1. PRINCIPLE: KILL THEM WITH KINDNESS.
When I take the Values-In-Action Character Strengths Inventory test, I discover that Kindness is fourth on the list of strengths I exercise most effortlessly, right after Forgiveness, Creativity and my most-utilized strength, Appreciation of Beauty & Excellence. How far I have come from those days I used to scream from the rafters in my writing, thinking the least of Kindness in the heat of my "cranky wingnut" rantings about the violence that is our cultural dominion. But so long as I could convince myself that indulging my spirit for revenge was activism enough, I was doing no better than haunting old halls; my protests never left the paper. But I went back to nature, this time sober, and it revealed to me some moral high ground. It reminded me of one of the most powerful forces at play in this world: the power of faith. That's why, in this report on "Killing Them with Kindness," I was so struck by these words: "When you lead with kindness, you're more likely to be seen as the sympathetic character in the story. You've come in good faith. You're trying to make things better." Because if nothing else allies people in this life, sympathy certainly does; if second chances are reductive, faith is the stuff that really believes we can do better. There is a time and a place for anger (see Anger Works Best When You Have the Moral High Ground), I might even say we can't get to the kind of kindness we need without it, but I am learning to believe in people - hell, institutions, even - the way I believe in trees. We have to meet people with the faith that they have the capacity for hearing us, and such a notion insists we have our message straight and our audience before us. It is a fact it costs one nothing to be kind. Ill will, on the other hand? That shit gets expensive.
2. TACTIC: INVISIBLE THEATER.
I've always been drawn to this idea of Invisible Theater, perhaps even before I had even known it was a thing at all, but I wouldn't know the first thing about rehearsing for it, let alone writing the material that'd work. Where the article offers that extensive rehearsals must be had before "performing" these pieces of invisible theater in public, I might argue that some of that rehearsal process does in fact need to happen in public, at new and different locations, by processes of praxis, learning more about the conversation and its position in the world with each attempt, before it can really be as effective as the article suggests. I would like to experience myself how Invisible Theater could put a person's well-being in danger by a means that justify the ends. Any cases of "staged" transphobia, or such incidents rehearsed to frame the violence that trans women of color face, at the very bottom of the totem pole, every day, simply as a fact of their existence in public? I'd be interested to know how many Invisible Theater pieces I've seen or overheard myself without knowing. Then, how effective can they be if there will not be a conversation subsequent? Can Invisible Theater shake hands with Legislative Theater ever if at all?
When I take the Values-In-Action Character Strengths Inventory test, I discover that Kindness is fourth on the list of strengths I exercise most effortlessly, right after Forgiveness, Creativity and my most-utilized strength, Appreciation of Beauty & Excellence. How far I have come from those days I used to scream from the rafters in my writing, thinking the least of Kindness in the heat of my "cranky wingnut" rantings about the violence that is our cultural dominion. But so long as I could convince myself that indulging my spirit for revenge was activism enough, I was doing no better than haunting old halls; my protests never left the paper. But I went back to nature, this time sober, and it revealed to me some moral high ground. It reminded me of one of the most powerful forces at play in this world: the power of faith. That's why, in this report on "Killing Them with Kindness," I was so struck by these words: "When you lead with kindness, you're more likely to be seen as the sympathetic character in the story. You've come in good faith. You're trying to make things better." Because if nothing else allies people in this life, sympathy certainly does; if second chances are reductive, faith is the stuff that really believes we can do better. There is a time and a place for anger (see Anger Works Best When You Have the Moral High Ground), I might even say we can't get to the kind of kindness we need without it, but I am learning to believe in people - hell, institutions, even - the way I believe in trees. We have to meet people with the faith that they have the capacity for hearing us, and such a notion insists we have our message straight and our audience before us. It is a fact it costs one nothing to be kind. Ill will, on the other hand? That shit gets expensive.
2. TACTIC: INVISIBLE THEATER.
I've always been drawn to this idea of Invisible Theater, perhaps even before I had even known it was a thing at all, but I wouldn't know the first thing about rehearsing for it, let alone writing the material that'd work. Where the article offers that extensive rehearsals must be had before "performing" these pieces of invisible theater in public, I might argue that some of that rehearsal process does in fact need to happen in public, at new and different locations, by processes of praxis, learning more about the conversation and its position in the world with each attempt, before it can really be as effective as the article suggests. I would like to experience myself how Invisible Theater could put a person's well-being in danger by a means that justify the ends. Any cases of "staged" transphobia, or such incidents rehearsed to frame the violence that trans women of color face, at the very bottom of the totem pole, every day, simply as a fact of their existence in public? I'd be interested to know how many Invisible Theater pieces I've seen or overheard myself without knowing. Then, how effective can they be if there will not be a conversation subsequent? Can Invisible Theater shake hands with Legislative Theater ever if at all?
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