This isn’t a vaguepost. It’s an observation about how I interact with the world, which evidently runs afoul of many people’s attitudes. We need a ‘pass’ sometimes, wherein we can just stand and shout, “WTF, dude? Explain this to me.” Sometimes, the person in question might apologize and say, “I needed to get my entire foot in my mouth. I am so sorry. That was stupid and petty of me.” People are going to misbehave, have a bad day, or just suffer the same affliction of quickness and not thinking twice that I do. If we did have a ‘pass’ option, at least we’d know if they react angrily that we aren’t dealing with someone interested in communicating authentically. Ain’t nobody got time for that, much less the sanity of long-term exposure.

We can’t know someone’s intentions most of the time. That’s why it’s more important to observe behavior rather than words. But there are times when “nothing” actually happens, but someone has consciously or unintentionally demonstrated a horrific outlook. In those cases, words have significant power. Last week, I heard a story about an example of this. Anger flared inside me righteously and briefly. The person being treated poorly and demeaned will never know about it. But I do. And I’m stuck with the knowledge, knowing that the person and people involved revealed a sliver of the “real’ them in their behavior. It wasn’t mere pettiness. It was hostility on a basic level. They pulled back the veneer and let their mask slip. Witnessing or knowing such an attitude is inside a person fundamentally shifts my ability to trust such people. This is so much of the reason that I have lingering problems with people I know to be racists. If they gossip to you, they’ll gossip about you. If they treat others with subversive hostility, they’ll do the same to you. It’s just a question of when. Most prejudice stems from the false idea of superiority. Superior arrogance lends itself to a lot of rationalization regarding behavior. In most cases, we never hear about it because they recognize that such behavior or words are reprehensible. They conceal and camouflage the “real’ them. I’d rather deal with outright hostility in most cases. You can avoid a snake in the open field or when it announces its presence; the ones hiding in the grass at your feet mostly can’t be avoided.

Love, X
.
PS That’s my cat judging me for not kicking the heat up to maximum. He ain’t 7 feet off the ground for the view.