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Anger (thelemmy.club)
submitted 1 month ago by to c/tumblr@lemmy.world
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[–] 6 points 1 month ago (2 children)

You are conflating the pain of loss with the emotion of anger.

If you have an ounce of humanity, sympathizing with this person should be automatic. They have every right to be furious and there can be no resolution until the underlying material conflict has been resolved. That is the purpose of that emotion, to drive behavior towards affecting change.

The approach/philosophy you are approaching this from is useful for when the brain gets "stuck" after the underlying conflict has been resolved or when someone is hallucinating blame to deal with the pain of loss. There is no possible interpretation where either of those is the case. The situation has been logically analyzed and the emotion has been checked.

If you have an ounce of empathy you should be mad as well. You have been informed of the situation. You are aware of the pain they are experiencing. You understand that without change this can/will happen to you. Why aren't you angry?

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  • [–] 1 point 1 month ago (1 child)

    I believe you and I are on the same page really. I do empathize, and yes, I do get angry (and I agree that anger is a necessary emotion at times), but I have to ask myself, is there something concrete I can accomplish or work toward? If so, I get to work. And if not, then I try to move on. I focus on what I can change instead of risking my own mental health focusing on things I cannot.

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  • [–] 2 points 1 month ago

    I don't think we are, but it depends on what do you mean by "move on"?

    It is almost always used to encourage very deliberate, self-destructive, disassociation. That will wreck your mental health and you will have trained yourself to not realize it. Your feelings are valid, suppressing them and ignoring the problem won't make either go away.

    If you are someone with an obsessive or single-minded kind of personality then that can be good advice. Obsessing over something you cannot change will wreck your mental health. However, assuming that's true of enough people that this is good general advice is insulting and damaging. It is also conflating obsessive tendencies with a specific emotion.

    It is valid and necessary to remain angry at injustices, even those we cannot immediately change, because that is the only way to gather the political will to do so.

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