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what if we stopped viewing antisemitism as basically a harmless quirk, easily overlooked in people we otherwise want to like?
recently i’ve been learning about some of the cognitive distortions that are often addressed in cognitive-behavioral therapy (although i’m not especially devoted to cbt, personally). one of them that has helped me a lot to recognize is mind-reading.
mind-reading is when you feel sure that you know what another person is thinking or feeling, without solid evidence to support it. now, obviously, a lot of times we make inferences about other people’s thoughts that are more or less accurate and this is useful in life. but it’s also true that in a lot of cases we don’t actually know what people are thinking, and can get it wrong. this is definitely true for me!
i’ve been finding it really helpful to stop and carefully check myself when i notice myself telling myself a story about what someone else is thinking. for instance, if i get a text that’s slightly brusque and think, “they’re mad at me” or maybe “they hate me.” if i sit and think about it, are there other explanations? did they say they were mad at me? perhaps they’re frustrated by the project we’re working on together — hell, i’m frustrated by it too! or maybe i realize their texts usually sound like that and that’s just their personality, or they’re an awkward texter. or maybe there’s something else going on in their life.
notice it’s not that they couldn’t be mad at me — just that i don’t actually know for sure. consciously observing that there are other possibilities that may even be more likely than the one i’m afraid of doesn’t stop my negative thoughts entirely, but it does allow me to approach the situation with an attitude of curiosity rather than doom and gloom and fear. and this in turn helps me see the other person as a more complex whole, and the possibility that they are angry as a potential problem that i can address once i have more information, rather than just something bad that’s happening to me.
this also applies to online interactions, where we often have only someone’s words, and little basis for attributing thoughts or motivations to them beyond those words. i’ve been very guilty of attempting to do so. i’m trying to think twice now. but this is only a suggestion.
in any event, it’s been beneficial for me to try to evaluate my automatic thoughts, asking, “is this accurate? what are the alternatives? how do i know?”
i’ve gotten to where i can actually forget tumblr exists for several days at a time and it’s a beautiful thing. i can’t recommend enough replacing this site with activities that create meaning in your life
worst thing about hdm series is its total lack of commitment to depicting daemons. like what the fuck
gulab jamun: the perfect dessert?
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i can’t believe we as a society let marketers get away with calling something that does not fucking hover a hoverboard
this was hard to read in a book from 1980 (more tales of the city), even if it was in the context of a rich character's rather crass plan to make money by opening a gay nursing home
i have no idea why the site for my favorite pie dough recipe keeps going down, but for the record here it is on the wayback machine
obligatory thanksgiving reblog. this dough is basically foolproof
“Fucking in Rhythm & Sorrow” from Life’s Too Good, 1988
If people, as historical beings necessarily engaged with other people in a movement of inquiry, did not control that movement, it would be (and is) a violation of their humanity. Any situation in which some individuals prevent others from engaging in the process of inquiry is one of violence. The means used are not important; to alienate human beings from their own decision-making is to change them into objects.
— Paulo Freire, Pedagogy of the Oppressed, first published 1968, translated by Myra Bergman Ramos 1970, republished 2000, Ch. 2.
i’ve seen a lot of twitter apologies lately that include the line “i didn’t read the article, just the headline/screenshot” and hey i’m glad people are at least admitting it now, that’s something! but there’s a lesson here for all of us
