Don’t Look Back in Anger
Remember my impassioned post about how I found reasons to seethe with fury every which way I looked? Sure you do, because I bet the paroxysms of rage I unleashed onto the universe caused your dog to dive his head under the couch and lose all bladder control. (Though he had the presence of mind to scarf down the two fossilized Cheetos he found there. Plus a rubber band. And the vacuum hose.)
An e-mail conversation with Melissa, who quoted Ani DiFranco and told me how she was using yoga to center herself, started the gears turning in my head (which always terrifies the hub). Then my friend Jean, whom I have to credit with getting me my first job out of college, said, “I’m a realist and I think there are happier ways to spend one’s days than to be angry at things one for the most part cannot change.” Since her comment was so reminiscent of the many times people have told me to “cheer the hell up” or offered pithy platitudes, my knee-jerk reaction was to … you guessed it, get pissed off. But while I disagreed with her, Jean’s point was equally valid, and Melissa had already gotten me thinking. The final push I needed was the latest Cary Tennis column on Salon.com, which made me wonder if I ever appear as shrill and contemptible as the letter-writer does—locked, as it were, in “a glass case of EMOTION.” (Though he almost sounds like he’s trolling, don’t you think?)
Anger is an irreducible animal condition, triggered by our base fight-or-flight response in the face of adversity. Anger has also propelled milestones in history, because if no one ever got angry, then no one would have felt the need to elicit change. Or held anyone accountable. Anger that results from recognizing injustice has long served as the impetus for social reform. Without the strength of conviction that results from righteous indignity, pioneer suffragists would never have fought for a woman’s right to vote.
Abraham Lincoln, to quote another example, was angered by the “monstrous injustice of slavery”:
This indifference, but, as I must think, convert real zeal, for the spread of slavery. I cannot but hate. I hate it because of the monstrous injustice of slavery itself. I hate it because it deprives our republican example of its just influence in the world; enables the enemies of free institutions with plausibility to taunt us as hypocrites; causes the real friends of freedom to doubt our sincerity; and especially because it forces so many good men among ourselves into an open war with the fundamental principles of civil liberty, criticizing the Declaration of Independence, and insisting that there is no right principle of action but self-interest.
Unfettered anger, has, of course, also led to tragedies of both local and unimaginably massive human scales. Yoda said in The Phantom Menace, “Fear is the path of the dark side. Fear leads to anger, anger leads to hate, hate leads to suf-FER-ing.” (I wonder if it’s a sign that I was poorly socialized as a child if my moral compass is a shrunken green muppet.)
The same fuel that is a catalyst for positive change can quickly spiral out of control. When an unyielding expression of anger results in acts of terrorism, the oppressed or misunderstood end up becoming the aggressors. Whatever message that was previously there is bastardized and diluted, since blame and unmitigated anger are ineffectual means of communication. Anger that doesn’t bolster action—that stays stagnant and festers within—is negative and counterproductive.
When all you see is red, your judgment is impaired. And you become bitter.
Abigal Lewis, a “recovering activist” writes on SpiralMuse.com:
The more I learned, the madder I got, the madder I got, the more energy I put into these campaigns, the more intense I got, the less people wanted to engage with me. …
My idealism became anger, and my anger became bitterness. … I was bitter that everyone who worked for Corporate America was being rewarded and everyone who worked for the betterment of the planet (environmentalists, teachers, care-givers) was being punished. Finally my bitterness became judgment. They were WRONG. They were THE PROBLEM.
After collapsing from burnout and finding herself forced to do some soul-searching, Lewis suddenly recognized that she was a “re-activist” rather than a “pro-activist.” Realization hit her: “Disempowered, angry people are only effective up to a point. You can’t create lasting positive change from an angry place,” she says. “When you get mad or go in to judgment/blame, you lose a little bit of your own life-force, your own vitality. You are letting something outside of you, something you deplore, rob you of energy. That certainly does not help your cause. Do what you have to do—but do it from Love, not hate and anger.” In order words, she elaborates later, be pro-peace rather than anti-war. (Another activist offers his own ruminations on the subject.)
Anger, in and of itself, is impractical at best. Unless it galvanizes positive action, anger is a destructive emotion that builds up walls, not tears them down. So thank you, Melissa and Jean, for reminding me that I need to move beyond my anger to a place where I can actually push for change.
Still, don’t you think that even Gandhi wanted to lay the smackdown on someone once in a while?
No?
Obviously I still have some work to do.
References:
1. Lincoln, Abraham and Andrew Delbanco. The Portable Abraham Lincoln. New York: Penguin, 1993.
Liz said,
March 10, 2006 at 3:15 pm
I alternate between being angry and apathetic and depressed and rarely hopeful. I try to do the best I can on my own homestead and get often get lost in my own little world. Maybe that’s not a bad thing.
You’re doing great suggesting ways for people to live a more sustainable life. Sometimes I think I’ve come so far from the mainstream that it’s hard to remember what it was like when I lived in the megalopolis and was trying to reduce my footprint. It’s so normal for me now, and I have no new little discoveries to share with readers… it just seems old hat.
Laurie said,
March 15, 2006 at 12:07 pm
This topic of anger and the downward cycle it produces has been much on my mind lately. Sometimes I have to take a break from the news because I feel like my head is going to explode. Taking classes about the global agricultural system doesn’t help.
I don’t know what the answer is, because although I know being bitter and judgemental doesn’t help my cause, I realize that when you’re fighting apathy, you have to find some way to wake people up. It’s a tough call for people who care about our earth and its inhabitants, but for the most part I believe that you’re right about anger building walls.
The Worsted Witch » Green: The Color of Money said,
March 30, 2006 at 2:42 pm
[...] I’m getting MUCH better at managing my anger these days, but two, three … um, maybe four … days out of the week you’ll still find shaking my fists at the heavens, as I mentally berate the general populace for its apathy toward global warming, our dwindling biodiversity, and famine and drought in much of the developing world. (I mean, nothing depresses me more than watching my husband down a bottle of Diet Coke. Okay, maybe baby seals getting clubbed to death depresses me more. Let it be known that the day my Paxil and Effexor quit on me will be a very dark day for humanity.) Times like these, I tend to forget that there is a sizeable population that can’t afford to be environmental, or have it in their power to make greener, socially conscious choices. [...]
The Worsted Witch » The Impossible Only Takes A While said,
July 17, 2006 at 10:51 am
[...] Every NYC Fair Trade Coalition tabling I’ve volunteered at, including the one I dragged my sister to on Saturday, you’ll always get a couple of smart-alecky yahoos who’ll ask you why you’re doing this—Why bother? You’re just one small group of people. You’re just one person. Nothing’s going to change unless the big political guns get involved. Then I bring up Susan B. Anthony, Mahatma Gandhi, Rosa Parks … Abraham frickin’ Lincoln. The odds were phenomally stacked against them; their contemporaries pooh-poohed them. One person. [...]