Thoughts on Self-Loathing
*Photo by Jon Taylor Photo
Thoughts on Self Loathing
Oh boy…this is a loaded one. Self-Loathing. Outsourcing it to others. To do our loathing for us. To loathe the things in others that we really loathe in ourselves. Nobody is immune. The best we can do is identify it when it comes up, and then try not to act on it.
I’m just as guilty as the next Bette about this one. Beginning with a learned body dysmorphia, paired with hours a week in a leotard and pink (!!) tights in front of full length wall to wall mirrors…the room became a fun house, wherever I looked, no reality to be found, just what my brain would turn my reflection into. I could only see myself in pieces, not as a whole. And I didn’t even have it that bad! Later on, I’ve learned that some of my friends look in the mirror and see an actual, literal monster, of the green dragon variety. Some just see a person who can never be enough, muscular enough, thin enough, pretty enough, etc. When I see these friends, all I can think is what absolutely beautiful people they are…but that’s not what they see. And it doesn’t go away. We learn to manage it, but it’s always there, and it’s so sneaky and unexpected when that dragon comes out of its cave.
Fast forward to adulthood, and dating. Sometimes you meet a couple and wonder why a person stays with someone where they are so clearly not a good match. The snide comments, the under the radar put downs, the obvious mismatched values, the total disrespect of them in public or private. You wonder why they tolerate it. Well friends, as usual, I’ve got a theory. They are outsourcing their self-loathing. There are people who I mistakenly spent my time with, behaviors I tolerated, that today I’d simply respond, “oh I don’t hate myself enough to put up with that!” and walk away. It goes for business too. Some people are not worth the trouble, and they end up on the LTS list. (Life’s too short list.)
I don’t usually talk about politics here, but there is such a good example of outsourced self-loathing, I can’t pass up talking about it. Seeing how people absolutely hated certain public figures, to the point of rageful mania, you wonder how someone who is so removed from their day to day life could inspire such vitriol. I’m thinking particularly about Hillary Clinton four years ago, and about some women I know (Democratic women too!) who just despised Hillary. One in particular I know who suffered from her husband’s infidelity, and stayed in her marriage, like Hillary. And she once thought the world of her too, so this is really interesting to me. She condemns Mrs. Clinton for the Bengazi scandal, where seven Libyans and four Americans died, and of which her personal culpability was cleared by the investigating committee, but doesn’t view our current president culpable in the deaths of over 230,000 Americans (and climbing) for disbanding the pandemic team, knew about how bad it could be it in February, did nothing, leaving us completely unprepared, and refusing to lead America with any kind of regard to science, with seemingly no decency, and with what is becoming clearer each day, his care only for lining his own pocket and inciting violence.
My conjecture is that it’s easier for this woman to hate Hillary Clinton for “other things” than to admit to herself that she did the same thing Hillary did, and this woman hates herself for it. Outsourced self-loathing.
Fine.
But now we have an inspiring VP pick for the Democratic ticket. Kamila Harris. Not perfect, but a decent human being, with values, care for her country, willingness to call out Biden on his issues, and then also willingness to work with him to right the ship. Within the first 24 hours, the attacks already started. Because so much is at stake, I utterly beg on my knees, check your self-loathing. If you don’t like either one of them, figure out what it really is that’s bugging you. I know the things that bug me about Joe Biden. Those things represent something I couldn’t speak up about in the moment when I was younger, but you know what?... I can now. And I do. So I can wrap my brain around voting for an imperfect person who is generally trying to do the right thing, is teachable, and yes, is flawed in ways that I have major problems with, but end of the day, is going to have to work tirelessly to negate the last four years of terror and abuse we’ve been living with. Because in the dystopian world that we are seemingly racing towards, Bulletproof Bette doesn’t exist. She’s in jail, or dead. Merely for daring to exist out loud, and unapologetic. Just like the cabaret community of Berlin in the 1930’s. Make your choice.
