Hezo Kittie

I talked to a friend over the internet the other day. The person began the conversation with:

Person: "Oh my goodness, there is drama within the group"
Me: "lol"
Me: "How is that possible?"
Person: "Don't worry about it."
Me: "I'm not."
Person: "Don't ask questions."
Me. "?"

This person might not have understood that "How is that possible?" is a rhetorical question, and that maybe they thought it was a question that warranted an answer, but a more general conclusion came about this dialogue that I am deeply concerned about.

This is highly unscientific, but before each conversation is initiated, both parties develop a general notion of how the other person is and will react before that person even says a single word.

This is shown in the above example because the Person assumed that I would be curious and inquisitive above the supposed "drama within the group", when in reality this was not the case.

And I've found that this is disrespectful. Once we let the preconceived notions of how a person is take over how a person actually is or what the person actually says, we've stopped treating the person as a human being and instead turned them into some static, flawed caricature.

I've decided I want certain things out of my life. I want to be a good family member, a good friend, and I want to give back (to my community and/or my family and/or my friends for providing me with good things).

I went to the Dizzee Rascal / El-P concert with my friend tonight, and I disrespected her. Dizzee Rascal is her all time favorite artist, and I was excited and glad to be able to share the experience of seeing her favorite musician perform live.

After the concert, we stood at the bus stop, and I was still amazed at how good Dizzee's performance was. I said that it was fun, and my friend replied, "There was too many stupid emo kids moshing and bumping into me. Who the fuck moshes during a rap concert. Save that shit for Warped Tour. I'm going to have bruises all over my body."

I lost my notion of the space between stimulus and response when I sarcastically replied, "Oh, heaven forbid EVERYONE ELSE not listening to live music the way YOU want to. Have you ever been to a concert before? Did you realize that, no matter who is performing, when you are four feet from the stage there will be people pushing up against you? That's too bad that your potentially amazing concert was ruined by a bunch of people having a good time."

I probably could've went on, even with some "See this? This is the world's smallest violin playing just for you" bullshit, but she looked seriously dejected at my surprising response, and with good reason. It was completely disrespectful and uncalled for.

Yes, I do believe honesty takes precedence over "being nice", but that wasn't honesty. That was a belittling and inhuman remark, and I truly regret what I said.

The one thing that burns a painful hole in my belly is when a person disrespects another person, whether it was me or a friend of mine or some stranger.

Today I disrespected a friend, and with this knowledge I know I have an extremely long way to go from being who I truly want to be.