Choose to Let Go of Status Anxiety and Open Yourself to Connection and Opportunity
This essay starts with some Twittervism to contextualize the topic. Really interesting episode about norm engineering & how argumentation doesn't necessarily change peoples' views. https://t.co/umzEMOedI3 Here's the old one. https://t.co/HjMTP5Xb6E Going to read the new one too see if see difference. This new spelling of “racism” is kinda funky https://t.co/STjlK7NFia So apparently the recent increase of "Democrats need to focus on the White Working Class" in the mediasphere these days comes from this Pew Research study https://t.co/tGpeJfiMH5. I've run into at least one push for "appease the WWC!" My opinion hasn't changed. Is it me or is [45] more of a political extorter than a deal maker? To Iran: "Except our terms or things will get worse for you. We can help keep things status quo, but you have to accept our terms." An explanation for the rise of Fascism in Nazi Germany was the forces Democracy and Socialism/Communism didn't have answers for social & economic woes. I'm starting to see despair of Americans of all sorts not getting answers from our leaders. I'm trying. How about you? Any idea? Morning wise crack: @NPR's All Things Considered (sadly no podcast) had commercial of a conservative saying he was sick of all the criticism from Hollywood, from academics, and from the media. This is one if those times when they should if there's something to the criticism. . .. A link would help. https://t.co/hmxqzMhPc9 [After hearing the GOP double speak calling allegations against Dr Ronnie political obstruction of [45], when GOP practically invented obstruction, found this. Out of date, but good analysis.] Correction: 4th Estate. Is it me, or are conservatives pushing for safe spaces or the US being a safe space for straight white Christians? How long ago were they complaining about others having safe spaces? So, on other words, it's not about the concept of safe spaces, it's about who gets them. Fearing such a revolution, politicians acknowledge the do something to stoke & Plenty of violence perpetrated by Far Rightists enabled by these politicians for NRA, Christian Right, White Supremacists, & more. Acknowledging their own role would help. https://t.co/HPXazIN1fN Despite the whole "status anxiety" term coming out as a euphemism for xenophobia & bigotry, I think it's actually a good question to check privilege, "Do I feel status anxiety? Are my actions coming from status anxiety, either lording it over others or jealous of others?" Despite the whole "status anxiety" term coming out as a euphemism for xenophobia & bigotry, I think it's actually a good question to check privilege, "Do I feel status anxiety? Are my actions coming from status anxiety, either lording it over others or jealous of others?"
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Why Trump’s War on the Deep State Is Failing—So Far - Lawfare https://t.co/usfjjgJlQQ
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Whereas last night seeing a couple bits of the Mister Roger: It's You Who I Like PBS special,
Few people would dispute that we have strong tensions in the United States right now, and that these tensions have grown even tenser since the 2016 Election. Depending on the side stood on and perspective coming from, explanations for the tension differ. The Right seems to think the Left acts out of proportion to gain or keep power, taking the form of a Deep State, obstructing appointments and policy, fact checking the Right, criticizing actions and policies of the Right, and exposing people on the Right to variety, diversity, and ways of life that are different.
From the perspective of the Right, I can see how they might reach this conclusion. Their criticisms of the Left and marginalized populations/communities acts as a mirror. Instead of admitting their fear and hate, they point out things that non-Rightists do as bad things, even though the Right did these practices themselves (obstructionism, heavy criticism of the Left through Fox, literature one example being Peter Schweizer and Government Accountability Institute, and through online news sites like Breitbart, and physical violence against marginalized communities/populations) or have adopted practices of non-Rightists for themselves (criticized safe spaces but now getting all worked up about "alternative lifestyles" being forced onto them, fearing violence from the "other side", and trying to adopt their identity as a marginalized community/population).
In reality, though, marginalized communities have a long history of having to defend their lives and having to fight and take risks to
All the while wealthy, influential straight cis-gendered Christian white people (mostly men), the privileged, have had the most power to determine the boundaries of what can and cannot exist in the boundaries of the United States. In the past, when laws and norms didn't protect marginalized populations/communities as much, the privileged could exert violence more openly with impunity. Now that violence is done
Then the Right
While not giving a crap about other people's rights or lives.
Layer on top of that, [45] trying to undercut the media and the Department of Justice (DOJ) while the GOP doesn't do their duty to keep him honest because they feel too attacked by the media. Even Senator Bob Corker, one of the few on the Right who criticized [45] for his bad behavior (if not his policies), mended fences with [45] after the media criticized Corker of changing his vote on the 2017 Tax Deal after getting a sweetheart deal in it that did nothing for regular, normal tax payers.
