ChrisBachmann.com

It's been an interesting trip since I first posted the original Choose Civility post in 2008. I've been writing a lot more than before, but not as much as I would like to. I've changed jobs and have been having a blast with that. The commute can be a bit of a pain, but it has it's benefits. P. M. Forni has been on Oprah shilling his hissy fit to a national audience, and we've had 2 public displays of incivility on the national stage in the forms of Rep. Joe Wilson and Kanye West. So given all of that, it's time to take a second look at the issue as well about the opportunity to bitch that my magnet was stolen off my car yesterday.

There's been the other web sites Embrace Hostility and Choose Insanity as well as my own Choose Senility, which I'll probably just merging back with this blog in a different section. And there have been the supporters too many to mention. While I certainly get mentally in sync with the others, I tend to go for a more nuanced critique of the library's campaign rather than an in-your-face approach. That's just how I am. Maybe I'm just civil...?

One of the reasons for this topic revisited is Rep. Joe Wilson of South Carolina. During the joint session of Congress, Rep. Wilson shouted out "You lie!" during the president's speech. Basically, he was acting like a jackass. Then, a few days later, Kanye West stole Taylor Swift's moment to act like a jackass. While Viacom has ordered all of these clips off of YouTube, at least the mashup of the comment to Obama's speech still exists.

I use these to illustrate what Forni and the library folks are talking about and why this will start cropping up in the future.

Now take a look at the 15 of 25 rules that the library has chosen to emphasize. While these on the face of it are very nice and admirable, but it's also clear that it's raised a number of hackles throughout the county and Maryland in general. Take a moment to read the comments to my original post. And that's just those who took time to do a Google search on "Choose Civility", find my post and take the time to write a comment. I've spoken to hundreds of people who talk about bad drivers with the bumper stickers. Hardly civil behavior.

I also remember page 23 of Forni's book where he discusses being on a train with his wife in Italy. There is a group of young people in that car as well. He talks about their rowdy behavior and the excitement they felt to be on that trip. Like a jackass, Forni rained on their parade, rather than engaging them, reveling in their excitement and perhaps enhancing the experience that he and the students were about to embark upon. I don't fault his wanting to have a moment of quiet, but we all have choices in our life. He had a choice to exert his expectations on others or to modify his.

This is the main critique of what I have previously called "Forni's hissy fit". This is not some flailing against some "liberal" "Political Correctness". Those of you who know me know of just how liberal I am and even who I work for in my day job (please don't mention it in the comments, I'm trying to keep a healthy distance between my personal and professional work). And the separation of the quotes above is intentional since they're separate concepts, but often get linked incorrectly in civil discourse.

The problem that I have with Forni's hissy fit is that rather than engaging in a discussion, he is trying to tell us how to behave like the "expert" he is. I know that we all need guidance on behavior from time to time, but it's critical to the human experience to make mistakes.

One of the rules that Forni lists is "Accept and give constructive criticism". This I would consider appropriate in general. Looking at Rep. Wilson's remark concerning illegal aliens being able to get health coverage is ignoring section 246 which is titled "NO FEDERAL PAYMENT FOR UNDOCUMENTED ALIENS" which is followed by "Nothing in this subtitle shall allow Federal payments for affordability credits on behalf of individuals who are not lawfully present in the United States." What it seems is that he and others don't want illegal aliens to even be able to buy health coverage in the exchange. So if we have an outbreak of swine flu, they should just die and/or spread it to others who might not have health coverage? That's not constructive criticism, that's being a jackass.

Kanye's stunt is also instructive in the civility sphere. Interrupting a country singer to show support for an R&B singer is certainly not "respecting other's time and space" nor "[being] inclusive" or even "[being] a considerate guest". It's clear to be that since his expectations were not met at the VMAs, he resorted to being a jackass and ruining Taylor Swift's moment in the spotlight. It's akin to Forni's experience on the train in Italy and it's rowdy students. They were both impressing their expectations upon others rather than truly accepting the situation for what it was and becoming a positive part of it.

It's evident that the library expects these car magnets to spread the idea of civility, but what is the actual effect? It seems to be creating an in group and an out group. Those who believe in "civility" and those who want to go about living their lives. They are just about to have Choose Civility Week and have an entire symposium to the topic. It's preaching to the choir for the most part, but where is the public engagement? If I wasn't looking for it, I don't think I would know about it. So I guess that makes me part of the out group.

What does it say to others when we slap a magnet to our cars and drive around town? What happens when that expression of civility conflicts with our human tendencies behind the wheel of an automobile? What happens when we take an expression of an idea, turn it into an expectation, and it's not met? It coarsens dialogue and civic discourse. It prevents an honest discussion between neighbors. It makes people feel like outcasts to society as a whole. How uncivil.