Letting go

I have to let some of them go. I cannot respond to absolutely every message board comment and blog post that I want to. I just don't have the time to take on every stupid, ill-informed, ill-thought-out, or just plain offensive opinion I read on the internet. There are just too damn many of them. Today, I have read many, many things on many, many topics that just set me off. I can't take them all on. I have to pick my battles.

I don't have time to reply to absolutely everyone who has posted somewhere on the internet about their disdain for the California Supreme Court's ruling opening marriage to all desiring couples or the NY Governor's declaration that his state will give full faith and credit to California marriages. I applaud those decisions, but I cannot take on absolutely every idiot out there who insists on considering homosexuality "unnatural" or "odious." I just have to let some of them go.

I don't have time to take on every idiot who got their panties in a twist over the paisley scarf Rachael Ray wore in a Dunkin Donuts ad. If you really want to think Rachael freakin' Ray was supporting terrorism, I will not attempt to stop you. Nor will I point out the fundamental problem with associating a type of scarf worn throughout the Arab world with terrorism. Although it should be obvious that not everyone in the Arab world is a terrorist and lumping all Arabs in with terrorists is stereotyping of the worst and most dangerous kind. But I can't let it be my problem every single time.

I don't have time to challenge every person who takes swipes at "feminism" instead of recognizing that their particular beef is probably with a small subset of the whole.

I don't have time to rip into every blog poster who willfully misreads other bloggers. If you really want to take one line out of an entire article and use that line to say the author's point is the exact opposite of what anyone who read the entire text would clearly see was the point, I will not let it bother me. Well, I'll still let it bother me, but I won't waste my time explaining to you the error of your reading comprehension.

I have other things to do. I have a job and friends and a really cute dog. I have dishes to wash and laundry to do. I need to mow my lawn. I have to accept the fact that it is not my responsibility to take on absolutely every opinion that I think needs to be challenged.