Victimhood and Retaliation

Today's nugget of insight is brought to you by "Dear White People", a series that would be considered incredibly offensive if the word "White" in the title was replaced with anything else.

As I mentioned before, I used to struggle with the temptation of seeing myself as a perpetual victim of everything wrong with my life. Sometimes, it revisits me when I'm at a weak point. But I refuse to allow myself to succumb to that kind of mindset and start actively waiting for change in my life. I shall take action instead. But unfortunately, that puts me in the minority.

When you're a victim, the first thing you need to do is absolve yourself of any responsibility for anything wrong with your life. In my case, the excuses would sound something like:

"It's not my fault I accidentally upset you. I have Asperger's Syndrome."

"It's not my fault I didn't get the position. A white person took it from me."

"It's not my fault I can't get a job. The economy sucks."

Once you've removed your own legitimacy from the equation, your next step is to broadcast yourself. For most victims, this takes the form of complaining about how much your life sucks, lots and lots of complaining. Because if you complain loud enough and long enough; eventually, someone will step down from on high and offer the prize all victims live upon. That prize is compensation. Someone takes pity on you and your poor, pathetic life and offers you a way to get out of it without you having to do a thing for yourself other than look miserable.

Does this sound familiar? It should. It's the same lifestyle that homeless people are forced to live every day. But they don't have a choice. Victims choose to demean themselves to get what they feel they're deserved. But as bad as this already is, there's an even worse alternative. And that is retribution.

Some victims aren't content with simply demanding compensation for their lives and they go on the offensive as well. It is here where the darker side of this mentality rears it head.

Going back to my earlier mention of "Dear White People," the main inspiration for this little post came from a clip that I'll showcase below. Both because the stance it takes of "Black people can't be racist" spawns a great deal of my remaining talking points and because I don't want you to have to take my word for it.

For starters, the statement here doesn't fit the dictionary definition of racism. The dictionary definition of racism is that you feel superior to someone else based on your race, and so you antagonize them for it. It doesn't have anything to do with power. Secondly, it fails to cover the "rules" for minorities being racist towards other minorities. Neither a African-American person nor an Asian person possesses the necessary "power" to qualify for their definition yet both are equally capable of being antagonistic towards each other or even their own race. Thirdly, it basically claims that because black people can't be racist, then any negative actions they take towards white people are perfectly acceptable because they lack the necessary "power" to be as offensive as the other way around.

What does this have to do with a victim mentality? Plenty. Once you remove responsibility from yourself to improve your life and identify an adequate scapegoat to blame all of your problems upon, then you can attack it with impunity. Since you're the "helpless victim" and they're the "oppressor", any sort of negative action taken against them is now considered "retribution for everything they've done to you." It's the same kind of rhetoric used for when abuse victims and bully victims finally snap and strike back, regardless if the retribution exceeds the initial conflict. It isn't only justified, it's outright encouraged.

So what do we do?

First, realize that blaming other people for your problems won't actually make them go away. Secondly, take responsibility for your own life and start working to improve it. Thirdly, turn your blames into blessings. Instead of pushing people down, try and help lift them up instead. You can help better your own life by helping others better theirs.