I will keep my criticism of undercutting the DOJ and the media short. For one, it makes [45] and others on the Right hypocrites if they criticize Venezuela, Russia, and other tyrannies for suppressing the media and free speech. The same holds true if they accomplish the goal of cutting down the oversight of the DOJ and media. The government has already expressed the desire to persecute protestors and other critics that focus their aim on his behavior and policies. Want to live in
I bet you, the reader, can think up plenty of your own examples of horrible political regimes that have nothing against using their law enforcement to persecute the press and anyone else who disagrees and criticizes them.
Some people like to focus discussions on the bad policies rather than the behavior. If no one focuses, diffuses, or attacks the behavior effectively, that behavior will lead to suppressing the people, their speech, and head us into the direction of tyranny, dictatorship, and totalitarianism. In many ways, this blowhard's behavior offers more danger than the horrible policies from him and the GOP.
I could go on forever with criticism of [45], the GOP, and the Right (because we have at least a few, if not plenty of, Democrats that would fit into the Right. . .at least in Chicago and Illinois). The first Twittervism of this entry makes me think otherwise, though. The episode of Invisibilia tells the story of the UN putting on an American Idol-ish reality TV show in Somalia to try spreading Democratic values and emboldening people to live more Democratically in a nation still fraught by a strongman society. Apparently, American Idol-style reality TV simulates a lot of Democratic-style practices, like
History has also shown that cultural entertainment can go a long way to fighting tyrannical societies and governments by giving the people in those countries an alternate way of life to aspire toward (apparently a lot of North Koreans have defected after enjoying some Western entertainment).
This episode of Invisibilia made a cutting statement that argumentation will more than likely cause resistance on both sides as they try to stratify their viewpoints. We like to think that rational and reasoned out argument will help the other side reach a breakthrough then be won over. Argumentation, per Invisibilia, however, does not fulfill our hopes.
Instead, psychologists in '90s found that poetics, drama, literature, and influencers of emotion, if you will, have a better effect on changing people's minds. This revelation won't stop me from engaging in argument, at least not in the short term. Engagement still needs to happen and rational, reasoned argument still needs to occur to fill in vaccums that could occur after poetics. Also, I don't have any short term poetic strategies that I feel confident enough to use on the fly, though I won't hesitate to practice with them when inspired. . .especially if poetics and argumentation can mix and match.
I might have even stumbled onto some mixing of poetics and argumentation over the last week, based on the research I've been doing for my project and the Twittervism I've posted today. I have to go back about sixteen years first, though, to either a distinct memory I had or an amalgmation of memories that I combined into an imagined memory. Back then, I had gotten myself into the deep end of not having a clue of how to move forward with my project (sometimes I feel that way in the present, but it happens more when dealing with particular, concrete instances rather than the overarching argument).
My problem came down to the argument of one person's utopia being another person's dystopia and that utopia can't ever really exist because human nature, the human condition, and so on and so forth leads to disagreements. The history of utopias, dystopias, and just the fact of our world have not provided any proof that a world of all happy and all virtuous people can exist. I'm not saying that it can or can't exist, I'm just saying it hasn't existed nor has any imagination truly imagined such a world to realization. Pick any utopia and anyone can poke a hole in it. Somewhere in that utopia, someone gets screwed.
To me, a eutopia (quick etymology lesson: Sir Thomas More combined the Latin word u-topia with the Greek word eu-topia for the joke of his book pretty much translating to "no place" [u-topia] and "good place" [eu-topia]) is a place where everyone has
Disagreements and such could occur, but people wouldn't resort to, as a viable acceptable norm to deal with anger resorting, violence, physical, verbal, or on a micro level, or rejecting people's humanity as a way to exert power. Once someone feels they can resort to violence or rejecting someone else's humanity, they hurt that eutopia. Self defense to prevent loss of life, limb, or ability is allowable because the possibility exists that someone feels they can resort to violence or rejection of humanity. In addition, respect for humanity and non-violence extends to non-citizens, too, and does not necessarily default to "keep out until proven worthy" for people who want to visit or live there.
