When something dominates the national news, it’s common to feel highly engaged but also mostly, if not entirely, helpless. We feel it, but we can’t fix it. So our very normal, healthy impulses to do something start to wander around, looking for a place to go.
And like any entity with a lot of energy and nothing to do, these impulses start to cause trouble around the neighborhood. Namely, we can feel very tempted to judge, correct, fixate on, fume at and try to micromanage what we see, or rename it Karen. Our friends, relatives, neighbors, colleagues, that guy behind us in the checkout line.
Sometimes bystanders must get involved, of course, as the last line of defense against bullies, abusers, even terrorists.
But most of the time, and especially when the impact of the person we’re correcting is drop-in-the-bucket negligible — or when the stakes are highly abstract — we risk doing more harm by butting in than by a strategic choice to look the other way. Our affectionate ties to others, after all, are the most potent, underrated weapon we have against just about every threat we face as people.
So when you catch your sense of righteousness loitering outside the minimart, looking for trouble, please call it home and find it something constructive to do.
Carolyn Hax, Washington Post advice columnist, February 14, 2021
And like any entity with a lot of energy and nothing to do, these impulses start to cause trouble around the neighborhood. Namely, we can feel very tempted to judge, correct, fixate on, fume at and try to micromanage what we see, or rename it Karen. Our friends, relatives, neighbors, colleagues, that guy behind us in the checkout line.
Sometimes bystanders must get involved, of course, as the last line of defense against bullies, abusers, even terrorists.
But most of the time, and especially when the impact of the person we’re correcting is drop-in-the-bucket negligible — or when the stakes are highly abstract — we risk doing more harm by butting in than by a strategic choice to look the other way. Our affectionate ties to others, after all, are the most potent, underrated weapon we have against just about every threat we face as people.
So when you catch your sense of righteousness loitering outside the minimart, looking for trouble, please call it home and find it something constructive to do.
Carolyn Hax, Washington Post advice columnist, February 14, 2021
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