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I Don’t Care About Your Feelings
I’m writing this post for anyone on the Left who might be curious about the political Right. Not for your leaders or political elites, but for you: the everyday person who believes the stories and the rhetoric of the Left, and feels that those on the political Right are to be feared and condemned.
But before I tell you why I don’t care about your feelings, let me tell you about myself and how I suspect you might feel about me.
I’m a Conservative. I live in a quiet community with friendly neighbors who join together to decorate our street for the Christmas holidays.
I like to read the news. I read books mostly about current events. I love dogs and watching TV shows about Alaska and veterinarians. My friends are people who raised good kids, and now in their later years, indulge their grandchildren. They often visit them because they have the time to do so.
Some of us love to cook; others dine out. We get together at Thanksgiving and have a neighborhood Christmas party. Some of us are couch potatoes; others fight off the challenges of aging by getting exercise at the gym.
Some of the guys play golf. Some of the women do, too. We bring meals over when people are unwell. Some of us go to church, others don’t. Some of us take vacation trips; others are homebodies.
In other words, we are ordinary people. In many respects, we are just like you.
We are not white supremacists.
We are not domestic terrorists.
We are not racists.
We want to live our lives in peace; isn’t it your deepest wish to do the same?
But I have come to believe that goal doesn’t ring true for you, at least not at a conscious level.
You trust in your feelings to make judgments and decisions.
You think those of us on the Right are cruel because we rely on not only feelings but on reason.
You hate this country, not for what it has become, but because you think we must bear the guilt of our country’s history, forever.
You want those of us on the Right to take the responsibility for every disappointment, poor decision, and crisis simply because you have become convinced that we are the best people to blame.
Your blame is not connected to evidence, facts, or truth but upon fear and hatred. It is also convenient and easy to blame us, and your feelings confirm your dissatisfaction with our country for not being a perfect place. You feel the country, and those of us who love this country, are guilty. Of horrendous crimes.
* * * *
By relying on your feelings, however, you are living a life of delusion and unhappiness. Feelings can be wonderfully satisfying in certain contexts. But when you rely on your feelings, you create a narrow and limited pathway for comprehending your life. Data outside of your feelings is deemed hateful, non-compassionate, and destructive.
When are feelings a satisfying and appropriate indulgence? When we embrace our friends and families. When we cook our favorite meal. When we make homemade chocolate chip cookies and eat them when they are still warm. When we are overwhelmed with joy at a child’s first birthday party. Even when we grieve the loss of a friend’s passing, our feelings allow us to appreciate what life offered him, and has offered us.
That experience of feelings is a personal investment that allows us to fully engage with our lives in an intimate way.
But it is not sufficient for making important decisions, to explore the pluses and minuses of the world around us; it ought not to be the sole way for choosing our friends and our aims in life.
If we limit ourselves only to our feelings, without expanding our life’s experience with information, or with resources that challenge our own ideas, preferences, and biases, we are locked into a mindset that will isolate us, making our lives ugly and dark.
I’m not suggesting that you use only reason to make your life’s choices. Nor am I saying that relying on your feelings is a poor approach.
I am saying that if you rely solely on your feelings without expanding the way you see the world, the way you see the political Right, the way you see me, I am compelled to make a choice.
I can’t make you change your mindset.
I won’t change my own view of the world.
As long as you indulge your feelings to justify your hatred, your attacks on America, and on our citizens, I will condemn who you are and what you stand for. I’ve made a heart-wrenching choice.
I choose not to care about you and your ideas.
And I couldn’t care less about your feelings.
Published in Culture
@susanquinn – would you define the following as someone ‘on the Left’?
Walks precincts in their home state to support a democrat who stands for the following:
Reforming the department of corrections (euphemism for defund the police)
Defends ‘Choice’ in deciding who lives and who must die (euphemism for abortion on demand)
Promotes ‘climate change’ to the extreme extent of bankrupting countries in a vain attempt to change the weather
Supports open borders and supports making ‘Dreamers’ U.S. citizens
Believes and supports the teaching of Critical Race Theory in elementary schools
Vehemently opposes ‘Choice’, at least when it comes to parents choosing schools for their children
I could go on, but I don’t care enough about the feelings of those on the Left.
Well stated Susan! My feelings (oops!) exactly.
FACT!
I would add, “I don’t care about your opinions.”
Yep. That’s a lot of it!
It’s not like I don’t care about the feelings of my Leftard friends; it’s just that their “feelings” have no business substituting for concerns based upon real evidence in these terrible times where millions are being ruined and in some cases killed by the consequences of the policies emanating from those same Leftard feelings. Those “feelings ” are generally self centered, selfish, and fashionable navel gazing that show a gross lack of empathy for the damage to others they are causing.