I expect some would see my willingness to go further in protecting non-humans in eutopia as radical, and I'm willing to work with that opinion about me. After all, this is my eutopia, which restricts me from trying to enact it forcefully onto the real world. My eutopia requires me to non-violently convince others through argumentation or poetics, not through force. You have nothing to worry about coming from me, unless, like some on the Right, you become over vigilant by my
I've tried backpedaling from my ideal eutopia in the sixteen years since that distinct memory and have completed a few essays. The last essay has been a sticking point, though. I have been able to use ad hoc arguments, the latest argument being about the importance of meaning and feeling of significance. I wrote many of those essays about fictions and communities that had distinct situations of
The last essay hasn't proved so easy, though. Historical texts don't clearly spell out
I've had to do a lot of outside research into theory that these people from just under 200 years ago wouldn't have even conceived. I've had to research other things they have referred to. I have to try understanding their actions and behaviors before their attempted utopian community. My studied imagination has spanned continents and centuries after the utopian attempt and before the time of which I'm writing about.
In many ways, it has pushed me to study human nature and the evolution of human nature since this eutopia wanted to provide an example for the world to follow to become a better place. The leader of this utopia would have liked to eventually break down walls and bring people closer together. Even before trying to realize his utopia, what may have encouraged him to try realizing the utopia, he tried breaking down barriers by
Those attempts failed. Sadly, the failure of his utopia caused enough despair for him to give up on any such lofty goals.
This man and the milieu of social stratification in which he existed, along with our current situation, and the two centuries in between, has pushed me into a lot of deep dives into trying to understand
I have wanted to find a good argument or, if anything, an approach of poetics, that would go a long way to convince people that bigotry and hate hurts them, even if they have the upper hand and privilege.
Tilting at this windmill has its risks. Approaching hate and bigotry as something to try understanding could lead to people on the correct side thinking that I believe hateful, bigotted people deserve empathy or sympathy, especially since I'm painting them as ignorant and just need to give them the right answer to turn them around, when many hateful bigots will stand their ground harder and harder the more you try convince them. I understand that, plain and simple, most bigots will probably never change their ways and will probably keep trying to exert their hate and bigotry on the world.
Another risk is that I have yet to find an argument about bigotry that doesn't assume the conclusion. This approach often leads to
Sadly on that last item, honestly, the Right has mastered it. If those resisting the Right continue to buy into it, the Right will likely win because they're controlling the vocabulary, grammar, and syntax of the fight.
I would be remiss to say that marginalized people have to follow my approach. They're defending their
Just to stay human and alive, they have to fight for all of that every day to an extent that I can never imagine as someone who generally has all the characteristics of privilege. A good deal of marginalized people are fighting for survival, physically and spiritually. With survival on the line, doing the right thing, just because it's right or for a good reason, is a luxury. I won't disaparage someone for doing what they really need to do to survive and defend themselves.
Which actually gets me almost to the focus of where I've wanted to go. Language and perception can get tricky. Nazis and White Supremacist believe that there really is an inevitable race war (even though they're the ones starting it), and that they have to fight it to survive and defend themselves. I believe they're wrong, but their belief shows the trickiness of language and perception.
As much I pour scorn on The Atlantic for using "status anxiety" as a euphemism for bigotry, the term actually provides a constructive way of looking at bigotry. The term could possibly provide me a good argument for the damage that bigotry causes the bigot, themselves. By embracing bigotry, they take on themselves a whole mess of anxiety they don't need.
One way to relieve the pressure of anxiety is to accept that there are just some things that a person can't control, like other peoples' thoughts, emotions, and in a reasonable world, their actions. To a bigot (and abuser), those parts of people are open game, the bigot can see those things as controllable and can be annhilated. Some places these days have norms and laws that are supposed to prevent, but in a society that believes in these things being right, it can be ugly.
My diving into argumentation generally ends there, in the fact that someone in a society that backs their bigotry and if that bigot works everything right, they can mold the world in their image. This point is a hypothetical because no one has molded the whole world into their image. The Nazis were defeated. Slavery is generally not an accepted practice by the powers that be in today's world, even if it still occurs in an underground fashion away from the eyes of authorities. Some genocides may have had 100% success, but no ethnic group has yet ever wiped out or gained full domination of ALL OTHER ethnic (phenotypic) human groups. And as we see in how much societies and religions don't make sense, people in a group will inevitably disagree, will divide, and will get to violent fighting over the littlest thing over the sake of being right and pure. They will create new ethnicities/phenotypes.
All that investment into being right and winning leads to a lot of worry, risk, and anxiety! Humans have a thing about ranking the status of themselves, whether individually, as groups, or as a species against everything and everyone else. It's part of the human tendency to essentialize, which we instinctively do from birth then become able to discuss verbally a few years later.
Expanding on the ideas from David Livingstone Smith's Less than Human: Why We Demean, Enslave, and Exterminate Others, religions and schools of thought have thought up spiritual/immortal caste systems, from the Hindus to the Christian Great Chain of Being. Even without necessarily a religion backing a system, Aristotle, the Humanist, even made arguments of what ranked higher and lower based on how "rational" they are (which even just common sense of today would shatter, since a lot of Western history's demoting women was based on Aristotle arguing women weren't as rational as men).
