I had a crummy experience with a parent yesterday, the woman who had a little Spanish club thing for the kids last year, the lady whose son HIT Ella in May. We have had limited contact with them since that incident even though Ella and her daughter are friends. But she asked if we could get together without her kids around so she could talk with me. Sure, I said, and so we met at the science center during the school day yesterday. My kids played and explored, and we talked. Well, I talked. She spewed. Ten or fifteen years ago, I would have been really intimidated and upset by the whole thing. But 12 years of marriage to David Ross plus other experiences with unthinking people has taught me a thing or two. And, I kind of suspected where she might be going, so I wasn't caught off guard. It wasn't pleasant, though. I could see how much she hated that I wasn't getting upset, that I could still be, at times, smiling and warm.
It is rare when issues come down so clearly to bare-bones discussions of philosophical differences--usually that stuff is hidden, under the surface, not the things that are actually talked about. In this case, though, I had decided to make sure that the fundamental differences were elucidated as far as I could.
Relativism, and rejection of the need to identify and integrate objective facts, is a crummy thing; when someone is forced to say it out loud, those who maintain this position can become really hotly defensive. My holding so confidently to the idea that there is such a thing as right and wrong, of good and bad...my passionate committment to doing the right thing in all situations...my emphatic maintenance that I am teaching my kids to turn their back on crappy people (and, let's face it, to become people who are just like me and David)...all of this was so offensive to her that in the course of the conversation, she said that she was feeling "uncomfortable at the idea of our kids interacting, given the stark difference in our philosophical orientations." (That's a direct quote.) Perfect, I thought to myself, good excuse not to have anything to do with you ever again, but I didn't say it out loud. You're so intolerent, she said. Open your mind, she said. Other people have opinions too, she said.
I found myself thinking over and over of one of Jerry Seinfeld's routines, the one where he describes the attitude of his friends who become parents. "We don't need YOU, they say. "We can make our OWN people."
It wasn't the first time that people have been intimidated by my confidence in my own evaluations, my assertion that what matters is coming to grasp the facts of objective reality, and my energy and productivity...but it WAS the first time that someone has suggested that hanging around with me might be somehow detrimental. (I had thought that someday this might happen with a homeschooling fundamentalist Christian, but this lady is an atheist.) Yeah, I thought to myself. Don't let your kids be around THAT lady, she might teach them not to lie, she might teach them not to be aggressive, she might show them that she's absolutely intolerant of anyone hitting anyone else, she might teach them that facts are important, she might somehow question their unthinking emotional responses to issues they should get in better perspective. She might teach them to judge. She might teach them how not to take crap from others.
David has said that people find this particularly startling because I have a warm and friendly exterior...people are not expecting the steel backbone and scorn for stupidity that underlies it.
Anyway...can someone please say something sensible, about ANYTHING, I don't care what. I need some long rational digital arms around me today. I'm feeling a little heartsick. Show me that there are some reasonable people out there who care that their assessments and emotions correspond to objective reality. People who, like Rand's characters, want nothing better than to be around people who are smart and productive.
You know, all five of you who read this blog. You know who you are.
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6 comments:
I am right there with you.
You should know that there are rational people out there/here who share not only your frustration, but also the hope that their children will one day be able to accurately assess reality without being stymied by the threat of poo being slung at them by moral relativists.
Even though I agree that this kind of stuff generally stays beneath the surface in daily operations, when it comes to a head, it can get quite ugly - particularly when there are children involved (especially if those children are mine, grrrrr).
The two most important things here are that you recognized that she was intimidated by the strength of your convictions and then reacted badly to them, and that you were able to stand your ground even in the face of a clear attempt at insult.
Relax. Take a deep breath. Maybe think of yourself as a Warrior of Reason. This sometimes works for me, but then again, after much work on my part, my intolerant reputation precedes me.
I too am right with you.
Like Lynne, my reputation precedes me.
I laugh when people try to insult me by calling me a "black and white" person.
Good for you for standing your ground. Your children will thank you one day when they turn out to be rational adults.
Marc's and my mothers are moral relativists and they hate that we stand our ground. Interestingly enough, without a word on our parts, the kids are starting to pick up that their grandmothers do not have rational cores. I thought it would take much longer than it has.
Consider yourself given a cyber hug. Just remember that there are many, many people out there. We don't have to associate with people who wish to do us emotional harm.
First, a cyber hug for you.
Second, you got under this woman's skin with your way of thinking. Why are you letting her get under yours?
Don't give her that victory. I bet that by sunrise tomorrow, you won't be giving her status to throw you off even a little ever again.
Third, have another hug. :)
Well done! That must have been tough in the moment, but you have the courage of your convictions and stood your ground.
Cyber-hugs to you!
Thanks so much, everybody.
You know what, in retrospect, really burns me? The fact that she said that POLITICS is one of those things that is neither right nor wrong, just like strawberry vs. vanilla.
This is a woman whose own parents had to FLEE THE NAZIS in Austria; they ended up in Argentina where they raised their children. You can't get any closer to smack-in-the-face consequences of moral relativism as applied to politics, and yet here she is spewing this nonsense in my face.
I have been, as people do, rehearsing what I would have liked to have said when she said that bit about politics.
"ONE thing is for sure: I would not have been a 'Good German.' Hitler could not have risen to power in a nation of people like ME; he relied on the complacency of people like YOU."
She would have been aghast, insulted, and furious, of course--but boy, would it have been satisfying.
(Well, Patrick, the day has dawned and I'm still pretty outraged about this--about the politics comment, because of its implications for a world populated by people like her, not about her discomfort with our kids associating. But then, you know me.)
I am reading this 6 days late. So you probably don't need support anymore. Because by now the icky feeling of interfacing with this person is probably mostly washed away. But you certainly handled yourself very well.
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