![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
unspeakablehorrorI think there's a tendency to do one of two politically harmful things: one of which is to mistake self-punishment for politically restorative action, another is to mistake an active choice to remain politically ignorant for avoiding the former.
I think it is important to avoid both of these tendencies. We must guard against the tendency to criticize ourselves merely for the sake of criticism, as if our guilt alone somehow cleanses us of culpability. We must guard against the attempt to expose ourselves to the negative merely for the sake of it, but also against the tendency to avoid the negative and the unpleasant because we assume political futility; because we assume there is no value in knowledge that may be difficult or upsetting for us to confront. Because there is value in that knowledge--confronting that knowledge is the first necessary step to the actions that can heal our world.
I think it is important to avoid both of these tendencies. We must guard against the tendency to criticize ourselves merely for the sake of criticism, as if our guilt alone somehow cleanses us of culpability. We must guard against the attempt to expose ourselves to the negative merely for the sake of it, but also against the tendency to avoid the negative and the unpleasant because we assume political futility; because we assume there is no value in knowledge that may be difficult or upsetting for us to confront. Because there is value in that knowledge--confronting that knowledge is the first necessary step to the actions that can heal our world.