Maybe Elon broke Twitter.
Maybe Trump broke America, or maybe Biden is breaking it.
Maybe it’s NATOs fault that Russia is now attacking Ukraine, or maybe Putin is a power hungry dictator who is bent on expanding his empire.
Maybe covid was a result of lab tests gone wrong, or maybe some bats indirectly made all of us sick.
I have my opinions on all of these—as I’m sure you do too—but for the most part, my job isn’t to make decisions that require my opinion on a lot of the stuff that’s at the top of the news (some people do, and my heart goes out to them). I can’t change what has happened, and me sharing my opinions with strangers only increases the noise that drowns out the great things that might be happening in the world.
I’m not saying we shouldn’t discuss these important things; and for those whose jobs require them to understand what’s going on, all power to them! Hopefully those people are surrounded by people that remind them of the good that exists, and why pushing through these challenging questions matters.
But the hot takes…
For all of us who take sadistic joy in associating some terrible thing we’re witnessing with some decision we believe the other side made in error (or because they want to see the world burn), maybe we should cool it. I, at least, have enough hard decisions to make in life, and not all of them are going to be the right ones. I’d like to take a time-out from critiquing the rest of the people, and see what good I can create.
Maybe Trump broke America, or maybe Biden is breaking it.
Maybe it’s NATOs fault that Russia is now attacking Ukraine, or maybe Putin is a power hungry dictator who is bent on expanding his empire.
Maybe covid was a result of lab tests gone wrong, or maybe some bats indirectly made all of us sick.
I have my opinions on all of these—as I’m sure you do too—but for the most part, my job isn’t to make decisions that require my opinion on a lot of the stuff that’s at the top of the news (some people do, and my heart goes out to them). I can’t change what has happened, and me sharing my opinions with strangers only increases the noise that drowns out the great things that might be happening in the world.
I’m not saying we shouldn’t discuss these important things; and for those whose jobs require them to understand what’s going on, all power to them! Hopefully those people are surrounded by people that remind them of the good that exists, and why pushing through these challenging questions matters.
But the hot takes…
For all of us who take sadistic joy in associating some terrible thing we’re witnessing with some decision we believe the other side made in error (or because they want to see the world burn), maybe we should cool it. I, at least, have enough hard decisions to make in life, and not all of them are going to be the right ones. I’d like to take a time-out from critiquing the rest of the people, and see what good I can create.
- Nathan