It’s hard not to pay attention to politics right now. Change is upon us which means rapid fire lines of blanket statements and titles instead of real meaning is jamming up everyone’s feeds.
I’m concerned.
There are a lot of inputs in everyday life, without all the causalities and spoils of living in modern day society. It’s exhausting. This article isn’t really about politics. It’s about kindness. The saying, “Shit rolls down hill,” I feel applies here.
There are full grown adults calling each other names and pigeon-holing each other over beliefs on national television, as we have children picking on others for not watching the same kind of shows everyone else is. Is that what we want? A culture of hate coated in a shiny online presence. I know, I don’t, but it’s gonna take some work. I’m not innocent here, we all fall victim to prejudgment, and looking at something one-sided and claiming it is the only way.
Shouldn’t we be focusing on how to make everyone feel welcome? Isn’t that what we all want?
Recently, one of my kids was dealing with an issue on the playground where another kid kept following them around telling them they should dress nicer. At a classroom party, that kid’s mother and I were standing next to each other waiting to set up Valentine’s Day stations, and she looked at me and said,
“You should have worn red for the Valentine’s Day party.”
Um… what?
Community is so important. But, so is tolerance. What good is a community if it is based on hatred? That starts inside of each one of us.
As parents. As teachers. As remodels. As humans. As the leader of our country. We have a responsibility to demonstrate what we want by how we act. Kindness matters.
Media pumps hate through all the channels, and we keep them in our back pockets. The fantastic mother and the sex symbol. The rich asshole and the computer geek. Are we just tabs of categories on our own devices?
Perhaps it’s all in my head, but I’m not so sure. Our society is competitive and fast-paced. We can get whatever we want on our phones. Our children all have tablets. I find it insulting that some can say it is all black and white. This way or that. Our world is complex because we are.
I want to figure out how to foster the world where we build each other up. Is it possible? I don’t mean in the sense of people competing, which happens, of course. I mean in the sense of inside of us as individuals.
We get hit with images of perfect bodies and winning the desires of the most iterative partner by age eight.
Yes, eight.
It’s that young.
We live in an age where the entire world is at our fingertips and our children’s handheld attachments spit information at everyone invariably. Everyone needs to stay up to date.
So take that, and think about this:
Shouldn’t the media take their responsibility into consideration? Shouldn’t we all?
So much hate, slander, and categorizing people takes up critical space on our tablets.
What do we regularly see?
Hate crimes.
Bigotry.
Bullying.
Most shows on Disney Channel are comprised of characters that are continually mean and disrespectful to the others on the show. There is so much talk and focus on how to stop bullying in our schools. This is not a quick fix because it’s a symptom of our society. For there to be a real change it needs to come up from the top.
Fearing others based on not knowing has unfortunately always been an issue to deal with.
I’m gonna call out the show The 100 for a minute as an example for a step in the right direction. The main character’s love interest in the first two seasons was male, and her next one was female. There was no coming out episode or anything of the sort. It was just attraction and emotion and all real. I loved it. We need more or that.
I would really like to be able to show my children the political leaders working together on what essentially is our common goal of making the world a better place. Instead, we have to watch pointing fingers and hateful words. It all feels broken.
Does everything have to be packaged? Can we still be real?
I wish it didn’t. Unfortunately, I believe my words are naive. I’m not convinced this is achievable. But, I wish it was. There is so much beauty in the world.
I believe in a common ground.
Photo Credit: doublecompile via Compfight cc
Jayme Beddingfield
Jayme Beddingfield is the host and producer of 'Too Many Words' a comedy interview podcast. She is also the creator of 'Elliot Granger and The Clueless Brigade', which is a weekly serial that follows Elliot Granger as she stumbles through grief and growing up. The series is featured as both a fictional podcast and written story that appears on The Scribbler. Jayme has been crafting stories since her third-grade assignment to write her own fairy tale. She prefers to work from the sofa with her dogs by her feet. Originally from Northern New Jersey, she now lives in Seattle, the city of her dreams. She lives with her husband, two children, and a slew of adopted pets. She is completely post-apocalyptic obsessed and also admits to being an audio enthusiast and recovering supervillain.
