Shock Proof Media + Graceless Spaces

This goes along with what I was talking about last week in terms of our current over-sensitive culture, but I thought I’d bring this up separately as it’s been something I’ve been trying to digest in my mind the past few days.

Is it even possible to be shocked by the media anymore? If there’s a mass shooting and the body count stays under 20, we simply shake our heads and move on. Bill Cosby, America’s father, turned out to be a serial rapist. (Serial rapists in general seem to be pretty common these days.) Michael Jackson of course did molest little boys and then Dave Chappelle made a bunch of jokes about said molestation. Nazi’s are a thing again and hate crime is on the rise. And lets not forget our current sitting President, consistently disgracing our nation with the basest presidential behavior ever witnessed with everything name calling to pushing conspiracy theories. Add in his near daily inclination for pathological lying and well I’m not sure I am shockable anymore. I’m all shocked out.

And that’s just the news. TV shows and movies are blurring the lines between porn/senseless violence/comedy and drama. Kids are watching TV shows and movies that I can’t even stomach as an adult. I don’t think there would have been a TV show in the 80’s or even 90’s that people would have openly admitted to watching that regularly featured gratuitous rape and violence. I know this sounds like a huge judgment for many of you right now (and well, sure… I guess it is) but you’ve at least got to admit there is some desensitizing going on there. I’m not saying these shows turn anyone directly into violent rapists–lets not get ahead of ourselves–but a correlation between violent media and violence in real life? Youbetcha.

As our shockability, and thus perhaps our ability to feel compassion, is waning, it seems that our spaces are becoming graceless, both in the real world and online. I can’t remember where I was last week, but I was in line with a woman who had someone do something rude to her and we briefly talked about how you can’t expect people to be polite anymore, because we are all so concerned with standing up for ourselves and not looking weak. “It’s not worth it,” and then she said something to the effect, “You never know how far someone is going to escalate things these days.”

We live in an age of information overload and now we know EVERYTHING. Just like the olden’ days of Bible bashing, if you want to take a hard, immovable stance you can find an article or a study (for Bibles it was a scripture) to back up your stance. Its not hard. And so we follow the people online who we agree with, study up on our social issues and feel really well informed, woke, conscious, etc. It is the way of 2019. To be clear, I include myself in this characterization. I so badly want to have the “right” view, as in I want to stand on the “right” side of history. I want all my choices to be smart and informed. I want my kids to see beyond their privilege and to be open and accepting of other cultures and peoples. And these are good things to want.

But in the process, we’re all turning into assholes. Everyone corrects everyone who doesn’t get it just so. (Again, I have done this plenty.) And now, we’re just trying to out woke each other.  Forget the fact that it took me a certain amount of time to learn what I have learned, YOU MUST KNOW IT RIGHT NOW! Why didn’t you already know this, read this and have a grasp of this very specific world view?

Of course there are many, many worldviews that need to change yesterday. Nazi’s should not be a thing. We should all have a better understanding of racism, sexism, homophobia, ableism and climate change. (Like, I totally assumed men knew what sexual assault was and that they shouldn’t do it, but turns out I was wrong!)  I am not advocating that we slow down the learning processes on these issues. Go, Fight, Win! I say. Lives and livelihoods are at stake. But learning and understanding take time. Can we allow for that?

I’m not 100% sure where or if there is an overlap of these two ideas, but I’ve been thinking about them a lot lately. Can our callousness in one area be leading to a lack of progression in another? It feels especially apt to think about today, the anniversary of 9/11, when what I remember most from that time period was how united our country felt afterwards. It was amazing. I hope it doesn’t take another national tragedy on a grand scale to bring us together again. I’m not sure we if it would make us or break us. What are your thoughts? Does any of this ring true or am I way off?