Read on Twitter
Twitter is not the best place to think out loud in a good faith effort to understand and process the world. I'm aware I'm participating in an echo chamber, but here are some thoughts about America and this election..
It's true, I have been reading a lot of Anaïs Nin's diaries from the 1930+1940s.
Her reflections on America back then make me think about how a nation's character develops. Much like the development of a person's individual character. https://twitter.com/KarenAttiah/status/1323262001074839557?s=20
Her reflections on America back then make me think about how a nation's character develops. Much like the development of a person's individual character. https://twitter.com/KarenAttiah/status/1323262001074839557?s=20
As a journalist, we are taught to look at political behaviors in dehumanizing numbers. Percentages. Ratings. Poll points. I would say, a male-dominated way of organizing people, shuffling them into boxes.
Politics are about feelings. We very easily dismiss emotion in America.
Politics are about feelings. We very easily dismiss emotion in America.
. @kristatippett had a very good @onbeing podcast with Arlie Hochschild about the social impact of emotion and how we need to take this more seriously in our body politic.
That facts are not facts, but rather what people *feel* to be true. https://onbeing.org/programs/arlie-hochschild-the-deep-stories-of-our-time/
That facts are not facts, but rather what people *feel* to be true. https://onbeing.org/programs/arlie-hochschild-the-deep-stories-of-our-time/
From Anaïs Nin to today, it's not surprising to me that the social clairvoyants about the emotional core of America often come from immigrant, black, and POC women.
So many of us spend our lives navigating around the emotions associated with maleness, whiteness, Americanness.
So many of us spend our lives navigating around the emotions associated with maleness, whiteness, Americanness.
There is a significant part of the population that does not *feel* racism exists.
That *feels* like as long as they are doing okay financially that the economy must be fine.
That *feels* America is the best place in the world, and we don't need to change anything.
That *feels* like as long as they are doing okay financially that the economy must be fine.
That *feels* America is the best place in the world, and we don't need to change anything.
Anaïs Nin wrote of the "harshness" with which Americans spoke about each other, in her bubble.
"..Talk is entirely of ideas, not of people. If art is our relation to the sense, then they have none. They argue...A Negro is an idea, not a concept. To me, he is a person."
"..Talk is entirely of ideas, not of people. If art is our relation to the sense, then they have none. They argue...A Negro is an idea, not a concept. To me, he is a person."
I've started using the term "intellectual calisthenics" a lot more lately.
By it, I mean many liberal elites who toss around data points and the ideas that they have about what people outside of their world think.
And yet they don't intimately care to *know* how people live.
By it, I mean many liberal elites who toss around data points and the ideas that they have about what people outside of their world think.
And yet they don't intimately care to *know* how people live.
People NEED to feel something.
How does Biden make people feel? What emotional effect were Dems banking on with him? The proximity to Obama? That he wasn't Trump?
How does Biden make people feel? What emotional effect were Dems banking on with him? The proximity to Obama? That he wasn't Trump?
Trumpism hasn't been repudiated.
Half of my timeline, white, progressive/liberal is feeling grief, anger, shock.
Another part: black people, people of color, women, foreigners-- who *feel* and know about whiteness, maleness, Americaness = who are sad but not shocked
Half of my timeline, white, progressive/liberal is feeling grief, anger, shock.
Another part: black people, people of color, women, foreigners-- who *feel* and know about whiteness, maleness, Americaness = who are sad but not shocked
I'm emo right now.
I'm also sleep-deprived and hungry so take all this for what it's worth.
But I am interested in what people think.
How is it that after all this time, so many of you don't know your history? Don't know your fellow citizens? Don't know your own country?
I'm also sleep-deprived and hungry so take all this for what it's worth.
But I am interested in what people think.
How is it that after all this time, so many of you don't know your history? Don't know your fellow citizens? Don't know your own country?
