In Defense of Minding Your Own Business. Literally.

[raybear]

OR, Raybear Gives a Lecture.

Please do me a favor. Do not watch the video footage that will inevitably be leaked of Steve Irwin's death. Ok, actually, do whatever you wish, but don't post it on your journal and/or write about it ad nauseum. I ask this because I care about you.

I am very anti-"rubbernecking" for two reasons. [I'm using the word beyond the traditional meaning of staring at car accidents, but to include all the watching we can do privately in our home via television and internet.] First, because if you've ever experienced some sort of public accident or trauma, it doesn't really feel that great to have on top of it all, total strangers gawking at you. I know, in some ways, it's the last thing on one's mind when it comes to serious situations, but on the other hand, its one of those random small things you can't help but notice in the midst of the chaos -- the sound of the aspen tree leaves blowing, how blue the sky is, and how a bunch of mofos are gaping at you while you're trying to control the bleeding and not freak out.

Look, I know its just curiosity. That we're human and it happens and it's not meant to be hostile or anything, that it's not even meant to be an intentional act -- most often we look without thinking. My instinct is also to look. I just try to observe and be aware that the inclination is not neutral. But I also think it has negative effects on the gazer, which brings me to the second reason I'm anti-rubbernecking. This applies especially to our tendency to watch footage repeatedly of trauma all over the world, whether it's space shuttles exploding or buildings blown up or bleeding bodies in foreign countries or high school students shooting each other. We're absorbing others' trauma and making it personally our own when it's NOT our trauma, we don't really know what it's like to actually have it be our trauma, and I think it serves to further distance ourselves from coping when things actually DO happen to us. Again, I understand why we do this -- it's not just curiosity at this point, it's also problem we can deal with precisely because its so distant. And I think this tendency to get absorbed in far away problems leads to us not knowing how to cope or look at what's actually going in front of us.

So when I say I don't want to see Steve Irwin's death on camera, it's not just out of respect and compassion for his wife and family who are directly effected and don't need to know that the whole world is nonconsensually inserting themselves into the narrative of person's life (and death). It's also out of respect and compassion for myself, to not engage in the societal tendency of 'othering' trauma at my own personal expense and thereby limiting my ability to engage in genuine own coping and healing when it does happen.

Note: I am not against stopping to help people or offering assistance. That is not rubbernecking. I am also not against documenting certain acts for the purpose of illuminating issues and educating people to push them to act. I'm also not immune to rubbernecking -- I obviously participate in pop culture and world events and get myself emotionally involved and watch things unfold. But I have certain lines I try to draw when it comes to distinguishing between what is actually my life and what is me purely consuming someone else's life under the guise that it is also my experience.

< /me telling you what to do >

Comments

[twostepsfwd.livejournal.com]

Thanks for this. I'm with you on just about all of it. I know rubbernecking is a human impulse, I have it too - But I don't understand wanting to see someone die when you can't actually be of assistance. And I think it's just plain disrespectful.

[keetbabe.livejournal.com]

yes, there is an innate curiosity of seeing such tragedy but after it's all said and done, these events then become spectacles, rather than life-altering/ending situation. i think people often respond thank god that's not me or anyone i know. but then what happens when it is you or someone you know? would you watch it then?

often i am curious but not. same thing with the tape of the grizzly man being mauled to death. want to hear it but don't at the same time.

[raybear.livejournal.com]

i recognize my response is sort of vehement and i can trace to the exact moment when it happened. in high school, right after i got a call and found out about a friend of mine was shot and killed by her stepfather and i turned on the television and saw the story on the local news and it just felt so wrong. that i was sitting there feeling completely devastated and upended and then there was this 30 segment summing it up, making it sound like every other impersonal event of the day. so i'm totally making it a bigger issue than it maybe is, because of my own personal experience.

but there is something about what you said, things becoming 'spectacles' and i think most people don't pay attention to how they are crossing those lines until it's already happened.

[cocolola.livejournal.com]

i think people are obsessed with death-as-spectacle and it is really beyond me (on a personal level -on a scholarly level that is, depressingly, exactly what i study). i inadvertently saw a person being burned on the street when i was a child (that's one one of the joys in living in the middle of a civil war) and i have no desire to repeat the experience in any form!!!!

[masscooper.livejournal.com]

There's this sense of ownership of celebrities in our culture that's really hard to negotiate. Yes, of course there are people who put themselves in the public eye intentionally, but the idea that this makes their entire lives our business is a little odd. I find myself thinking about this with relationship to my own attitude towards celebrities (most recently Lance Bass's coming out) -- it's definitely starkest when it comes to personal tragedy. It's hard enough for the average person to handle the commentary or questions of others in such situations, I can't imagine seeing my personal business in the papers or on the internet.

[thedemonnemo.livejournal.com]

Interesting to hear your philosophy on this matter. I have a similar policy on the beheading footage of hostages from Al-Jezera.

[sharkysmachine.livejournal.com]

I am not in the least bit curious, as I didn't even know who the mutherfucker was until his untimely death. I think it would be weird if people posted it and more weird if the footage got out/is already out there.