Blimix

Some decades ago, during my college days (yes, I'm getting old), I accompanied a friend to his family gathering. I wound up engrossed in conversation with his stepsister J., age 15, whose knowledge and insight impressed me. At dinner, the three of us occupied a conversational niche at the middle of the table. The conversation at the table's end was the sort of speculation that often entertains dinner companions: The women of their parents' and grandparents' generations were taking turns sharing their explanations of some curious phenomenon. They took each other seriously, even though none of them had anything convincing to say on the subject. (My apologies: As much as these events have impressed themselves upon me, the intervening years have been more than sufficient to steal the subject itself from my memory.) A slightly heated debate ensued. At an appropriate gap in the adults' conversation, J., who was seated at their edge, made the usual gesture to draw attention. She began to submit a solution to the question under discussion, in the simple, explanatory tone of one who knows the answer. The adults avoided eye contact with J., and one of them immediately started talking over her (not to her; only to the others), so that they did not hear more than three words from her. It was smoothly done, as if J. had merely tried to interject during an insufficient pause. She politely waited for another pause, and was then interrupted in an identical manner. After the third time it happened, she gave up.

( The rest is behind a cut for the sake of your feed, but you know you want to read it. )

All right, I'm getting sidetracked. tl;dr: I like to show respect.

I could have left it at forty-two posts, especially with the Hitchhiker's Guide being significant to my forty-second post. But alas, here we go with another post. (I hereby invoke bleem to keep the count at forty-two until my next post.)

I went to the Poesten Kill gorge with Neil recently, to walk and swim. There's a pool fed by a waterfall next to a tall cliff. Atop the cliff are two spots from which people sometimes jump into the pool. It's dangerous; they have to get a good running start to clear several feet of slope and rocks, and several more feet of submerged rock shelf before the deep part of the pool. A group of four teenagers played there: Two girls were encouraging two boys to jump from the top. One boy jumped repeatedly; the other climbed up, but refused to jump. The girls progressively goaded, taunted and insulted him, trying to get him to jump. (Yet they wouldn't even climb up.) Finally, after he had climbed halfway down, I called up (while swimming in the middle of the pool), "You're the smart one!" Due to the distance and the noise of the waterfall, the shouted conversation went like this:

Girl: "Who?"

Me: "The guy who won't jump!"

Boy: "What did he say?"

Girl: "He says you're smart because you won't jump!"

Afterward, Neil playfully asked, "You always have to be contrary, eh?"

I said, "No. I didn't want him to feel that the whole world was against him just because he was doing the smart thing."

Neil: "Oh... That was actually very kind of you."

Here's where I generalize. Every once in a while, I notice the person who is right being bullied by people who are wrong but who have stronger personalities. Frequently, it's a child versus the adults. Sometimes it's a quiet, lone voice of reason in a discussion. And I try to let them know, when I can, that they are not alone.

We're not programmed to do that by default. There's more incentive to bother to communicate, especially with strangers, if we disagree with their decision or opinion, than if we agree with them. (I mean real communication, not just the meaningless social noises made by a group of similar people who take turns preaching about their favorite "controversial" topic upon which they all agree.) After all, what do you accomplish by *not* changing someone's mind? Why not just stay silent, if they're already doing what you want them to?

Is it any wonder that so many good people have low self-esteem? Nobody bothers to speak up to say, "Good job!" People only hear, "You're wrong. You're a coward. You're an idiot. You're screwed up. You're an asshole."

It sucks to feel like nobody understands you. Especially when you're right, but you don't have the force of personality or the debating skills to convince anyone of that. So, I like to let people know that someone else does understand. It can be a great boost to their confidence and morale. This is especially important for children in formative years. Without such occasional rewards, one who is not self-assured can spiral toward "The world sucks, and I suck."

I remember what childhood was like. I didn't come close to suffering the worst of it, because I was extremely self-assured. But I did experience the frustration of being dismissed because I was a child, unable to convince others of my (sometimes correct) point of view. And maybe I never learned to respect others until my late teen years because I was never treated with respect as a child. (My grandpa Ed was an exception, as some who have read my eulogy for him will remember, but he lived 1300 miles away.) (I have previously hypothesized that I simply had never met anyone worthy of respect until my late teen years. I don't know whether either of these ideas carries weight.)

I can only imagine that the majority of people, who by default treat children with no respect, have forgotten their own childhood treatment. It becomes so easy to pressure, dismiss and bully people who cannot stick up for themselves that no thought is given to whether it is right. I am lucky to have escaped that trap. Not only do I remember, but I have many friends who were/are worthy people as children. Some of them have at times been kind enough to share their stories. (I think you all know who you are, and I thank you.)

So I can still empathize with an experience that I haven't felt in over half of my lifetime. And I'm motivated to do something about it when I see it. A few words expressing solidarity can make a huge difference in someone's day, and in their self-image. When I get to see the result (which I have several times this past year, generally in a more personal setting than shouting over a waterfall), it can be heartwarming.

Who else out there does the same?