Paul Cantrell
I don’t think anyone is at their psychological best right now. Me? I’m grouchier than usual, and have a shorter fuse. Several times the last couple of months I’ve been carelessly unpleasant in my own communication in ways I regretted — but I’ve also been quicker than usual to throw other people’s negativity back in their face at them without taking a breath. It’s not good. It’s not who I like to be.
1/2
Paul Cantrell
I’ve been wondering a lot which concrete steps I can take in the face of this full-scale attempt at US fascism — just first small steps, maybe, but •concrete• steps with an impact, not just getting informed and discussing and brooding.
I think this I’ve found that first step, and it’s nipping everything I described in the previous post in the bud. There’s a lot of people in my life I’m in a position to help or harm just with my words, with my affect — people who are themselves struggling.
They want us off balance. They want us unkind. I’m in a position — with work, yes, but in a position — to balance myself, to be kind.
That’s where I start. Saying it here as a commitment to myself.
2/2
your auntifa liza 🇵🇷 🦛 🦦
welcome to being the Angry Black Woman racist stereotype.
that means you just started feeling what i have felt my lifetime.
had white americans had any empathy with us Black women, who have been sounding the alarm since forever ―including Nobel Prize winner Toni Morrison― we wouldn't be here.
i have been in perpetual rage mode, at the very least, since 9/11/2001.
and i fucking hate it.
Paul Cantrell
@blogdiva
Yeah, I honestly don't know how you all hold it together. What I said above…given the relative comfort of my general situation, I’m doing it all in white person easy mode, and it's still hard.
Paul Cantrell
Just to be clear: I am demanding •none• of the above of anyone else. This is Paul goals. Like I said, I’m in a position to do this work because I’m in a relatively more comfortable, more privileged, and less vulnerable situation than a whole lot of other people.
Please don’t go out and be the niceness police because of what I wrote. If you’ve got it in you to find a new well of kindness, great. And if someone is grouchy with fighting for their very survival, well, the fact that they are grouchy should be the •least• of our concerns.
3/2
Paul Cantrell
@iris
I appreciate that, and my addendum was not in response to any kind of negative feedback I was getting. I just thought it was an important thing to say, in case what I wrote made anybody feel either self-blaming or like they needed to go out and enforce it.
Iris Young (he/they/she) (PhD)
@inthehands fwiw I appreciate reminders that small daily kindnesses are part of the foundation of community and more valuable than we tend to give them credit for. I thought you were quite clear that this was introspection, not niceness police propaganda, and that's why I thought it was worth sharing.
GNU social JP is a social network, courtesy of GNU social JP管理人. It runs on GNU social, version 2.0.2-dev, available under the GNU Affero General Public License.
All GNU social JP content and data are available under the Creative Commons Attribution 3.0 license.