Pixabay Image - by Lubos-Houska
We’re genetically encoded to care. To pick up the abandoned kitten by the side of the road and bring it home.
To help someone cross the street who’s having trouble.
Even give back the extra $5 bill the cashier gave us when counting out our change.
But giving a shit gets scary at times because we keep having to do it.
The bullied kid could be helped by someone else, but no, we reach in and put ourselves in harm’s way because it’s the right thing to do.
And we do give a shit, often, and all over the place. In big cities and small towns. On interstates and pot-holed country roads. We keep showing up and making a difference.
But it begs the question, doesn’t it?
If we’re so busy giving a shit and doing the right thing, then who is out there creating all the chaos that gets reported on every day?
Rebels in Yemen shooting missiles at cargo ships carrying bananas and iron ore.
Gaza on fire.
Ukraine at war.
Bombs going off in big cities.
Mass shootings happening so often, that they’re only mentioned next to the sports page.
And yet while we stream the latest shows on Netflix and HBO; as we walk into PTA meetings and sit patiently waiting for it to begin or dine in a new restaurant opened by a friend and write a glowing review on Yelp, the world, or at least a part of it, is threatening to fall apart.
And Then What?
So, we become committed to giving a shit every day and if we didn’t go around doing the right thing and actively spreading it carefully everywhere we go, then what would happen to the rest of the world?
Without the billions of us caring and dreaming and loving someone more than once in a while, would we even be able to recognize mean or understand terror for what it is?
Or would that simply be the new standard?
See the thing is, once you give a shit; once you open your heart and think, that’s not right, “they” got you. Yeah, there must be a “they” otherwise who is fighting so hard out there to keep the world sane while another, more vocal and less caring “they” are actively doing their best to stir shit up.
Not the same shit, but a variant of it.
It’s like this.
There’s giving a shit, which is another way of helping or being a mensch.
And there’s stirring up shit, which means finding something that’s almost broken, about to hurt someone, or about to make someone sad and finishing the job. Just getting it done and moving on to something else that just needs a little push.
The consequence of giving a shit is that we are constantly made aware, every single day, of what’s not right.
What’s off, or hurtful in any number of ways, which many people know about and can take advantage of. Because it keeps on happening.
Origins
When giving a shit started is not known but probably when people started understanding the difference between the two.
Some just survived and got on with it.
Others, for whatever reason, made a conscious decision to not roll over anyone and everyone to do that. They thought it wrong or maybe it just felt funny and being much, much closer to Nature, they trusted those instincts and kept doing it.
Thus, giving a shit evolved. Became more organized, and more efficient.
Groups of people got involved. Helped another when they fell or broke a leg, rather than just taking their stuff and leaving.
They helped children grow into adults. Took care of those who lost their parents to hunting or disease and raised them as their own.
Others saw this, thought, fuck this has possibilities, and started talking it up, so it became a thing.
More saw it, liked it, and did it and thus we are where we are today.
Eight billion of us trying to do the right thing but each calling it something different.
The Problem
Maybe this is where it went off the rails. When confusion set in.
Because doing the right thing became a matter of perspective.
When one group, hard pressed for food or clothing or staying dry, got a whole different idea of what was right for them to do.
Different because another group thought it was wrong. Mean even.
But there being no true definition of giving a shit, and no committee or institute of higher learning to correct any errors, everybody went their own way and trouble ensued.
It’s just a theory but it seems to fit. With so many people striving to do the right thing and giving a shit as often as they can, there appears to be an equal number doing the reverse.
Which would account for the never-ending cycle of hope and fear, death and life, and peace and war.
But maybe, and this is a stretch, there are far fewer people creating the chaos but they are better at stirring shit up than we are at giving a shit and promoting it.
Social Media Enters to Lend a Hand
You see if we open a page on our morning feed, or flip on our daily podcast about crime rates, inflation, and the elite owning everything worth owning then we are likely, just saying, to fall into the habit of believing that everything is fucked.
If we think 87% of everything is bad, it’s hard to counter that belief with heartwarming videos about dogs saving babies and cats rescuing their owners and things like that.
Content creators are busy, really busy making content like this but it seems hopeless at times when Big Media, with all their technology and networks of reporters and embedded journalists, are churning out more bad news than we can read, then you end up feeling like crap.
Which is completely different and not to be confused with the shit, being discussed here.
So, giving a shit takes a backseat to just reading about it and eventually doing the right thing becomes an abstract concept like being woke or a good Christian or what money means – who has it and where does it keep going before April 15th every year.
Digging Deep
Archeologists over the years have found sufficient proof by examining bones, graves, and burial sites throughout the world that giving a shit was a thing 10,000 years ago. And that not giving a shit was also present though it’s inconclusive if it was as prevalent as the former.
But we’re hopeful.
Now one can construe that giving a shit or doing the right thing is problematic; that it causes potential upsets, family disruptions, neighborhood skirmishes, and the like.
And that would be incorrect.
There’s a simple formula to follow when in doubt.
Giving a shit = good. Stirring the shit = bad.
The consequence of giving a shit is what we are experiencing today all around us, with one basic flaw. By giving a shit we are where we are and not worse.
Now if we made a point of marketing giving a shit, putting it on our podcasts, making it first up in our Feeds each day, and the like then maybe it would catch on even more.
Or we can keep tuning into car thefts, carjacking, homicide rates, rates of suicide, inflation rates, medical emergencies, rising cost of medicine, floods, earthquakes, rising costs of gas, bacon, drywall, nails, click, click, clicking while Big Media and its all-knowing algorithms keep churning out the crap we don’t need.
Conclusion
Then maybe the stirring the shit crowd would get less coverage, fewer clicks, fewer views, and eventually less money and will start to go away and be replaced by videos and content that collectively reduce society’s pulse rate and gives us all a chance to breathe and think, write poetry, and plant flowers – using all the leftover shit that’s no longer on the airwaves.
It’s possible, right?