Tell me if this sounds familiar?
Out of nowhere you are called “aggressive” and it knocks you out for days. Someone says they are “disappointed in you” because your opinion doesn’t agree with theirs. It affects you more than it should. While you want to give everyone the benefit of the doubt, sometimes it really feels as if people are taking advantage of your goodwill to avoid taking responsibility.
While we may see idealised images of Martin Luther King speaking to crowds, or the still quiet strength of Rosa Parks looking out a bus window, we are wrong to imagine that changing your world doesn’t come with a huge cost to one’s emotional well being.
People don’t like conflict. More often than not, changing our world means you have to come into conflict with somebody. It might be someone in the family who is uncomfortable with us posting about the problem on Facebook, or might be a CEO of a huge company who refuses to see how their organization is directly hurting people.
People don’t like conflict, and they will do anything to avoid seeing themselves as part of the problem. So to avoid this, more often than not, they will attack you in order to get you to back off.
Because a personal attack will do more than engaging with the issues at hand.
People who just want equality don’t like to be called aggressive. Chances are they have been victims of aggression.
Nobody wants to be a disappointment, particularly when you are doing the best you can.
If someone calls you up on being out of line, you’ll feel so guilty for failing it will silence you.
Yes, there are still big laws and structural inequalities which need to be tackled to make the world the best it can be.
BUT
MORE OFTEN THAN NOT PEOPLE WILL USE EMOTIONAL BLACKMAIL AND PERSONAL ATTACK TO SHUT DOWN DISCUSSION.
In order to see injustice people must have open hearts, and open hearts can be wounded quickly with the right combination of attack and gaslighting behaviour. That puts you in the middle of some real heartbreak and, perhaps more crucially, makes it so that you’ll think twice before raising your voice again.
It was only by seeing how people used emotional blackmail again and again to keep me down [to the point of severe depression] that I began to have a personal and heart lead understanding of the real motors that keep oppression and inequality going.
There are many sites, books, and forums that will go on about what change needs to happen, and a few less about HOW that change can happen.
This site is dedicated to the truth that YOU are the change that WILL happen and as such, we must protect you from the inevitable slings and arrows that have to be endured along the way.
Have you been attacked and are trying to pick up the pieces after raising your voice. Head over to the free side of our site, The Fallout Shelter, and gather some support.
Ready to get back to it and change your world [or help someone else change theirs]? Check out our subscription section or apply for a scholarship.