the people who write articles that frame one-sided issues as two equally opposing and worthwhile stances worthy of debate. These are the people who get thousands of up votes on reddit for their cliches and paltry pandering to white elitism.
I think these people are the worst. A flat racist, for example, is usually fueled by what I'll call “simple” racism. In a sense, they don't know any better. A person who throws up their arms like they're above it all, in my estimation, is fueled by an active denial of things they refuse to speak honestly towards. These are people who invent all the excuses that attempt to equate levels of struggle and pain. These are people who blow the fog of confused and misused words over an issue that's been settled. These are the people who reflexively equate indifference to progress.
You can see it across topics. “Oh they're all corrupt!” when they refer to politicians. This, the person who's incapable of telling the difference between a Warren or Sanders and a Trump or Ryan. “Well I'm not a rapist!” when they downplay the perpetual pressure women feel around men. I heard a guy in the bar the other day say, “come on and smile!” like the bartender owed him one, as she quickly voiced the location of her boyfriend on the other side of the room. My favorite is the kind of bleeding ignorance from something like “teach the controversy!” when it comes to evolution in schools. Can you get a more direct piece of evidence about the tools that fog gives the know-nothings?
It's not enough to be sick. It's barely enough to be aware. You have to work as actively as the culture is working against. That's the black struggle. That's the woman’s struggle. That's, if you were honest and not a lazy fuck, your struggle if you cared to show any respect for your fellow man. And yet habitually we reduce all potential for understanding to these fly-bys of angry shouting matches that resolve to all-but “fuck yous” and silence by the end. We disappear behind empty euphemisms and wash our hands of any responsibility. As many problems as there are for translating language and experience, to go on a morning news show and signal that the conversation is stuck at that level is to work backwards.
You're never going to be as sick as the person who can't escape. You're indignant tone doesn't carry the weight of the person who lives it. You're not better than them because you lucked out and escaped a kind of shadow. Moreover, you're not better than them because you understand your own, maybe negative, experience as somehow “worse” or “equally worth attention” as if to diminish what it is someone else has to say. The best cop in the world is not an argument against historical racial oppression and fear resulting in unnecessary violence. The gentlest giant on the planet won't stop the hair on a girl's neck from rising when he shows up to buy something from her on Craigslist. The culture and the consequences don't disappear because you're either distracted or feel like it doesn't concern you.
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