“Anger is the lazy person’s emotion. It’s quick, it’s binary, it’s delicious. And more and more, we’re gorging on it.”
So writes Jeffrey Kluger, an editor for TIME magazine in a 2016 article on why people today are so angry. Have you ever wondered when that happened? When and why did anger become the norm in our society?
Last week, walking into the grocery store, there was a woman in front of me, struggling to get out of her car, which was parked in a handicapped spot. She hoisted her walker out of the back seat and slowly began to cross the lot to the doors of the store. That’s why the shiny new SUV came roaring up, stopping not much more than a couple of feet in front of the woman.
The driver, a relatively young woman with the requisite phone attached to her ear, began making hand motions for the woman to hurry up. As the woman on the walker tried to speed up, the car sped around her with only inches to spare. To add insult to injury, as the car rushed by, the young boy riding along in the car — not much more than eight — gave the struggling woman the proverbial finger. Nice life lesson taught to your child, mom!
Your neighbors had some opinions on where all this angst and anger is originating.
Haley Castellanos, St. John: People feel the loss of control. We worry about paying the mortgage, losing our jobs, getting sick — any number of things we might not have control over. When that kind of pressure builds up, we tend to lash out as a release. Anger over our situations has become our safety value of choice, it seems.
Tom Zale, Munster: I think people get angry often because they’re scared of things spiraling out of control. The violence in our society, which was not seen in most neighborhoods, is now everywhere — airports, schools, shopping malls, concert venues. Unless you build a fort and lock your family in, there’s no such thing as a safe harbor anymore. That makes people angry; it makes me angry.
Adele Malecki, Crown Point: I would point a finger at increasing use of technology. People no longer have social skills and they’ve lost the art of effective communication. When you dash off a thoughtless email or text; when you’d rather have a relationship on Facebook over sitting down with a friend over coffee, it becomes easier to be rude and inconsiderate of the feelings of others. We’re definitely feeling the effects.
Clare Stachon, Miller: We model what we see from our leaders. Public service once was an honorable, self-giving profession. Now we see elected officials whose self-interests come before those of the people. They are more invested in winning the next election than solving the country’s real problems. And, they’ve modeled what it means to be self-righteous right-fighters, who are always angry. This is what our children now witness and will see as an acceptable way to behave.
I started with a quote, so I’ll end with one.
“We are made up of many parts and sides. There are parts of all of us that could be made softer and kinder. We can learn to see the good in each of us that exists and teach our children to do so. Or we can continue to get angry, bully each other, make threats and demands. It is our choice.”
— Goal Auzeen Saedi, Ph.D., April, 2013 Psychology Today.
Debbie Bosak is a freelance columnist for the Post-Tribune.
