Every day I must ride by the abortion clinic. And every day I see these religious folk standing outside of it on the street holding banners and chanting prayers or reading sections from the bible.
Now I’m not a religious man, nor am I a non-believer. I’m just drifting along in life, and what happens happens. I have no problems with religious people, I have friends one extreme ends of the spectrum, and at all points in between. I am generally able to find the good in all people.
BUT I have an extreme dislike for these people for trying to control other peoples lives. For trying to guilt trip young women. I think that they need to mind their own business, it’s not like a woman is happy to go to the abortion clinic, the last thing she needs is a group of religious folks judging her at the gate.
I don’t care what your stance is on abortion, you can have whatever opinions you like. But I posted this because every day I ride by them, and it just boils me up inside. I get so angry at them, and I don’t get angry about anything, truly. Today as I rode by them they said “Wow that is so cool”… it absolutely ruined my day that these people that I have such an extreme dislike for, actually LIKED me, and thought that I was “cool”. It is one of the weirdest emotions I have ever experienced, being angry that someone liked me when I didn’t like them. I don’t know how to explain it.
And they’re there ALL DAY EVERY DAY. Do they not have jobs?! Go contribute something to society you losers!!
This is not a post to discuss your view on abortion. This is just me venting, and see if anyone else has experienced something similar to this. It is so strange, it’s still effecting me now, almost 10 hours later.
Hmm Dane, can you really separate the two…I mean those people are standing there because of the abortion clinic.
You can’t really divorce abortion from the discussion because their view on abortion is the cause of them ‘picketing’
I’m not religious either BUT they are probably there because they feel someone needs to speak up for the baby being aborted, not because they want to control the carrier.Its a subtle difference, but perhaps looking at it that way will humanize them a bit?
PS: I agree that some of the religious typed from America you see on TV are very disturbing!
I should have specified better, I was ranting about them yes. But the topic is really about the feeling that I got. I understand my dislike for them, but when I heard those words it just stripped away all good feelings and replaced them with anger. I don’t understand how my emotions could take such a massive u-turn with a simple (positive) comment like that. It’s very confusing. Part of keeping my mental status in a good place is looking for the reasons and causes why my emotions do this.
I’m hoping that someone will share a similar story in relation to that emotion, because I am looking for answers.
PS: I don’t even watch TV anymore. I can’t even stand the news, “entertainment news” as I call it. I just listen to public radio
I’ve had the opposite happen, I was riding around town at night and there were some drunken out-of-towners/typical scumbag types coming down the road next to me, bottles in hand. I instantly judged these guys based on their condition and how they looked (so ironic for me to do this, I’m a juggler/unicyclist in a smaaaall rural town with “long” hair, I definately stick out), I anticipated these guys shouting and/or bottling me but instead one of them shouted in his Dublin accent “That’s class!” then the group proceeded to cheer as we passed eachother
Suppose that was a bit tangential - but it’s of the same nature IMO.
In order to be angry at someone for their opinion, isn’t it necessary to respect their opinion or think it has some validity? If some clown insults you for riding your unicycle, and you feel their insult is without merit and unicycling is the coolest thing around, then what basis do you have for being angry at them? Their opinion has no merit in your eyes, so why get bothered over it?
Now I realize your situation is sort of the opposite case, where somebody agrees with your opinion, but isn’t the same principle at work here as well? You have to respect them and their beliefs in order to be angry at them. If you don’t respect them (and you obviously don’t), what does it matter what they think of you?
Good points. I think it was that I wanted to dislike them so much that I couldn’t accept that they would have something in common with me (liking of unicycling) Maybe the emotion is more anger at myself?
I appreciate that you are honest with yourself Dane. Perhaps it is good that you started the thread so that you could examine why you want to dislike them. Whether religious or not there is in most of us a clear sense of right/wrong or good/bad. But our upbringing, training, experiences, and personality all play into the details. And over time we often change some of those details, primarily by self examination. Separating the person from the action is a good way to approach people. Not that I am that great at it, I have nevertheless found it to be very beneficial.
Scott is right, this is probably for the Just Conversation forum. But since it is here it is kind of fun to get philosophical once in a while.
Living in Utah it is interesting to see some of the people picketing at the LDS Church (Mormon) General Conference each April and October. A few years back I was working as a volunteer helping with traffic and pedestrian control. There are 20,000+ people that attend each Conference Session (there are 3 Sessions on Saturday and 2 on Sunday), so there is a lot of road and foot traffic. There are numerous groups of protestors holding signs, chanting phrases, yelling taunts at the attendees, and generally making a ruckus. I was next to one such group of 4 men all day on Saturday. It was shocking the things they said to the people. At the end of the Saturday evening session my shift was over and the crowds had thinned out. As the last of the picketer’s in the group near me was packing up his sign I struck up a conversation. He turned out to be a pretty nice guy in a one-on-one conversation.
I have no idea what possessed him to stand all day with a big heavy sign, making taunts and jeers, and putting a book of scripture that I and all the Conference attendees hold sacred under his foot. It was a lot of work! But he had as much right to be there as anyone else and as long as he did not break the law he had the right to voice his opinions and seek to influence people. So I really never got angry even though he was directly opposing and attacking the things I hold dear. As he left we had a quick chat and parted with a handshake. It took some restraint on my part not to say a few things, but I am glad I did not. Even though what he was doing seemed quite wrong to me I was able to keep him as a person and his actions separate enough that I harbored no anger, bad feelings, nor ill will.
Don’t know if any of this helps. But again, I think it is cool that you are examining your own feeling and motivations. That can be a hard thing to do in an open forum. Tying it back to Unicycling (questonably! :))…it does not seem that odd because most of that ride unicycles are pretty extroverted; and there will definitely be plenty of opinions as most of us are not shy about sharing them! Thanks for posting.
Thanks for sharing you story NSYO, if I were in that situation I would be afraid that I might not be able to control myself. I can take a lot of crap and deal with things I don’t like pretty well, most of the time. But it is almost like a dam, where it can hold a lot of water just fine until the water hits the very top, and then it starts to overflow.
As much as I like to think that I don’t make assumptions about people based on their appearance, I still do it, as everyone does. The mind likes to organize things and group them together to make things simpler, and my mind likes to take all these people and clump them together in one section of judgement.
As for the unicycling bit:
I have decided upon a different (longer) route to take for the time being, and I hope that in time I will get used to this new route and forget why I am avoiding that section of street. Because if I am consciously trying to ignore it, then it makes me think about it, which is no better than riding by them!
Maybe when I figure out my issue with them exercising their legal rights, I will approach one and attempt a civil conversation to understand their mentality.
Why do you ride that silly thing down the street? Why not do it indoors and mind your own business? Shame on you for reminding people of the skills you possess that they don’t believe they ever could.
If it’s any help, note that they didn’t like you, any more than you dislike them. They like “that”, which is what you’re doing. All you know about them is the cause they stand for, and possibly that they spend every day protesting it. They might be nice people otherwise…
Thanks for posting.