Religion has a bad precedence for framing reality and society. Just look at the religious wars that occurred in Europe over the "right" Christianity and the "right" monotheistic religion based around Yahweh.
Look at what a lot of the warring factions in the Middle East over the "right" Islam and the "right" monotheistic religion based around Yahweh.
Look at the disagreements over Judaism in Israel or the different interpretations of Hinduism, Buddhism, and other religions in the East.
Philosophies and science don't have the best record. Maybe they don't start as many wars and battles, but they're constantly changing as the perception of humanity increases.
Even just spatially, we have such a small miniscule undersanding of reality, we are fated to destroy ourselves and the Earth around us before making any meaningful progress out to other worlds, just to establish that one group knows better than the other group.
How can we know the actual right, true path or belief and be willing to die for it when human history is full of those KNOWING the actual right, true path then leaving a wake of destruction. . .or not really knowing, but then others in the future discounting their idea of the actual right, true path or belief?
With the human propensity for ranking ourselves against each other, other species, and other objects, status anxiety as a source for bigotry makes sense to me. Unless people check themselves, they will find something to fight about, even if it's just about being on the side that ranks higher than the others.
Sometimes martyrs will occur, but those without the means to win will often know they can't win and not fight back until they're pushed back into a corner. Other groups of those that can't win, especially if they're close enough to the privileged dominating group, will generate stories to tell themselves that those on top are looking out for them or that if they work hard enough or act in certain ways hard enough, they will gain the power to make it to the top, either by joining the privileged group or by defeating the privileged group (Marxism is just a ideology of one interest group taking over from another one). Or maybe they can have enough learned helplessness that they're just happy to be alive. Some groups accept that they won't rank that high on the same scale, but they can create their own alternative scale and parallel social world to make a comfortable enough rank for themselves there.
Reaching this revelation yesterday that the term "status anxiety" has some use, I broadcasted on social media the idea that we can check our privilege (it bears repeating):
From my college years explorations of other viewpoints, I found Americanized Buddhism/Hinduism and Twelve Step programs especially useful (I have plenty of issues with how both can be practiced by some groups or people, but both of them have some good ideas, including take what works and leave the rest). I still had and have some growing and wisdom to learn. Learning that it is possible to let go of some anxiety helps a lot, especially after
Frankly, I determined that it's not worth having to force my power over something; influence and persuasion within moral and ethical norms, maybe, but not force. Forcing power over something just leads to anxiety since you'll always to have gauge when and how much force to exert, while also worrying about possible backlash and predicting when backlash may occur. Vigilance is tiring and anxiety-inducing.
On the flipside, though, we can find real connection, understanding, and bonding if we let each other go, and we come back (or all it takes is a reminder that we're around for the other person to stay connected). And is it really worth pushing and pushing to try keeping something when it requires so much effort and risk?
I might have adopted a stoic attitude at some point in life.
I acknowledge that some people do have
that lead them to not have the choice of letting go of anxiety.
These days I still have to deal with my own demons, especially since I have so many projects and things that I want to get done but get in the way of the practices like
that helped me work through my hang ups and anxieties.
In the end, though, despite the human propensity to ranking and bigotry, I believe that we human beings can choose to let go of the anxieties and propensities. Maybe it takes some work, especially after living with these thoughts for a good amount of time. The first step is just seeing the damage status anxiety does to you and deciding to put an end to it, choosing a life of control over your thoughts, emotions, and propensities.
Don't worry, you'll find a lot of support once you drop your barriers and open yourself to connect to other people in a welcoming fashion. People are now trying to defend themselves and their souls from you and your anxious anger presently. Humble yourself and see how your status anxiety has caused damage, and I'm sure you'll find it rewarding, worthwhile, and who knows, opportunities might abound and you may discover things you never knew about yourself.
One tip, though: don't go looking for forgiveness from those you have harmed. That will likely cause further harm. Seek your own absolution by fighting against bigotry and status anxiety other people have. Seek your own absolution by working to make the world a better place. Show your growth by your actions, not your words. You may never get forgiveness from the people in your past, especially if you've caused lasting harm, but you may learn to forgive yourself by helping the world be a better place.
Or live with your anxiety, vigilance, fear, stay the same, and miss out on the warmth that the world can provide. Every person gets to make their own choice.
Me, I choose life, openness, warmth, and connection.
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