A couple of things have really started to bother me lately, and they're sort of related, but not really. I'll start with the word deal and work into the current event deal, since I think the segue will be easier.
I am growing very very tired of hearing the word "naive". I'm hearing it a lot lately, whether it be in television shows, books, or on the radio, usually in the form "Are you really that naive?" or some variation on the pronoun. (Or alternately, "You really are so naive.")
What bothers me about it is that in almost every case it's used to put down someone who could also be lauded for their unwavering idealism, instead implying that the person is completely without any experience in the way anything works at all. It's not really that the word is insulting, to me. It's that the insult is so easy, so unreliant on any sort of basis or proof. All a person has to do is call another naive, and that stigma automatically carries and disrupts any respect or authority they previously had.
I mean, why insult someone for thinking the world should work a certain way? I was taught not to accept if the world told me it operated differently than it should. "If you don't like the solution, change the problem", or if that's not the way things work, make it work that way. I find idealism admirable, respectable, because in reality it takes one hell of a load of guts to hold onto ideals when everyone else is telling you how childish you are for holding onto them.
What made this occur to me was when I was listening to the radio last week—Michael Savage, I think, since that was the station playing when I started the car—and he made the comment "....does President Obama think [something something something], or is he really that naive?", and I got aggravated.
Now. I'm Republican. Or at least that's who I identify with, though heck if I support them sometimes. Point is, something in me doesn't sit well with our current president. BUT.
I don't outright hate the man.
And I understand that when a Democrat is in office, the right-wing media is going to lay into him like a rolled newspaper to a dog that just crapped on the sofa. And when a Republican is in office, they'll simmer down and the left-wing will have their go.
But I get really tired really quick of all the time saying this president is incompetent or that president hates the previous administration THIS MUCH that he's willing to do such and such just to prove he's not the same as the previous administration. Because, really, the President does have supreme executive power and all, but he's also, and make note of this,
A FIGUREHEAD.
So while he's in office as president, he's also having to play to his party, who got him their and who funds stuff and so on. So I don't think it's always the current president who dislikes the previous administration that much, but the current administration who dislikes the previous that much. Or in this case, like usual, one party saying Ha Ha, we're in power now and we'll undo all of your stuff so neener neener wait eight years because we've got charisma on our side this time.
Or whatever on their side this time. Because, again, I don't want to come off like I'm bashing the liberals or the democrats or whoever gets bashed since Obama is in office now. I mean, old George Junior made some bonehead calls in his tenure, too. (BONEHEAD, man. I mean, golly.) I didn't remark on it then because I didn't care. I only remark on things now because I've been conscious of the political . . . well, politickings for several years now, and just get tired of the same old crap all the time. I mean, no wonder people don't vote when they hear what each side says about the other just because they're the other side.
(Although I still think that's a very tantrumy way to get out of voting. I mean, you don't vote and you by proxy agree with whichever side wins. Doesn't mean you get to complain, means you get even LESS right to complain since you didn't at least try to make something happen, 'one vote against several billion" argument or not.)
Blah blah blah ramble ramble stuff.
