Cruelty of Anonymity

If the internet has taught us anything about the human psyche, it is how miserable people can be in anonymity. But our internet persons aren't distinct from our social selves, just under-supervised aspects of our personalities. It's easier to bandwagon and mob when it's only an avatar, and your actions are not judged by those who actually know you.
I hesitate to say "in real life" because pitchforks are raised immediately when it is suggested that an online existence doesn't have merit. Of course it does. But if you suggest the internet carries psychological weight, then you must admit it does so for others.
I've been thinking a lot about privilege and racism and the horrors that mankind can inflict upon itself. Racism can be a bit of an umbrella word, like organic. We stack patches onto its meaning until it gets unwieldy and confusing, and every conversation about racism is about "All x are racist" and "I'm not a racist because" when every side uses whatever definition of racism leaves them the least culpable for their atrocities of character.
I am a person of great privilege, and I intrinsically act out of a systemic racism that I desperately attempt to fight, daily. Some days I succeed and some days I fail. But there are other definitions of racism, I'm sure, that would exonerate me. I do not believe I should be ashamed of that racism that stems from my phenotype. No one should be ashamed of their phenotype, whatever advantages or disadvantages it brings. Shame isn't the correct response to most anything. But I still need to understand the systemic advantages my appearance and social class have provided. I have so much more in the way of life chances, and that very privilege carries with it an incultured set of indoctrination and racisms that I may never fully shrug off.
But I will try.


I've been thinking a lot about hate recently. I can't think of an instance in my life where hatred of a person has been constructive. I can't think of a single time in my life where being cruel has helped or been beneficial. I can't even imagine how it could be.

Easy, Lucky, Free

Ascribing to the American Dream was never my prerogative. It's impossible to be a white, middle-class male and not fall into subliminal racism incessantly, and I skirmish internally with my "ease of life" every day, my inherent life chances. 

More and more, I feel a pervasive shame for my class. If I made a list of things I despised, near the top would feature "entitlement" and "cruelty" and "disloyalty" and "selfishness". These are the psychologies that are symptomatic of poverty, hunger, abuse, murder, and racial injustice. If I woke up in another shade of skin, would I deserve a different lot?

It sounds silly on paper, but yet it remains ingrained into our society. If I woke up Black or Asian or female or gay, my "life chances" drop considerably. It's strange looking at our country and seeing our government deny bathroom equality for transgenders and think, not that long ago we had segregated drinking fountains and buses for differing melanin levels. It's not about the bathrooms; it's not about the buses and fountains and lines. It's about a cultural baseline that entitles a racial injustice, and rather than those people feeling shame, they feel morally superior in comfortable ignorance of the cruelty of the subjugation their are perpetuating, either actively or passively.

My life is easy, lucky, free, but simply as a byproduct of my phenotype rather than my morality or generosity or graciousness.