Saturday, March 14, 2009

Trite Misconceptions

Most of the time when I'm at home and not fighting the every day battle on the front lines of urban education, I like to zone out to mind numbing television. It's Saturday morning and I'm lounging on the couch, half way paying attention to my eggs and half way listening to The Real World: Brooklyn. They're having their regular episodic fight about "You're so arrogant! You're a bully! Nobody likes you! Leave me alone!" (Why hasn't this show been canceled yet? It peaked about 10 years ago...) Anyway, the kid comes on the screen in the confessional shot and says, "All functional families fight a lot... it's out of love."

Wow, really? That's interesting. And by interesting I mean stupid.

How many times have we heard a phrase like that. We fight because we love each other. It means we're close and we care. It's how we work things out. Does anyone ever actually think about those words? It's moronic at best.

Functional families fight, but not a lot. And it's not out of love. It's usually out of selfishness and lack of a better way to communicate. So if you're in a family or a relationship where fighting is just the norm, I wouldn't say it's a loving one. I'd say it's a selfish and probably very confused one, and not very functional at all.

And for goodness sake, let's not be the new MTV generation and quit saying stupid trite things without thinking about them. The world will be a better place if we think before we speak.

And there you have it.

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