The Anti-Soapbox: Collected Essays Page 5

confused victim, often all the predator must do is present their ploy in the proper way. In this case, that is a format compatible with popular media programming, for this will guarantee automatic acceptance from a disturbingly large number of people. Thanks to the victim’s lifetime of media conditioning, a predator’s quasi-fictional stories are not only accepted, but might very well go unquestioned at all, simply due to their familiarity, the way a round peg fits a round hole. If we aren’t careful, this familiarity factor can penetrate the subconscious mind in a profound (and potentially unnoticeable) way, so that almost anything might be accepted and believed, however outlandish or baseless, simply because it fits the preconceived format accepted previously in endless TV shows and movie plots. These type of attacks are even more effective with the success of twenty-four-hour news channels, which utilize many of the same techniques as Hollywood filmmakers to quickly package and convey a storyline (condensing complex, intricate events into sound-bite-friendly versions, stripped of facts to the point that they no longer resemble reality). Then, the line between fantasy and reality is blurred even further, now to the point where the news and a TV show overlap almost to the point of being indistinguishable.

  Keep in mind: just because this is common practice doesn’t make it acceptable. Here, I’ll invoke the proverbial saying: if it was common practice to jump off a bridge, would that make it okay?

  But don’t misconstrue: the problem is not so simple as a minority of “evil” people exploiting the public’s confusion for personal gain. Instead, there are gray areas, such as the confused predators mentioned earlier, who believe they are doing one thing when really doing another (like the thief who justifies their theft because it’s from the rich, Robin Hood-style). Another example of gray areas: because everyone’s doing something, it must be okay—again just as in a movie, where appearances are meant to be taken at face value, thus opening the door to someone directly hurting another but thinking they aren’t doing so, right down to their deep, subconscious perceptions of their actions. I repeat: This sort of low-level confusion is so widespread, and has been going on for so long, the offenders themselves are afflicted by it, so that they are often unable to tell the difference between reality and their selfish, exploitive fantasies of how they want or need things to be—their lines blurred to the point of nonexistence, you could say. So, more often than not, today’s crimes and scandals are far more complicated than a black-and-white struggle of good versus bad. In this strange drama, many of the offenders are as much victims, and vice-versa.

  For the central problem addressed in this essay, solutions are neither obvious nor easy. In a perfect world, simple awareness of our confusion would see a fast, effective cure; but ours is not a perfect world. Furthermore, the very nature of the problem contradicts its solution, because, as mentioned earlier, the confused usually don’t know they’re confused. Also, there is the matter of possibilities; that is, the average person’s sense of what’s possible, which is far more relevant to daily life than is normally thought. For some people, the very premises of this essay—that media and entertainment are conditioning and confusing us—will be rejected as impossible, sometimes for the sole reason that they’ve been conditioned to believe as much. In these cases, circular logic ensues: we’ve been conditioned to believe that no conditioning is occurring, and so it continues, a vicious cycle.

  If we believe the problem cannot possibly exist, how will the problem ever get solved?

  So, what is the true solution? There is only one, and it, too, is not easy: we must become self-aware, as to see through the mind-altering barrage of words and images which assaults us daily in popular media. Only by gaining awareness of our deepest psychological workings can we protect ourselves from the self-destructive confusion which can result from immersion in today’s media-centric world. Then, one might closely scrutinize the ideas and information they receive, to determine if there is any true substance in that news story, or if the plot of that movie should be mimicked in real life, or if that war being sold is for good reason or just smoke-and-mirrors.

  Only by self-awareness can we cease blurring the line between fantasy and reality. Until then, our minds will keep playing tricks on us, perhaps with deadly results.

  IV. HELP?: HOW I LEARNED TO DO NOTHING

  I told her “no,” and it was the best help I could’ve given.

