What is Offensive?
It’s everywhere these days, but it still confuses me. Are certains things offensive? Or do people take offense at certain things. I think the later. It’s a taking. And for it to matter to anyone else, the right to take must be granted by society. There is nothing which is itself offensive. It cannot be.
I’m offended by many things. No trespassing signs on vacant land in the middle of nowhere. But I don’t get too worked up about it. There might be something I don’t know about involved—namely, even on remote vacant land people might’ve been vandalizing so much that the owners put up signs. Therefore I recognize that my offended feelings are my own and I keep them to myself.
Oh heck. Am I really offended by NT signs? I get pissed, I know. But the signs don’t injure me in any way,nor do I let them. It seems that to be offended, one must allow an event to hurt one a bit. NT signs make me mad at them. They do nothing to me. But even if they did, like if they were signs at a meeting that said ‘Jeff Stay Out’, I would again just be mad, UNLESS! ah ha…unless the sign was a surprise. This meeting is full of my friends, I think! Now my feelings are hurt and I’m offended. OK, so hurt feelings seem to have to go along here.
The other day I was with a friend at a cabin and she saw a little religious tract on the wall that someone had left. She was offended by it and wanted it down. I kinda wanted to see it up for awhile and to look at it. Taking it down to please her would displease me. We were in a bind. Then she was kind of offended that I wouldn’t just take it down out of consideration for her feelings. It all has me thinking about this whole ‘offensive’ thing.
If I’d had really bad childhood experiences with leaves, seeing them in the yard at my friend’s house might upset me and so he could perhaps rake them up to calm me down. Could I demand that he rake them? Could I rightly tell him that the leaves were evil and stupid and that’s why I couldn’t stand them?
I think that by becoming offended I’m giving myself permission to elevate my opinion above any prevailing circumstance. It’s the elevation of subjectivity. My feeling about a thing takes precedence over the thing itself.
There’s also a judgment going on. I decide that both my subjective mood will now get precedent over any need to keep silent and I judge that I know enough about the thing—my mood being the most important thing at this time apparently—to decide its fate. It’s right to be or be respected is revoked. —I decide to climb over the fence and trespass. Or demand apologies for whatever. Or tear the tract off the wall. Throw the flag in the trash. Whatever.
In being offended by the casual conversation of some rural white people, for instance, when they say “You want to buy some fresh fish? Go ask that old n****r down by the river there, he’ll tell ya,” you’re deciding you know enough about the situation to feel free to be upset. As for me, I don’t presume to know everything about every culture or situation I encounter, so I’d just go down and buy the fish.
In being offended by any casual racist/sexist/homophobic talk by the guys down at the bowling alley, I’m deciding that I’m fit to judge these people’s faults. As for me, I say no one’s perfect, if they’re not fixin to busta head or
poppin gaskets over some fantasy, then I leave em alone. Actually, if they’re revving about various conspiracy theories and getting heated up, I’ll realize that they’re using the subject to vent spleen and that the subject isn’t the point. Again, if I wasn’t part of their gang, I’d leave em alone. I wouldn’t presume to know what’s going on or how to fix it. But be offended?
In being offended by something to the point of taking action you’re also deciding that it’s a crime. If things bother me I never really care or act unless someone is actually being hurt or something wrong/bad is about to happen. If
I see bad taste, so what. If I see violence I do something. But then am I offended by crime? Am I offended that there’s a burglar in my house? I’d think I’d be angry with him and want to hurt him, but I wouldn’t be offended.
Another part of being offended seems to be that the subject somehow has a larger than life hold on you. You’re getting off on riding your bike and not owning a car, you see smog, you hate cars…you’re offended by cars. You can’t see any bigger picture. I could vote for Clinton and not Bush and leave it at that…or I could get angry if someone said that Bush was smart—I could say he was a jerk, that he was destroying America. I’d be close to being a person who could be offended by someone mentioning the name Bush in my house. At a party once a bunch of people were saying how great Clinton was, I said C’mon he’s not perfect and they gaped at me. I was thenceforth shunned. Perhaps I offended them?
People feel they have a license nowadays to be offended. I don’t recall feeling offended about anything. Therefore I’m risky to be around if you are easily offended. I’m a loose cannon. I only say what I think. I will be polite to
everyone I know and will never serve meat to a vegetarian and I won’t talk about things I know make people made, but you never can tell. When people’s whims take the fore, one can never stay ahead! —Unless one has the same whims.
Then there’s all this stuff about ‘privilege’ and implicit power relations. It’s all very weird.
If anyone can simplify, clarify or point me to some help on this subject, I’d appreciate it.
