People Can Stop Repeating The Familiar

My last blog post expressed my confusion about the personality types who were involved in the Capitol riots. Since then, I’ve heard several people express similar confusion. As I listened to them, I remembered something my counselor told me about people of similar personality who were/are in my life: It’s good that I don’t understand them, because if I understood them, I’d be like them. Just because we can’t, and maybe shouldn’t, understand some people doesn’t mean we can’t increase our understanding of ways to protect ourselves from them. Since the Capitol riots, law enforcement has determined that some of the people involved belong to radical groups. Some people from my past are part of those radical groups. Some of them have stormed my house in ways that were similar to the Capitol riots on a much smaller scale. A victim of that type of behavior shouldn’t be expected to accept it any more than our country should be expected to accept what happened at the Capitol. Actions have, and should have, consequences. Some of my pastor friends preached about the Capitol riots. From a faith perspective, they reminded their congregations to love the rioters. I understand why they preached that. The reminder is needed. It’s difficult to love people who exposed us to years of hate propaganda that divided our country and fueled the riots. I agree that we need to love them, but how do we love them and keep ourselves safe at the same time? Does loving the rioters mean that Mike Pence should associate with people who marched down the hallways of his workplace expressing a desire to hang him? Does it mean that Nancy Pelosi should risk her safety by personally trying to de-radicalize their thinking? Does it mean I should have the people who stormed my house over for dinner? Does it mean you should put yourself in contact with people who harmed you in whatever way you were harmed? I don’t think so. Experience has taught me that loving someone who has harmed me means not retaliating, keeping in mind that seeking justice is not a form of retaliation. If a person is harmful to the people in an organization you’re involved with, it is your responsibility to inform leadership; however, it is retaliation to gossip to members of that organization who don’t have the power to make a positive change. If a person has committed a crime that you witnessed, it is your responsibility to testify in court to make your community safer; however, it is retaliation to gloat if they get convicted. If someone is harming themselves, it is your responsibility to talk to them about it; however, it is retaliation to try to hasten their demise. Love can be expressed by praying for and speaking kindly about a person even when seeking justice; however, it doesn’t necessarily mean reconciliation. I know it isn’t always easy to return love, even from a distance, with people who easily express hatred; however, I’ve learned from experience that’s the only thing that works. The situations that led to the Capitol riots mirror experiences I’ve had with radicalized and toxic people. As an example, when Mike Pence displeased a person who was skilled at misleading and splitting people, he immediately went from being accepted to being in danger. This is a common dynamic among radicalized and toxic people who see anyone who doesn’t agree with them as a threat. Since I have radicalized religious people in my past, I’ve witnessed and experienced this dynamic. Unfortunately, people often repeat the familiar until they heal, and I was not an exception to that rule. There were many times I accepted environments I should have rejected and quickly ended up in a situation similar to Mike Pence's riot danger. Before I began working on healing, I tried to resolve mob mentality situations by talking to people. When facts and common sense were rejected, I wrote letters. It was as effective as trying to help a conspiracy theorist accept facts – and it often ended with a mass violation of personal boundaries and/or personal space in a manner similar to conspiracy theorists storming the Capitol. It’s better to accept when a person or group is radicalized or toxic and walk away. That’s what I do now, and that one thing has healed my life more than anything else I’ve done. In the radicalized and toxic environments of my past, I witnessed mob mentality happen to other people. In one situation, it happened to a co-worker who shared a toxic social environment with me. When I saw how deeply the situation was effecting him at work, I offered support. We met once a week for dinner, so I could be a sounding board and safe person for him. That allowed me to understand the big picture and fairly evaluate the things those who had surrendered to mob mentality were saying about him.

The mob mentality gossip had started due to a conflict between him and his ex-lover. The gossip painted him as a monster and her as a saint. In our conversations, he was honest about the mistakes he’d made. He understood how their mutual mistakes had led to the break-up. Seeing that clearly gave him a desire to clear his name. When no one would listen to his words, he began to write letters. People ridiculed his letters, but I understood why he’d written them. Similar exasperating situations had led others and me to comparable desperate attempts for resolution and closure.

After I understood the big picture, I tried to advocate for him and quell the gossip. My attempts taught me that gossip from the ex-lover was accepted, because the environment thrived on it. His attempts to resolve the gossip were perceived negatively, because facing what needed to be faced to bring healing was perceived as a threat.

During one of our last weekly dinners, he told me he was afraid he was going to have a heart attack because of the stress the mob mentality was causing him. Sadly, he was correct. At his funeral, I diplomatically expressed my feelings about being loyal to friends and not allowing gossip to erase everything we knew about them from our own experiences. I expected to become the next victim of mob mentality for saying that. Instead, people who had victimized him thanked me for what I said.

A counselor once told me that people usually don’t reject radicalized or toxic environments unless something happens to make them feel the harm they’re causing. That’s what happened to me. I got sick and learned that my needs couldn’t be met in my environments, so my body’s limitations forced me into better environments and a better life. Death seems to be one of the things that makes people feel the harm they’ve caused. After someone dies, people often remember them in a kinder way. Although my friend will never know this, in death he’s remembered as he really was instead of how mob mentality rumors convinced people he was. I wish he could have received that love and acceptance again in life.

Watching his experience revealed that victims of mob mentality are often shamed into doubting how they see what’s happening to them, which my counselor tells me is a form of gaslighting. As horrible as it was to watch him suffer, it was healing for me to witness it separate from that shame. I recognized the truths of the situation, and that accelerated my healing. Healing was still a process that took some time, as it usually is for most people, but the understanding that came from witnessing rather than experiencing accelerated my healing process.

The Capitol riots, as horrible as it was, is also accelerating my healing process. I long ago recognized the role people from my religious past, many of whom became part of President Trump’s base, played in spreading conspiracy theories and the agenda behind them. That knowledge led me to share facts and logic to try to stop the propaganda .I was often shamed and/or ridiculed for my attempts. Witnessing how most people in the United States are responding to the riots is allowing me to admit what I have long seen without being shamed. That gives me clearer vision, which allows me to see that I had been right to try to address what I saw.

Clearer vision is allowing me to see that I gave too many people too many chances. If someone is spreading radical propaganda and conspiracy theories, I don’t owe them anything if they don’t listen the first time I talk to them. As long as I remain civil, I'm allowed to have my voice. I don’t have to walk on eggshells to keep a radicalized or toxic person from triggering on me on a regular basis. I don’t have to accept the shame they expect me to feel for not agreeing with them. Since the Capitol riots, I’ve ended friendships with several people who I’ve long found intolerable due to how much their radical message consumes them -- and by extension consumes me. I can’t help them. If they step over the line far enough to face consequences for their actions like the people who were arrested after the Capitol riots, maybe that will help them recognize the problem behaviors they need to address. Like I said earlier in this post, until something happens to make them feel the harm they're causing, it’s unlikely anyone can help them.

Often, radicalized and toxic people and environments existed in that state long before you knew them and will exist in that state long after you’re gone. It’s doubtful there is anything you can do to change the way they see things. It’s okay to walk away, and the sooner the better. Consider the Serenity Prayer – ‘have the wisdom to accept the things you cannot change’ and move on with loving intentions to a place where you can be safe, happy, and at peace.