(no subject)
(cross-posted from Facebook)
I'm really tired of watching people look for The Difference.
I'm not talking about looking for The Cause. I'm talking about looking for The Difference, the thing that made the shooter and his family Different From Us, so that we can be reassured that That Kind of Thing Can't Happen Here, and that certainly Nobody We Know Would Do Anything Like That.
There isn't one. It's not true. Stop looking. We can have a conversation about guns, yes, please, not an argument but a real we're-all-on-the-same-side conversation about collecting as a hobby things that are interesting, even fascinating, but designed specifically to kill. We can have a conversation about mental health, and how even small signs of undiagnosed mental illness are stigmatized in this country, and how developmental disorders and neuroatypicalities are often treated as mental illnesses, as though someone who is dyslexic is as likely to go on a killing spree as someone with Antisocial Personality Disorder, and to what degree the ostracization and bullying might make that a self-fulfilling prophecy. We can talk about homeschooling, and how relieved some parents were to have made that decision, and how some other people think it contributes to the problem of poorly-socialized children willing to hurt other children.
But can we please, please do that with an eye to solving the problem? With the understanding that not only does deciding who or what to BLAME not solve the problem, doing so gives us a false sense of security that keeps us from seeking and implementing actual solutions, actual preventive measures, and can far too easily become part of the problem instead?
Look. We're all capable of evil. ALL OF US. The more we deny that we could ever be driven to do thus-and-such, the more vulnerable we actually are to the pressures that drive people to it. It's scary to think about. It's even scarier to think that right now, someone else is in a pressure-cooker of stress and pain that they'll never escape because we're so busy telling ourselves how autism is the problem, mental illness is the problem, guns are the problem, divorce is the problem, freedom of religions in school is the problem, homeschooling is the problem, black clothes are the problem, video games are the problem, and since we know that We Are Good People and we know that Good People Don't Do Those Things, we know that We Are Not the Problem.
We're the problem, folks.
WE are the problem.
Our need to differentiate ourselves, our instinct to cull from the herd anyone who doesn't conform to an "average" that doesn't exist, our hope that by cutting out the autistic kid, the homeschooled kid, the nerd, the "troubled" kid, the antisocial kid, nobody will notice that we're not always happy ourselves, maybe not always as kind as we ought to be, maybe have some melancholy moods, maybe don't feel as loving and grateful or as patriotic and grateful or as exceptional and grateful as society says we ought to: that's the problem. Our need to isolate and dehumanize people who do evil things, so we don't have to face the potential for the same acts within ourselves: that's the problem. Our extension of that to people who share unrelated characteristics with those who have done evil things in the past, isolating them and giving them less reason to care about their fellow humans instead of more: that's the problem. Our lessons, explicit or by example, to our children that this is how to deal with difference -- that differences should be identified, classified, denounced, and used to dehumanize: that is the problem.
And humanity's capacity for evil is the problem. Not facing it in ourselves is the problem. Not confronting and subduing it is the problem. Not having compassion for it is the problem. Our lack of self-knowledge, self-recognition, and self-control is the problem.
So while we're having all those other conversations, about guns and homeschooling and mental health and video games and violence in movies and ANY other conversation, can we please keep this in mind? We know what the problem is: the problem is that there is no The Difference. We just don't want to face it, and would rather create any number of other lonely, isolated, desperate souls than admit that but for the grace of circumstance, there go we all.
I'm really tired of watching people look for The Difference.
I'm not talking about looking for The Cause. I'm talking about looking for The Difference, the thing that made the shooter and his family Different From Us, so that we can be reassured that That Kind of Thing Can't Happen Here, and that certainly Nobody We Know Would Do Anything Like That.
There isn't one. It's not true. Stop looking. We can have a conversation about guns, yes, please, not an argument but a real we're-all-on-the-same-side conversation about collecting as a hobby things that are interesting, even fascinating, but designed specifically to kill. We can have a conversation about mental health, and how even small signs of undiagnosed mental illness are stigmatized in this country, and how developmental disorders and neuroatypicalities are often treated as mental illnesses, as though someone who is dyslexic is as likely to go on a killing spree as someone with Antisocial Personality Disorder, and to what degree the ostracization and bullying might make that a self-fulfilling prophecy. We can talk about homeschooling, and how relieved some parents were to have made that decision, and how some other people think it contributes to the problem of poorly-socialized children willing to hurt other children.
But can we please, please do that with an eye to solving the problem? With the understanding that not only does deciding who or what to BLAME not solve the problem, doing so gives us a false sense of security that keeps us from seeking and implementing actual solutions, actual preventive measures, and can far too easily become part of the problem instead?
Look. We're all capable of evil. ALL OF US. The more we deny that we could ever be driven to do thus-and-such, the more vulnerable we actually are to the pressures that drive people to it. It's scary to think about. It's even scarier to think that right now, someone else is in a pressure-cooker of stress and pain that they'll never escape because we're so busy telling ourselves how autism is the problem, mental illness is the problem, guns are the problem, divorce is the problem, freedom of religions in school is the problem, homeschooling is the problem, black clothes are the problem, video games are the problem, and since we know that We Are Good People and we know that Good People Don't Do Those Things, we know that We Are Not the Problem.
We're the problem, folks.
WE are the problem.
Our need to differentiate ourselves, our instinct to cull from the herd anyone who doesn't conform to an "average" that doesn't exist, our hope that by cutting out the autistic kid, the homeschooled kid, the nerd, the "troubled" kid, the antisocial kid, nobody will notice that we're not always happy ourselves, maybe not always as kind as we ought to be, maybe have some melancholy moods, maybe don't feel as loving and grateful or as patriotic and grateful or as exceptional and grateful as society says we ought to: that's the problem. Our need to isolate and dehumanize people who do evil things, so we don't have to face the potential for the same acts within ourselves: that's the problem. Our extension of that to people who share unrelated characteristics with those who have done evil things in the past, isolating them and giving them less reason to care about their fellow humans instead of more: that's the problem. Our lessons, explicit or by example, to our children that this is how to deal with difference -- that differences should be identified, classified, denounced, and used to dehumanize: that is the problem.
And humanity's capacity for evil is the problem. Not facing it in ourselves is the problem. Not confronting and subduing it is the problem. Not having compassion for it is the problem. Our lack of self-knowledge, self-recognition, and self-control is the problem.
So while we're having all those other conversations, about guns and homeschooling and mental health and video games and violence in movies and ANY other conversation, can we please keep this in mind? We know what the problem is: the problem is that there is no The Difference. We just don't want to face it, and would rather create any number of other lonely, isolated, desperate souls than admit that but for the grace of circumstance, there go we all.