Kindness Would Have Stopped the Slap Heard Round the World

I have been writing things on Facebook.  Longer things.  As a result, the blog is not seeing much activity.  I guess I will commit to making sure that what I am posting there if I ramble on gets a version posted here.  Today it seems the whole world has forgotten about Covid and the Ukraine for a moment based on Will Smith smacking Chris Rock.  Dramatic?  Yes.  Meaningful in the greater scheme of things.  No, not really.

 

My only thought on the slap heard round the world.  

 

We Americans have become too mean, too insensitive, and too cavalier in our humor and also in our general discourse over the past forty years. I think the joke that sums it up is a person stating to another, “Nice day today.”  The response is a snarling, “What do you mean by that?” 

 

Don’t know if we can put the incivility genie back in the bottle but the word play and yuks that come from attacking everything from physical ailments (e.g., a former leader of this republic ridiculing a reporter with noticeable health issues) to attacks on mental health claimed to be jokes, need to be reined in by self-censorship.  And those who don’t self-censor should be given the cold shoulder.

 

Oh boy, we can’t use the n word anymore.  So what? Instead, we can use a thousand different body shaming slurs and a raft of other jocular darts on people who we don’t feel fit perceived normative standards. I am a big believer in free speech but I am also a believer in responsible speech.

 

åDon’t get me wrong I am not innocent in this.  When I was young, I made racist, homophobic, and sexist jokes with the best of them.  Trust me, I remember those of you who told me those jokes first before I incorporated them into my repertoire. In my day-to-day speech there have been times when I used each of the seven words you in the past couldn’t say on television as mere punctuation to my language.  Yes, I for the most part have qualified to have a lifetime sticker of NSFW slapped on my forehead.  But as I have matured (read, I have reached the age when I remember when dirt was still rocks) I have seen the harm. Humor should be pain and folly seen from a point distant in time. Humor should not be the intentional, or merely knowing, infliction of pain or ridicule.  Refocus. Be kind.

 

A final thought. We are crowded together far more physically than we have ever been before.  So many billions of people.  So many cube farms.  So much gridlock on the road and on the phone.  Constant noise rattling our senses from streaming services, podcasts, and talk radio.  And there are few private spaces left, that you Zoom. As a result, we have damn short fuses, the kind where people kill because someone asked for the mashed potatoes in an off tone. Thus, we need to keep the level of agitation down.  Again, be kind.