I got a text message today, from someone who was a friend at one time. She had been approached by someone who asked her the fastest way to get rid of a hickey. She asked me if she should be offended. You may see why our friendship is considered past tense.
The fact that she was asked is sort of irrelevant. The fact that SHE asked ME how SHE should feel, is what bothered me most.
This isn't a new development. I wish this was the first occurrence of people asking me how they should feel about something. I realize this question is more to get my opinion on the matter and not specifically a request for exact feelings. But there is a deeper lying problem within a lot of people that this presents.
Nobody owns anything.
What I mean to say is, that people in current American society do not own anything. There is the literal representation: home mortgages and car payments that say the bank really owns your possessions. What I'm driving at is that so few people own their desires and wants.
Take for instance the current situation. This girl needs to ask me how she should feel. Why isn't her feeling of being slightly offended acceptable enough? Why does she need to check with someone to see if being offended is OK? Should I ask her if to tell me if her question is stupid? Not at all, I think it is and therefor it is stupid. I don't need her validation for my own thoughts.
Just like we don't own our feelings, we don't own the causes of them. We get upset about a bad grade in class. So we blame the professor and the material, but rarely ourselves. You know, the person who slept through half the semester and didn't bother to study for the final.
It frustrates me to no end that no one belongs to themselves anymore. It is always about acceptance.