A person who operates solely on emotion and feelings and can’t use reason isn’t free. A person who operates solely on feelings cannot be a responsible citizen in a republic. He is only fit to be a subject of a government, which is why our elites want people to operate on emotion.
Here’s the stinger: A person who operates on feelings has no reason not to liquidate you.
Which are just verbalized emotions/feelings. No rational thought needed.
A little off topic, but years ago Mrs Rodin and I were on the Wine Train in Napa CA for my 40th birthday. The experience involved a fine meal while riding from Napa to St. Helena and then drinking from St. Helena to Napa. There was a large and obnoxious party on board who decided to walk the length of the train singing “Row, Row, Row Your Boat” and getting everyone to join in as they went along. When they got to someone who was sitting near us, that person clearly wasn’t having any of it. Instead of joining the round, they broke into the song “Feelings”. The party turned about and went back from whence they came. It was the best use of feelings I have every come across.
Exactly right, Unsk. It’s all about them, and anyone who thinks differently is irrelevant, if not evil.
I agree! I’m just a body in the way, aren’t I?
I wonder if anyone who read this post had the question cross his or her mind, why should anyone care about how you feel about him or her? Well, most of us would respond with, pound sand or some such insult. But you see, so many on the left suffer from narcissism that they would be appalled that we don’t care about them. I think you’d need to be one of them to really get it . . .
The facts don’t care how you feel about them.
That is precisely why, in our many trips to Napa, we never took the train! Although I would have loved to have answered with that song!
Not necessarily narcissism. As Adam Smith observed “Man naturally desires not only to be loved, but to be lovely”. Meaning most of us desire to be held in some esteem by our fellow man. In a healthy society this means regards for other’s feelings. I certainly didn’t take your post to mean we should go out of our way to be cruel. I do think that the focus on someone’s feelings to the exclusion of reason and the truth is a problem. I also don’t intend, nor should anyone to care about someone who has negative feelings about me. As another wise person noted you can only control your reaction to these people.
They are stubborn that way. Unfortunately in our world of relativism, people have convinced themselves of that absurdity of Hamlet “There is nothing good or bad, but thinking makes it so.” and extended it to believe they can undo the laws of nature by mere will.
You are correct. But I think at least some of them are so self-absorbed that they shut out others who don’t agree with them.
Of course, We live in an age of narcissism. I was just pointing out that the short hand you were using. i.e. “I don’t care about your feelings” is just that short hand. Not an endorsement of being intentional cruel. Also when we “why should we care what someone thinks/ feels about us” that is a kind of shorthand as well. Naturally we desire that others should think well of us. It is what makes shame such an important part of social cohesion. We just need to get back to a healthy society where these things are in the proper balance.
This should be on the main feed and sharable. Excellent, Susan!
Very well said, Raxxalan. In fact, I debated whether to use the sentence, I don’t care about your feelings, because I kept it in because I was so attached to it, not because it best expressed my sentiment. As you said, cruelty is not my path, at least not intentionally! Someone should write a post on shame. It’s crying out to be addressed. I’ll have to see . . .
Thanks so much, Caryn. Lately I’ve had some intriguing ideas show up, and I’m always grateful–especially when others appreciate them!
I have heard laughter is the best medicine so I take some every time a libtard decides to foist their feelings on me. 100% effective in curing what ails me.
It’s not so easy for me, Bunsen. One of my dearest friends is a lefty, and I make sure that whatever feelings she shares are not about politics. I refuse to talk politics anymore with her, because she’s rarely interested in the facts. In fact, I told her about my feelings about the Left just before I wrote this post. And she was silent throughout. It might have been perplexing for her to hear my ideas. I think she considers me a compassionate person, and can’t imagine my rejecting people who refuse to also use reason.
I’ll expand on this just a bit. This “heart-rending decision” is what I mean when I say that to fight the current evil, you must make a stone of your heart. I know I’ve said it around here several times, in both incarnations. Mental clarity flows from moral clarity.
I hear you. You are a stronger person than me as I have difficulty doing the same with my liberal friends. We attend the same church and have in the past shared intense faith experiences so on the one hand I don’t want to ruin the friendship over politics but on the other, don’t want to hear them go on and on as they sometimes do. Fascinating how we are having to make decisions like this!
Really appreciate your OP!
Must I? Can we make it a lump of clay, so that I don’t lose my heart forever? (I’m half serious.)
It is tragic that we have to, isn’t it? Thanks so much for the kind words!