He is famously kind, my husband. Always sending money to those afflicted with obscure diseases or shoveling the walk of the crazy neighbor or helloing the fat girl at Rite Aid. Heās from Ohio. This means he never forgets to thank the bus driver or pushes in front at the baggage claim. Nor does he keep a list of those who infuriate him on a given day. People mean well. That is what he believes. How then is he married to me? I hate often and easily. I hate, for example, people who sit with their legs splayed. People who claim to give 110 percent. People who call themselves ācomfortableā when what they mean is decadently rich. Youāre so judgmental, my shrink tells me, and I cry all the way home, thinking of it.
from Dept. of Speculation by Jenny Offill
the most important thing to happened to me in the last year is a friendship i made with another young woman. weāve had weirdly similar arcs, in terms of experience and character, and weāve shared all of our anecdotes, all our minutia. when we were younger, we were both conspicuously compassionate, sort of aggressively, relentlessly generous. we contortedĀ ourselves into feelings of empathy for people who donāt ā and who never will, regardless of our behavior ā care about us. who do not, and never will, in any sense, wish us well. i was so, so proud of the empathy i could feel ā empathy which was, of course, nearly always a very complex fiction, a litany of excuses that now seem desperate and unlikely and naive. she and iĀ both have literal physical plaques awarded to us for our ability, as teens, to suppress our own desires and bad feelings and be nice. we refer to them now, disparagingly, as our ānice girl awards,ā and we think they fucked us up ā and that the same body of expectations fucked other women up ā in not insignificant ways.Ā
a lot of our conversations now involve us saying horrible things to each other ā i say i want to see this one rapistās teeth knocked out, she mentions a passing desire to throw a molotov cocktail into someoneās window. at first, when we were getting to know each other, we said these things tentatively, with a lot of āthis is awful butāās, now we just say them, without hedging. the other day, i made a note on my phone about whatās changed in us: āwe used to think compassion was the answer, or an answer, and now we donāt.ā
one of my close friends, a white man, has told me repeatedly that my anger ā about injustices iāve faced, personally, and about the incredible ocean of injustices that for reasons of race and class and nationality etc. etc. etc. i have never and will never have to face ā is toxic, and dangerous to my health, and that i should find a way to feel calm, find a way to feel no resentment, no rage. some kind of bastardized, westernized zen thing. he has a book about it. and guess what ā this makes me livid! weāre not as close now, now that heās made it clear that my anger makes him uncomfortable. i generally trust his intentions and politics, or did, at least, and still, i think, itās very convenient for a white guy to say: donāt be angry about these systems that function explicitly in my favor. donāt be angry. itās bad for you.
so ANYWAY, my point, i think, is that while i DO think kindness and a genuine, robust attempt at understanding are important, i also feel like this sort of bland neutral compassion that jenny offill describes is like. itās not something everyone can or should cultivate, and it wonāt hurtle us towards anything better, necessarily, towards any kind of better future. and that energy shouldnāt be wasted trying to humanize people who HATE you, you know? i cannot spend another second saying ā what pain was he feeling when he was trying to rape me, or even, what pain caused him to write these awful, hateful female characters. i think it is a healthy and reasonable thing to hate, reductively, and even gleefully, the thing that is trying to degrade and destroy you. the thing that would NEVER pause to ask, even, āis she also a human, like me?ā
MIDDLE FINGER EMOJI TO THE WORRRRLLLLLLDĀ
