The trouble with the world today…
There’s an old Mandy Patinkin song that starts something like this: “The trouble with the world today, it seems to me, is coffee in a cardboard cup.” I am thinking that nothing about coffee could ever be bad, right?!?! But I had an aha moment just now (I’m a little slow, so it took me a while to get there). I have decided that the trouble with the world today is not coffee in a cardboard cup. The trouble with the world today is that being right has become more important than being kind.
Arguing has become more important than caring. Condemning has become more important than understanding. Principles have become more important than people.
Some are willing to engage in viscous arguments over statues… statues that no one had mentioned or cared about for years, but suddenly they’re extremely offensive and suddenly they’re extremely important to our history. For the record, I care about people, not statues, and I’m willing to listen, but only if the argument is stated peacefully and by open-minded people willing to consider both sides.
The trouble with the world today is that some people are ready to pounce. Sometimes they just want to get their 15 seconds of fame. Sometimes they are so angry about something else, they just react without thinking and then they’re too stubborn to back down. Recently, feminists are outraged because a football player expressed that he was surprised about a female reporter knowing so much about the game. (He wasn’t rude or ugly, he was reacting in the moment with an honest response. I’d imagine it is very unusual to hear females ask such technical questions.) Females don’t play in the NFL, so it’s not extraordinary to expect that many don’t take interest in or understand the specifics, at least not on a deeper, more technical level. I suspect if that reporter’s boyfriend or brother had made the same comment that Cam Newton made, she’d have punched them in the arm and laughed it off, maybe even taking it as a compliment, feeling pride that she’d impressed them with her knowledge… the way I did twenty years ago when my husband told me I drove a stick surprisingly well for a girl. As much as I believe in equal rights for all sexes, men and women are different! It’s a fact! It doesn’t mean one sex is better than the other. We need to stop turning every innocent comment into an opportunity to protest.
The trouble with the world today is that many people are hypersensitive. They are so hell bent on being treated as equals that they are not treating others as equals. They keep thinking they have to push everyone else down in order to raise themselves up! It’s time to stop being so SENSITIVE, but it’s also time to stop being so INSENSITIVE.
Let’s address the situation of bad people, not bad races, religions, sexes, etc. We need to stop looking at people as classes or groups. There are good and bad people of every color, race, creed, sex and sexual preference!!! There are good and bad teachers, police officers, politicians, and used car salesmen.
The trouble with the world today, is a lack of acceptance. It’s a lack of religious values or what stems from religious values. It’s a lack of love. In the words of Dionne Warwick, “What the world needs now, is love, sweet love. It’s the only thing, that there’s just to little of…” Yep, the world needs more love… and more coffee.
