The Real Crisis

I cried so hard last night, and it wasn't about the election. I was crying because of the shear meanness and anger that so many people have toward one another. I see more and more evidence of bitterness and/or apathy, and I don't know if it is because I am getting older or because the world is just progressively getting uglier. Thanks to the anonymity of the Internet, people have forgotten that respect is a virtue. And after some get accustomed to being nasty at the comfort of their keyboards, they grow more easy being that way in crowds and then so with individuals.

There is no use in being mean. None. Somehow being nice has become equated to weakness. One can be strong and resolute without being caustic and cruel. It seems like everything society worships are the things Jesus reviled. It takes more strength to be humble than to overflow with pride. It takes more courage to be wrongfully rebuked without retribution than it does to lash out in revenge.

I cried because I was so sad for humanity. I wanted to just love everyone so hard and all at once in some attempt to quell the hatred that seems to ooze so easily and out of no where. As if I were somehow important enough to get heard long enough to say, hush, just be nice, love one another, respect one another, comfort one another - or just be quiet. If they actually listened, would there just be silence?

I know I am an idealist to the core, and that will never change. I would rather die than turn stoic and cynical. I continue to seek the good in people and refuse to believe that anyone is a lost cause. I refuse to believe that changing the world is up to someone else and not up to me. I take the crises of humanity personally, but I don't know if it is me who is flawed or those who don't mourn personally for the loss of the moral character of each and every one of us. I don't know.