4:29pm May 28, 2014

This is why expecting perfection of people is so bad.

Expecting that all activists do everything the same.

Expecting that all good people be activists in the first place.

Expecting that all good people do things the same, do the same things, believe the same things, have the same neurological setups that allow them to do the same things, etc.

Expecting that everyone hold beliefs that are all in lockstep. All the same beliefs, for the same reasons. Acted upon in the same way.

These ideas are everywhere right now, at least everywhere in the local echo chambers around here. They are so common, that people start expecting to see them, and they see them even in places that they aren’t.

And that is why I was dismayed today when someone asked me if they should kill themselves because they were not like me and could never be like me and could never do things the way I prefer to do things.

I felt horrible.

Horrible for any indication I’ve ever given that I might actually wish death on someone for not being able to do things the way I like things to be done.

But also horrible that this situation exists at all. Because I’ve been in the position where I thought maybe I should die because I couldn’t be everything they wanted me to be.

In my case it was back in the Mouth Magazine days. They were putting out issue after issue saying that if you weren’t going out to the ADAPT protests then you weren’t a good enough activist, that you were lazy and used to doing nothing for nothing. And I was furious but I turned it inwards and became suicidal. I couldn’t even feed myself reliably, let alone transport myself to an action in San Francisco and navigate that whole mess and get home again, without getting myself locked up somehow, which wouldn’t help anyone.

It’s not always possible to control how people will see your words. And some people will always see things you didn’t write there. (And that is not necessarily their fault.)

But it’s good to think about it.

And it’s good to think about what it means when you send out any message that says “You’re with us or against us” basically. And any message that basically sends out the message that good people, or activists, or any other group of people, have to be perfect. Or have to do things in only one possible way in order to be doing them right. Or whatever. All of that can do a lot of damage to people who are already feeling fragile.

Notes: