Pen-Elayne on the Web

Whither Withering Anger?

As few people know better than PMS'ing women (*ahem*), emotions and energy levels tend to run in cycles. And yet, this seems to surprise some very intelligent bloggers. Anne Zook (link at sidebar) asks, "When did we become so complacent?" Avedon Carol (l.a.s.) mentions an essay "that kinda makes me inarticulate with fury...I could rant for pages if I only knew where to start." Lots of folks seem to be implying, "Why aren't more of us angry and protesting and rising up in revolt over what our current government is doing?"

I think the answer to this implicit query is, like so many other things nowadays, fairly complex and not that easily given to sound-byte psychobabble. Naturally, this doesn't mean I won't try. First off, I think many people are plenty angry, and they express it in varying ways, some good and productive and some not-so-good. You don't need me to tell you about all the intelligent blogging that's come from righteous indignation at the perceived path down which our current administration is leading us; just check the sidebar. But you know, an individual can sustain this rage, or most any deeply-felt emotion, for only so long. I still get twinges when I spot the World Trade Center in the backgrounds of TV shows and movies, but I can't keep carrying around the grief I felt on September 11 and for about a month or so afterwards. You simply cannot function in a constant state of shock or rage or fear. Sooner or later you have to put it in the back of your mind (where believe me, it constantly lurks!) so that you can get on with the business of living.

And that leads to the other reason you don't see more people storming the Bastille. The poorer among us are too preoccupied with survival, and the navigation of bureaucracy that this often entails; and the slightly more comfortable not only wish to hold onto that comfort (the "don't rock the boat" theory) but are often too overworked and overwhelmed by all the sensory input around us that the result is just plain exhaustion. Between my job and commute and errands I can't even keep up a personal exercise regimen much less a protest regimen - and I essentially sit at a desk all day! It's just All Too Much sometimes. And yes, I know the richer and more powerful among us might have planned it that way institutionally, to yield precisely such results, but understanding how it happens doesn't really prevent it from continuing to happen. And so we find ourselves mired in situations that only exhaust us more the more we consciously consider them. Again, it gets shoved into the back of our minds.

Then there's the fear, which for me has existed at least since I found out about the Nuclear Clock a couple decades ago, and continues through the current period of intense civil rights erosion. The fear usually goes directly to my brain's backburner; I can't afford to give it a second thought, I'm too scared.

There's no easy way out of perceived complacency (read: actual exhaustion and burnout) and into continued, steady activism not strictly of the armchair variety. A sudden infusion of unexpected cash and the free time that money can bring would be nice, but most of us (more of us than ever, in fact) can't count on that. So we have to fall back on the coping mechanisms that work best for us with other situations: small steps, one thing at a time, nothing too much for us to bear or that would make us numb or burn us out. This is not to say, of course, that further suggestions wouldn't be greatly appreciated.