Crazy Is Relative

* I’m cutting way back on my Internet usage. Way, way back–to the tune of putting parental controls on my laptop. The timer is working, but not enough. Wireless is just too easy. And with all the upheaval in my personal life lately, the feeling of being “connected” is acquiring a lot of importance–but how “connected” am I if I’m just aimlessly surfing? Work’s got to get done, and if it takes this to do it, well, then, this is what it takes.

I feel like an idiot weakling for reducing myself to parental controls, but if it works I suppose my ego can handle the blow. The words, like the spice, must flow.

* My friend Wolfinthewood commented yesterday that my linking to her posts on the Google Book Settlement brought back the search rankings for them. I’m still watching her LJ for updates. I’m wondering if anyone else writing about the settlement has seen their rankings/search results disappear?

* Slacktivist linked to an op-ed titled, “In America, Crazy Is A Pre-Existing Condition.” Both pieces are well worth reading. Speshul Snowflakery and Pathological Entitlement do not just happen in publishing. Oh, no, precious, they do not. And the best way of dealing with them? Slacktivist does a three-pointer from downtown:

Throughout Wise’s account, Stevenson comes across as unflappable. I picture David Niven playing the part. When a member of the IndigNation — Frank McGehee himself, actually — heckled and tried to shout down his speech in Dallas, Stevenson paused and said, “Surely, my dear friend, I don’t have to come here from Illinois to teach Texas manners, do I?” The crowd cheered.

Stevenson may often have been, as Perlstein writes, “earnestly confused” by the irrational claims and behavior of his opponents, but his response to McGehee and to the crazy woman with the sign don’t convey such confusion. He knew exactly what to make of those people: They were rude and irrational. The politeness of his rational response in both cases doesn’t blunt the implication of those responses — that these people ought to be ashamed of themselves.

That’s an example of what’s often missing today in dealing with the IndigNation. These people are offended and outraged and so politicians and journalists respond by trying not to further offend or enrage them. As though that were possible. Indignation is their raison d’etre. They will take offense whether or not it is given. There is no point trying not to offend them. There is no point in trying not to make them angry.

An appropriate response isn’t to be more offended or more offensive, but it should involve going on the offense. The IndigNationalists are behaving shamefully and it is appropriate and necessary to point that out to them. It’s our duty to point that out to them.

The appropriate and necessary phrase when confronted by members of the IndigNation — by the birthers, the deathers, the baggers, the immigrant-blamers and homophobes and cryptoracists and misogynists — is simply to tell them the primary thing they need to hear: “You ought to be ashamed of yourself.” (Slacktivist)

I’m going to remember that.

* I went to Ikea this past weekend and got my very own potato ricer, magnetic knife-strips that I put up myself, and a skimmer. Plus, I saw more crazy than usual. I had to check to make sure the moon wasn’t full because, wow. Even the Little Prince stared at a few of the people. Of course, Coyote Boy (the UnSullen, for those of you who missed his “I am no longer a teen” moment) knows to take the kids and get some drinks as soon as we hit the kitchen section, so I have about ten-fifteen minutes to commune with cookware in peace. So I guess “crazy” is a relative term in this-hyere blog post.

Over and out.

Posted from A Fire of Reason. You can also comment there.