It was quite the challenge to write it down as I did. With every sentence, several examples of extraordinary stupid human behavior came to mind, and double that for sarcastic commentary on those. It's my favorite coping mechanism. As much as I wish to be that stoic, I'm not, and despite the progress in recent years (10 years ago I climbed on the hood of a car parking on a zebra crossing and walked over it, jumping down on the other side), there are way too many moments that I find myself wanting to wield the force to distribute the deserved. Or what I believe it to be.
It's sucks to accept that our power is so limited. But it's not 0, and that's something. But the next dude that drives with 60 in the fast lane...
You know, the more I thought about it, the more I thought that perhaps getting rid of 'intolerance' and 'knee jerk reactions' might be the way forward. Our reactions to behaviour is our own problem. It's easy to rant and complain - and oh boy Jamie and I do it alot - I mean, there's a lot to be outraged about! However, that just festers in our own hearts and guts, surely. We're the ones that suffer from our inability to tolerate stupidity.
The older you get, though, and I concede, the more you want to put people to the firing squad for infractions. Or perhaps avoid people altogether.
I love the meme video where you see a British guy in the supermarket, saying 'sorry' 'sorry' 'sorry' to everyone in sight. Cultural politeness at it's best. Yet the moment he gets in the car, he's screaming at people cutting him off in traffic, forgetting to indicate and so on. I think we're more tolerant when we know the person and meet them in real life. We're nicer when we are face to face.
I find just saying 'some people are just idiots' is enough to make me calm down. Or 'how much time am I spending ranting about something I can't change?' or even finding a reason for why they're a fuckwit (they've had a bad day, bad news, they don't understand the rules and so on) helps.
You can't fix stupid, but you can fix your own reaction to stupid.
I like the "Some people are just idiots". That one works for me, too, mostly. Getting all riled up usually doesn't solve anything, as you say, it's against one's own best interest.
The example of the meme video is very interesting, as it shows the superficiality of being nice. It's not genuine, many people are not genuinely nice. I try to be, though I do find myself pretending from time to time - gotta work with humans, and though most got used to me being direct, I can't always be, especially to clients. So I smile and wave and make mental notes to never be like that.