I am shocked and amazed at times with the way that threats and insults have become commonplace, and even overwhelm the encouragements and niceties that society once held in high regard. Americans are assholes. It just keeps on coming up as a truth in my experience. I can’t deny it anymore.

I was online and saw this photo posted with “I bet you don’t know what is wrong in this picture” trying to challenge you. And I knew what the person posting thought was wrong with the picture immediately–the man was standing to the inside, not the outside near the street, as he walked along with a woman. I pointed out that this is a really misogynistic sort of view of women…that you need to claim or protect them while they walk on a sidewalk expresses they are weak or in danger, at best, and that they are your property on a more nefarious sort of level.

And I was immediately met with ALL CAPITAL LETTERS and people trying to “educate” me and people making comments like “wow” (which denotes crazy) and “poor child” (which denotes ignorance). The assumption that these are appropriate responses to a woman voicing a feminist concern is not necessarily surprising anymore, because I see it happening so often. What does surprise me is that the “schooling” offered by these people, who were hurling insults, was directed at teaching me that a man flanking your street side is “A SIGN OF RESPECT”.

Wait a moment…the people who are trying to tell me how I need to be respected are doing so with blatant disrespect?

What is the world coming to?

Now, don’t get me wrong, I love blatant disrespect in certain contexts–sticking it to the man, refusing to adhere to standards that harm you, ranting in your kitchen when only the dog is listening–but trying to tell me that I need to accept a misogynistic practice in order to be respected, by being disrespectful, is a practice that I will not accept. And being told that I need to feel a certain way about an action that makes me uncomfortable and angry is something I also will not accept.

You see, the offense is two-fold here. Not only am I told that I am ignorant and crazy for my view of this practice, I am told that I need to view the practice through their eyes. I’m not allowed to be offended by it because they like it and see it as good. So, I must practice niceties, while they insult my intelligence.

Really?!

It has taken me many years to begin to understand the way that the niceties practiced in the small, religious, conservative town I grew up in has left me damaged. It has taken many more to learn skills to cope with and combat that damage. I will always, likely, have a life where I fight against the tendencies to maintain the status quo and not offend and not insult and show respect at the expense of my own health and safety. And these strangers on the internet are seeking, by insult and injury, to force me back into that place and accept things that make me feel sick as things that are really just confused in my perception, but actually really good for me.

When did internet strangers become the voice of the patriarchy, the right-wing fanatic, and the media interest for the degradation of women, all rolled into one? Where do they find these people who are so ignorant of their participation in the machine of oppression that they claim it proudly and with gusto and insulting language?

And the most important question, I suppose, is how do we wake people from this participation and help them see that asking me to kindly accept my oppression is really messed up, and not something they want to participate in any longer?

The whole issue of the guy on the outside isn’t really the point. (Though I still find it offensive and one of those patriarchal heteronormative practices that refuses to die but does us no good.) The point is that when we use insults and shaming to attempt to validate our actions, we immediately invalidate our argument….even when we might be correct.

If you need to harass me into accepting your view, then I never really accept it. If I cannot accept it without insult or shame, then I am not accepting it at all. Being a bully does not make you right. Being an asshole does not make you right. And trying to convince me that what or how I feel is wrong, instead of using a rational argument to make your case, is not right.

I still abhor the practice of a man walking to the outside of the woman. Calling me ignorant and crazy hasn’t changed that. Calling me ignorant and crazy hasn’t changed the misogyny inherent in the practice–the way it treats women as less capable of handling life than men, and in need of protection. But calling me those things has changed something. It has eliminated any respect for you, the ones who called me names. It has actually, then, made you LESS convincing, not more. It has eroded your arguments and not strengthened them.

So, what I find shocking is that people who consider themselves more psychologically balanced and more informed than me would not have the keen awareness to know that name-calling doesn’t secure a debate victory. What I find shocking is that those who would observe the niceties of the patriarchy would observe no niceties of other human interaction. What I find shocking is that people still think calling me stupid would make me view them as smart. (It didn’t work in Grade 5. It doesn’t work now.)

Perhaps, what I find most shocking is the way that the shaming and blaming aspects of our society stand strong while the kindness and the understanding and the encouragements of our society are washed away. I am not certain why this is. I intend to find out. And, in the meantime, I encourage you all to use your intellect and your kindness in interactions. Feel with others and hear their stories and seek to understand the ways that their perspectives are shaped and influenced. Challenge ideas without bullying people. Accept knowledge for the sake of knowing, and not for the sake of using it to support your own agenda. And learn how to observe empathy in the place of niceties, so that you are not forcing people to swallow their feelings in order to maintain your ideals.

In other words, stop being an asshole!