Outrage Overload

I love the Internet, really I do.  As a teacher, I have tried to embrace its usefulness in enhancing my students' learning experience.  I participate myself in social media such as Facebook and Pinterest.  I use the Internet daily as a resource to learn more about the world around me.  I am able to connect with old friends, former students, family, and friends in mostly positive ways.

I hate the Internet too.  It has, in my opinion, created what I call a "culture of outrage".  Because we have access to news stories from around the world, we see and hear about events that we never would have learned about even five years ago.  Small town news stories come across our news feeds, and then suddenly the story goes viral.  In fact, I think it's quite appropriate that the adjective applied to an Internet story spreading quickly is "viral".  Because the outrage created by some of these viral stories is like a disease.

Take, for example the recent story about the Miles Ambridge class photo.  If you haven't heard this story, you can read about it here: Miles Ambridge Class Photo.  The second grade class at this Canadian elementary school had its group photo taken, but the problem was that one of the students, who was in a wheelchair was "excluded" from the photo because he was off to the side.  In the photo, the young boy was leaning to his right, straining to be closer to his classmates.

This story has come up several times on my Facebook news feed, and to summarize a lot of the reaction, you'd think that the photographer was the leader of an anti-wheelchair hate group.  I may be exaggerating just a little bit, but the indignation the photograph created seems excessive.   Please don't get me wrong, I believe people should be treated fairly and that intentional exclusion because of a handicap or other characteristic should never happen. 

But I just don't think that this was intentional.  And I don't think that the photographer and the school should be vilified because of something that was inadvertent.  People make mistakes.  Sometimes things like this just happen.  When we're in a hurry, or on a schedule, or for whatever reason, sometimes we just don't think and we take the quickest route to accomplish a task.  It's unthinking but it's not always intentional. 

I don't think there's anyone out there who hasn't done something similar for a similar reason.  We've made a poor choice, not because we are mean people, but because we are in a hurry or it just doesn't come to our minds.  Sometimes those actions can hurt others' feelings.  Sometimes they don't.  The end result is almost always "What was I thinking?"  If it is something that hurt another person, then you step up and try to make it right. 

I have a 10 year old nephew.  A couple years ago, when the last Harry Potter film came out in theaters, he spent the night at my house, we watched the 6th movie, and then the first part of the 7th.  We made special treats (mint chocolate chip brownie ice cream sandwiches).  Then the next day we went to the theater to see the last film.  It was great, and we decided we'd do it again.  Last summer we did it with the Men in Black movies.   It was a sort of special thing, just me and him together doing something with "just us."

A couple weeks ago, I was with him, his sister, my mom, and my sister at Orange Leaf.  I asked him if he wanted to see the new Despicable Me movie, and both he and his sister responded quite enthusiastically.  Without thinking I suggested that we do our special spend-the-night-at-my-house thing, and his sister responded enthusiastically, but he didn't.  In fact, the look on his face was a little disappointed.  Oops.  Later on I talked to him by himself and asked him if he was disappointed, and he was.  Fortunately, we were able to have our special night this past week, and when Despicable Me 2 comes out, the 3 of us will have our fun treat and movie night-to-day. 

The thing is, just because something like this happens doesn't mean that outrage is warranted.   The school responded with retaking the picture.  It took responsibility for the mistake and took steps to make it right.  If the school had not responded or responded insensitively, then maybe outrage would be warranted.  But is MY outrage necessary?  Does this directly affect me?   What good am I really doing in this particular situation?  Is there something in my own community that deserves my outrage?  I live in Indiana...what does a photograph of a second grade class in Canada have to do with my community?   I would be better off turning my eyes to my own community and directing my energies to righting the wrongs here.

Seriously, outrage should be reserved for what is truly outrageous.  Intentional, detrimentally hurtful actions.  Outrage is exhausting, and taking a moment to think about what outrages you allows you to perhaps truly affect something significant.