Blimix

A friend once noted, upon rewatching the film as an adult, that Ferris Bueller's behavior left something to be desired. I too recalled that he had no business pressuring Cameron into using his dad's car, or getting huffy about being called out for trying to steal a restaurant reservation. Kind of an entitled prick. But Karen just put on the film again yesterday, and holy cow, Ferris was so much worse than that. He was consistently downright abusive to Cameron. He only once apologized, just enough, after he had gone too far, and then gently put the blame back on Cameron as soon as Cameron had been mollified. A classic abuser! He also disrespected Sloane's bodily autonomy.

It all works out for him because he's Ferris Bueller. Sloane is in love. ("When you look at someone through rose-colored glasses, all the red flags just look like flags.") Even his gaslighting Cameron about feeling ill (My irony meter just broke!) turns out to have been... Correct? Because it's his movie? I feel like my chronically ill friends would get triggered by watching that. They've suffered way too much dismissal. It hurts and demoralizes.

Ferris is right about school, of course. It's all about attendance, compliance, subservience, and bullshit rules. That's a big part of why the film resonates with us. And this may be part of the problem: This theme is an example of a long standing trope in which media presents a willingness to transgress as a mark of extreme cool, without making any distinction between transgression against rules and transgression against people.

This idea draws in those people who lack a moral compass. They too think that they can show off how cool they are by behaving in insensitive and harmful ways toward others. "Look at me, and how much I don't give a fuck! Suck it, society!" Of course it doesn't work like that. In real life, being a douchebag to people engenders fear and resentment, not respect, and it'll cost you those friends who are most worth having as friends.

You know who are cool? People who transgress against harmful rules! People who violate a sexist dress code. People who hide immigrants from ICE. People who go on strike for living wages and humane conditions. People who call out the bad behavior of their loved ones. People who oppose abuses of power.

To try to be "cool" by transgressing against other people, and against the societal rules and guidelines that protect other people, is pathetic. I'd also call it evil, but I don't want anyone thinking it might be a cool kind of evil. Abusing people is just a base, boring, embarrassing evil. It's a "kinda want to kick that cat so I can feel like I matter" sort of evil. It's not something anyone would aspire to, or even admit to.

Don't push people around because you can. Don't be Ferris Bueller. You want to be badass and don't-give-a-fuck cool? Do some things you enjoy, and some things that matter. Brush off the haters (quickly; don't spend effort feeding the trolls, because they want to waste your time). Stick up for someone who is getting bullied. If your friends and family are being douchebags, talk to them about it.

Do you want to achieve master level "don't care what they think"? Bare your goddamn soul. Talk about the things you're scared to talk about. The things you hope, the things you fear, the things that embarrass you, and the things you're ashamed of. Ferris Bueller's high point in the movie wasn't climbing on a float: A scene which attributes to chutzpah what can only be accomplished by rehearsal and cooperation. It was his admitting to the audience that he was worried about the future of his best friendship and his relationship when he left for college. But even Ferris Bueller didn't have the guts to say it to anyone in his world. It would have been even cooler if he had told someone, "I always take control because I'm constantly worried about what will happen if I don't. I don't trust other people to make good decisions: Not even my best friend and my girlfriend. I'm starting to see that this is a real problem that I need to work on. And I'm scared that when I'm gone next year, Cameron and Sloane with realize that they have other options. Eventually, they're going to figure out that I'm a really shitty friend and they don't need me." But vulnerability takes courage, and Ferris Bueller isn't *that* cool.

Yeah. I said it. Show some gumption and some courage and some concern for others, and you can be cooler than Ferris Bueller.

(Also, don't pull someone into the pool if they're shouting, "No!" Seriously.)

I have made a couple of references to the social and/or authoritarian "totem pole," which is essential for understanding typical bullying. I realize now that I have elaborated insufficiently. Luckily, I have written some letters that can be repurposed here.

( Cut for length. )

In my "Biggest Bully" explanation of conservatives, I noted close overlap with Siderea's explanation of The Two Moral Modes and George Lakoff's comparison to families.

However, I also disagree with their notion that the conservatism of the masses is about the way they think the world should work.

It's not so much a desire for an authoritarian social hierarchy, as a simple belief in it. This is an instinctive and unconscious belief, shielding it from scrutiny. The "desires" attached to it constitute the small comfort that people on a totem pole can take: That there's always someone lower. I think they don't precisely want their social group to be able to dominate and abuse others: Rather, they strongly feel that that's simply how the social totem pole already works. Those who lack a sense of self worth, in particular, resent liberals for implying that it isn't, and for making it taboo to publicly acknowledge that they (the right-wingers) are better than LGTBQ+ folks, black people, women, Mexicans, Muslims, poor people, people with disabilities, et cetera, excluding those groups to which they themselves belong.

They love Trump, not because he promised to give them the right to abuse people beneath them, but because he validated their understanding that they already had that position and that right.

The fact that everyone who voted for him is getting shafted by him doesn't change that! The irrationality of voting against their own interests, while blindingly obvious (even to some of them in hindsight), is irrelevant. Suffering is the price of being low on the totem pole: Those above you, like the government, can do what they want to you. Their votes didn't mean, "We prefer to be part of a hierarchical, authoritarian totem pole than not be," but rather "Life is a hierarchical, authoritarian totem pole, and you have to submit to the dominance of the people above you; deal with it." Trump acknowledged the totem pole and claimed dominance. Clinton, being a woman in America, wasn't in a position to claim dominance even if she had wanted to: The totem pole puts women below men.

The refusal to acknowledge this is part of the insidiously fascist undercurrent of the self-flagellating "Liberal America didn't reach out to poor white people" sentiment. (Also, that sentiment ignores all of the unethical things that Republicans did to win the election, in favor of blaming compassionate people for not expressing sufficient sympathy for views based on hatred, bigotry, misogyny, and lies. I suspect that the sentiment arises in the same way that causes many Christians to blame others' misfortunes on their lack of piety: It's comforting to pretend that our fate is entirely in our own hands (or God's), making us feel safe from malign forces outside of our control. Of course, that pretense leaves people ill prepared for their own misfortunes, so one must keep rationalizing: They/we must have done something to deserve it!)

Okay, my latest attempt to save the world is now up on Medium. I'd regard it as a personal favor to humanity if you would please spread the word.