Sticks and Stones might Break My Bones but, Words will Never Hurt Me.
Is a little poem that we used to hear quite a bit, back when I was growing up. It was written in the 1830s and used to be used to help defend school age children’s mental and emotional ability to defend their own self worth during the school years … because kids are quite often assholes.
But, I was listening to Neil DeGrasse Tyson on Impact theory and I can honestly say that it’s probably dumbest phrase ever (I’ll defend it in a minute). This is coming from a guy who will often insult for entertainment but; I very, very rarely mean to hurt. We’re at an era in life where it’s SOOO easy to hurt people and life-changing dramatically. Suicide and self-harm are at all-time highs … more kids use antidepressants and other mind-altering substances than in any OTHER TIME IN HISTORY. Like, we’re beating the boomers … and those guys spent 15 years listening to Hendrix and Marley …
Here’s the deal though, that’s normalizing and CONDONING the action of verbal bullying. That very statement means that it’s definitely fine to say mean shit to people because they can defend themselves … and … I don’t know about you guys but, I want to live in a world that’s GETTING BETTER over time not regressing. For everything else health-related the entire earth is progressing … we’re hurting ourselves and each other more than ever.
I started thinking about this about, 5 years ago and … I don’t want my eulogy to include “biggest asshole ever” like … I wanna be the “happiest motherfucker” or something like that. idk. I’ve lived sometimes being a real prick. Some deserved, and some just … being a human asshole.
Here’s the thing though, You DO have to defend your mental and emotional state … Yeah, it’s bullshit … life’s not fair. Defend yourself first and foremost … and sometimes (especially now) that doesn’t necessarily mean physically. You’re going to have assholes at work, jerks in school … all sorts of things that you have to deal with but, you have defend yourself. Let’s not just make it okay, bust a fucker’s nose emotionally if he’s attacking you emotionally. Take it to the streets. Because it’s at least as bad as physically.
This paragraph is an aside: I really kinda reversed how I thought about myself and it’s really started to change me … because as a teen and early 20-year old I thought of myself as quite pessimistic and introverted but, I NOW think those were just remnants of my younger life … because naturally, I’m … almost bubbly (after coffee, shit’n’shower). and … I’m actually incredibly optimistic … like I hid it away for 20 years or it was beaten down or some shit. Like, I love sunrises … and I’ve spent the better part of my life thinking that I hated mornings and that life sucked … things just … are a bit different … and every day is a little different too.
Anyway, that aside leads into how I have started to treat others … because sometimes it’s really really easy to be a negative person in this world but, if you give it a try, you’ll realize that it really doesn’t cost anything intellectually, it’s actually way beneficial emotionally, and MAYBE costs a little physically because, you’ll find yourself going out of your way to hold a door or an elderly person with groceries. Guarantee, that shit come back ten-fold and it will start to change how you look at shit.
To wrap that all around, stop calling each other names … stop being a pious cunt (or whatever negative thing you keep doing) and just consider people.
Anyway, I’m starting a full category on education, and though this is a kind of random post, it’s the start of the education category.