  I’m neither a good person nor a bad one, for this depends on whom you ask, and when. When doing what is desired of me, I’m apt to be perceived as the good guy; when I don’t comply, I’m as easily seen as the opposite, even if noncompliance is ultimately in the other party’s best interest. So, which is the accurate perception? Something in between, for there have been times when I’ve “helped” someone by doing what they want, rather than what’s best for them, and “hurt” someone by denying them in the moment for the greater good.

  So far, I’ve never been thanked for the latter, nor scorned for the former. This says something about mankind, I think.

  As it so happened, the woman in question was one of the people I’ve “hurt”: because I refused to give her what she wanted. The woman wanted my “help,” the euphemistic kind mentioned above; that is, she demanded my favor and support under threat of disapproval—under threat of punishment. In my experience, this sort of subtle duress is so common as to be ignored. The woman, who was disabled and poor, leveraged her disapproval as a weapon, holding it over the head of anyone who dare deny her wishes. But this, too, went ignored, by herself as much as those around her—and, initially, by me as well.

  In time, that changed.

  Sadly, my understanding came only after years of “helping” this woman. Errands, rides, small loans, chores, reluctant emotional support—these were her demands, and these I gave. Did I do so out of the kindness of my heart? Yes, sometimes, at least at first; but, more often than not, I did so out of a subconscious desire to avoid the woman’s disapproval (and that which she would garner from other supporters in the event of refusal). There’s a whole philosophical study here, but I’ll refrain. Instead, I’ll just say that I slowly became aware of the unhealthiness of this relationship, and the fact that, rather than helping, I was merely enabling.

  My realizations came by degrees. Yes, the woman was unprivileged and chronically ill, but this was at her own hand—from the alcohol and other drugs she abused; from the abysmal diet which left her obese and poisoned; from the total lack of exercise or any attempt to rectify her self-destructive lifestyle; from the toxic emotional and mental state she created for herself. Initially, I was naive enough to point these things out to her, but that only introduced me to the extent of her silent punishments, and her eagerness to carry them out. To my surprise, I came to see that she was manipulating others similarly, in plain sight, yet as invisibly to them as it once was to me. Had I been so blind, to miss the control dramas playing out in front of my face?

  Under the burden of these observations, the day came when I said “no.”

  I’d thought about it for some time, weighing the situation and its gravity. My endeavor was a bit more lofty than it might seem: Perhaps denying her was right in principle, and for her ultimate good, but in the meantime, she had needs to be met, which were not made easier by her delusions of victimization and helplessness. Maybe I’d be doing the right thing in the long run, but what about in the Now? Would she get to her doctor’s appointments? Make her rent? Have food on the table? These concerns were complicated by my own sense of empathy, which has a double-edge: Could I be mistaken in my perception of the situation? Was I really being used and exploited, doing a disservice to someone whom could help themselves? Such questions started out as a healthy self-doubt, but soon progressed to an unhealthy level, as I absorbed the narrow, distorted perceptions held by this woman in question, in which “good” and “bad” were defined purely on what satisfied her in the moment. In the end, however, I sided with my convictions.

  There comes a time when one must show a healthy selfishne
ss, to do what’s best for others by way of what’s best for oneself.

  So the next time I was propositioned by this woman, I told her “no.” And the next time, and the next. Each rejection, I suffered her quiet punishments—the insinuations, the passive-aggressive comments, the awkward pauses where I was supposed capitulate, the social pressure from other helpers. But I refused to be swayed. In time, I cut myself off from this unfortunate woman, because it was clear that she did not want real, constructive help, or to so much as believe that it was available to her.

  Then, I found myself challenged in another way: to avoid having the last word in the conflict. A part of me harbored a bitter denunciation of the woman and her fawn, a desire to condemn their poisonous delusions and then make a big, triumphant, childish exit—“I’m taking my toys and going home.” But this, too, I successfully evaded, instead letting her have her beliefs and make her choices, that right to which we are all entitled, however self-destructive.

  I had to do this, for it was the best possible help I could’ve given her. It was my love, you could say.

  Perhaps the woman will come to see