So we’ve defined the broad limits of what an asshole is: someone who can’t natively anticipate the consequences of their actions.
If you happen to look at the news, you’ll see a lot of examples, naturally, given that Shitler and MAGA are all over the place. Of recent note are the MAGA idiots in the US who are shocked that the people and policies they voted for and supported for years have consequences that affect them.
I recently saw a meme post that called this the “Shirley Exception,” and that used the example of a (possibly fictional) conservative white woman whose life was endangered by being forced to carry a fetus that was dying (and in fact parts of its body were rotting), but whose heart was still technically beating.
“Surely there was supposed to be an exception in the law for this,” said the (possibly fictional) conservative white woman. “Surely I shouldn’t have to fly to a different state to get the medical care I need.”
The conservative white woman did not anticipate the consequences of her actions, that is, supporting conservative narratives that would later cause her serious, life-threatening negative consequences.
Would this make her—if she even actually exists—an asshole?
Maybe; maybe not.
The thing is, a conservative white woman in that situation could be affected by multiple sets of consequences:
- Carrying a child in a state that does not allow abortions except in the case of a woman who is actively dying.
- Living in a community that will cut off support for her and her family if she does not publicly and privately support anti-abortion measures.
Make no mistake: a conservative white woman who is pro-abortion will be cut off from non-trivial resources, and she will be punished.
Let us here assume that people who are being controlled and abused—whether or not that abuse involves physical, direct harm—will lose survival-level resources if they try to leave their situation.
And they will be punished.
In short, if you’re in a cult, then leaving the cult will cost you.
It may cost you everything: your life, your kids, your kids’ lives, your property, your job, your support networks, your friends, your bank account…and your whole world view.
That last one is key.
It takes a miracle to escape abuse.
The worst part is that skillful abuse is hard to identify in the first place, and it’s even harder once you’re being abused.
The narrative of abuse is that it is not abuse, but only small flaws in a good system.
The abuse that most people think of as abuse–the battered wife, the suicidal/homicidal cult, the older person forced to sign away their possessions by a “caregiver”—is unskillful abuse.
Shitty abusers gets caught. Skillful abusers don’t.
If you only define abuse as the abuse that is so monstrous that it’s obvious and so unskillful that it gets caught…
…then you miss most of the abuse that assholes do, even when it happens to you, even when it’s in plain sight.
“It’s not that big of a deal,” you’ll say. “That person/group/institution just has a couple of flaws. Doesn’t everyone?”
The thing is, we do all have flaws. And we all act like assholes sometimes.
So which is it?
Are we all assholes? Or is nobody an asshole as such, and we shouldn’t put labels on people like that?
—Thing is, this type of question, the kind where there are two distinct and opposite categories being considered, is a trap.
It’s an asshole way of reframing the situation: either the person says everyone’s an asshole (and therefore we shouldn’t call out any behavior except the most obvious abusive behavior), or the person agrees that we shouldn’t put labels on people, only behavior (and therefore we shouldn’t call out any behavior except the most obvious abusive behavior).
Either answer lets most assholes avoid immediate accountability, most of the time. Shit might catch up to them, but it’ll catch up to them later, and that’s the important part.
Because, to an asshole, “later” is the same as “never.”
Here’s what I want you to consider:
- Not all supporters of asshole policies are assholes as such; it’s just that their survival involves copying asshole beliefs and perspectives on such a deep level that they can’t be forced or tricked into betraying any other opinion.
- If your reaction to that statement is something like, “But there’s no real nuance to the situation; they deserve what they get,” then you are either an asshole or have been brainwashed into agreeing with them.
Victims of abuse will tend to support systems of abuse and may appear to do so whole-heartedly; failing to do so it a survival-threatening action.
A conservative white woman who needs and can’t get an abortion is being abused. She may also be perpetrating an abusive system. But that doesn’t mean she’s not being abused.
Right and wrong.
Black and white.
Us and them.
The mark of being a non-asshole is not about being immune to manipulation, or being moral, or being flawless.
It’s being able to rise above black-and-white thinking and see nuance. To know what’s right, yet be able to walk sympathetically in the shoes of those who get caught up in the wrong. To see flaws and forgive them, yet still hold ourselves and the people closest to us accountable.
Being fully and truly human is a heartbreaking mess. It sucks. You’re always second-guessing yourself and grieving over things you can’t change. You’re always at risk of losing connections, resources, friends, and family when you refuse to get sucked into asshole systems. You’re always having to compromise.
Being an asshole–that is, someone whose conscience is broken–or going along with assholes feels safe. It feels effective. It feels good.
Until it doesn’t.
It is so easy to think “Surely I have put in my time and shown my loyalty. Surely people will understand that I meant well. Surely, for me, there will be an exception.”
There will not. Assholes set up systems of exploitation. It’s easy to fall for the lie that either you’re an insider or an outsider: protected or unprotected.
But assholes systems don’t protect. They exploit.
They exploit the people outside the system, and they exploit the people inside the system. When you’re inside the system, it just means that you’re flagged for long-term exploitation and not direct punishment—for now.
The second you go against the narrative espoused by an asshole system, the pattern of exploitation will shift. Whether you meant to disagree with the system or not.
You will become an outsider, and worse than an outsider.
You will be punished.
Getting out is a miracle. The only way to get out is to let yourself see what you have been trained not to see—the abuse—and then you have to survive both having your resources removed and the gamut of punishment.
Some of the worst punishment for abuse comes from people supposedly outside the system of abuse that the victim just left.
You can find the Asshole Mitigation Plan series outline here.
