"Please resist racism, sexism, homophobia, transphobia, Islamophobia, climate-change denial, body shaming, ignorance, and corruption. Resist hate."
The above note used to be a part of my work desk back when I was working from office. It had a ton of positive impact because it acted as a filter and reminder to attract only non-judgemental open-minded folks into my life.
During lunch time, I used to overhear a lot of giggles over sexist and racist jokes, but for those people I became unapproachable (other than professionally) for good. Most people who would walk upto my desk, already knew what my expectations were. Whenever someone would walk upto my desk with a comment that would be sexist or in any of the hate categories, I would immediately point my finger towards this note without having to say anything.
Time and again, I face an inner moral conflict when someone I'm talking to passes a comment that falls into any of these or similar categories; because more often than not, I don't have the mental energy to fight it. I sometimes also try to empathize with their ignorance as their lack of education about a topic. Sometimes, I go deeper to convince myself that it does not come from their inflated sense of self, but rather from low self-esteem, wherein they try to elevate themselves by pulling another person down.
I think by choosing to not fight it, I may be passively encouraging such a behaviour around me. Maybe I am wrong in doing so. So here I am putting my thoughts (and conversational expectations) out to the world - a world which has now quite literally gone virtual.
No, I'm not suggesting to display idealism but just kindness, and as John Lennon puts it, "it isn't hard to do".
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