Embodying Change

The recent suicide of designer Kate Spade prompted Ivanka Trump to offer the usual platitudes. Which in turn prompted a critic to dismiss her statement as just words, citing reductions in the federal budget for mental health services.

For the record: Pot. Kettle. Black. It's all words, and no one is saved by them.

"How," I asked myself, "does sniping at Mrs. Trump make anything better?" Given that government spending priorities are not set by consulting Twitter comments between the President's family and their random Internet critics, the comment came off as little more than anti-Trump virtue signalling. And, like most virtue signalling, it prompts others to feel good about the virtue being signaled, but doesn't actually move the needle. In case you haven't guessed, I'm much more in the "be the change you want to see in the world" camp. Being there for someone who is in crisis does much more to prevent suicide than whining to the President's children.

But here's the thing about trotting out "be the change you want to see in the world;" it presumes that they currently aren't. But what if they are? What if the way people act is precisely indicative of how they want the world to be going forward? It would explain a lot. And it makes sense in the broader context of human nature. Forging a relationship with another human being that is strong enough that when they are at a crisis point in their lives, one that becomes a literal life-or-death situation, is a lot of work. And that work has very real costs that, like many things, won't always seem to be worth it. And in the end, when that crisis point comes, it may not help.

Maybe, rather than pushing people to be the change they want, it would be better to ask them to be honest, with themselves and with us, about the change they want. When we look at the ways in which people interact with the world, it becomes more or less clear that many, if not most of them are in their comfort zones. In this instance, it's not that virtue signaling is easier than working to save lives; it's that a world in which people die, and the survivors preach their choirs about how others aren't doing enough is simply more desirable, for whatever the reason happens to be, than a world in which those "needless" deaths are prevented.

I understand that this is a fairly bleak and cynical viewpoint, even for me. (Ironically, I understand how my outlook on life {among other facets of my personality} puts me at increased risk for depression.) I'd like to say that I take no comfort in it, but that would be inaccurate, because I do take comfort in the idea that I understand the world around me; to the degree that I can, anyway, given the fog of my own experiences and perceptions.

But it doesn't take a clinician to understand that simply hating on Mrs. Trump isn't going to prevent the death of the next Mrs. Spade. I'm not sure that I can think of anyone who honestly thinks it does. Given this, there is an understanding that the time spent sniping at people for not being aligned with one politically is time not spent working to save someone's life; just as the time I spend on this blog is time not spent looking after the people in my own life who I understand are at risk. Yes, I understand that when push comes to shove, I have other priorities than the change I claim to want to see in the world; and I own that.

Perhaps I've simply come to believe that if people really wanted certain changes in the world, they'd be doing more to actively, and constructively, bring them about. Maybe I've fallen into the trap of not realizing that just because something seems clear to me, that this doesn't mean that it's true. It could be that I find people's actions so wrong-headed that this is the only possible explanation I can come up with. I don't know. But I do believe I know that it isn't a secret that what people are doing now isn't working. Unless, of course, it is.