What I’ve written here, or said out loud in the past, here now, or sometime in the future will probably offend someone. So, in the interests of keeping the peace and preventing gatherings outside my front door, I apologize. In fact, my front door mat says, “Go Away”. I’m sorry for those of you that come to the front door and take umbrage at the sentiment. I just thought it was definitely a message for our time (and totally hilarious).
Sometimes I almost feel badly for athletes who like to Tweet. Just about everything they say will offend somebody, and let’s face it – the world of sports harbors a great deal of righteous indignation. Mostly that’s because there are so many sports talk shows and they all need something to talk about. Politicians too get themselves entangled pretty quickly and easily. I swear, one of them could say, “I have a plan to give every American family million dollars and it won’t cost the taxpayers a dime.” Next day, an apology goes out because someone was upset. Corporate executives are the other group that should say way, way less on social media. Less is more, and silence is golden.
Yesterday, as I was driving home from visiting a friend, and yes, we distanced and wore masks (except when drinking our coffee, which I picked up at drive up window, in case you’re ready to point a finger), there was a car in front of me that caught attention. It was an older Mercury Grand Marquis with a Trump bumper sticker. I want to apologize now for all the things I was thinking and that I would have said had those folks pulled over so I could confront them. Are you kidding me? A Grand Marquis in this day and age, with global warning and electric cars? That thing won’t get 20 mpg.
As a teacher, I’ve had to watch what I said over the years because I really wanted to model appropriate comments. Despite that, I do remember a principal telling us that “you never use sarcasm in the classroom”, and that would have taken out a healthy percentage of my repertoire. As my teaching was limited primarily to middle and high school students, one could get away with a bit more, but still . . . . We had to teach that proper response to a compliment is “thank you”, and the correct response to an unkind comment we’ve made, particularly about someone, is “I’m sorry”. Tone is important too. An “I’m sorry” with a smirk, a snarky tone and edge of attitude or an icy stare won’t cut it. Apologies only work if there is a hint of sincerity. That’s what makes texts and emails sometimes so hard to read. There’s no vocal context by which to judge the “contriteness” level.
Overall, we Americans are not a not a nation of apologists. On a serious note, even now as I write this, the country and much of the world is in flames over the George Floyd killing, yet not one of the four police involved have said, “I’m so sorry. We really screwed this up.” The mayor of Minneapolis did, but not one of the police officers directly involved did. One would think that, seeing the results of their actions – a mixture of peaceful and violent demonstrations around the world, they’d at least publicly express something to show they regretted their actions, exercised really poor judgement, or didn’t give much thought to intervening. Nor has the father/son team and their traveling photographer responsible for the death of runner Ahmaud Arbery in Atlanta expressed any sense of remorse. Of course, our legal system advises against apologizing, because it weakens their defense. So, there you have it – don’t apologize and nobody can accuse you of anything.
Let’s look at the historical events for which apologies were in order. For example, Pontius Pilot could have taken action, but didn’t know what to do, so in the case of Jesus, he just let events run their course. At some point, though, a public utterance – “Yes, I really let this get out of hand.” might have mended some fences. There again, the Church and several popes really should have expressed some regret for the Inquisition and the Crusades. Even, “in retrospect, these weren’t good and we apologize.” To my knowledge, Vladimir Lenin has never felt badly about having the Tsar and his family shot. Would it have hurt him to announce, “It seemed the logical course, but I just feel terrible about it.” Or the guy that shot Archduke Ferdinand and started World War I. That certainly requires and apology. The British burned Washington during the War of 1812, and again nothing. They could have called, “we’re frightfully sorry” to Dolly Madison as she ran for cover from the smoldering White House. Of course, there’s no record of us apologizing for burning Toronto shortly before, either. King Philip of Spain should have sent Queen Elizabeth I a nice note of apology for sending the Armada against England. “I’m so sorry, Bess. At least it floundered helplessly, so no hard feelings?” The Chinese Emperor should have sent word, and perhaps a nice bouquet of flowers to Venice to apologize for exporting the Black Death. Even a card saying, “We’re so sorry. Who knew rats could be dangerous?”
Just about every driver I’ve ever known should have a sign on a stick that reads, “I’m sorry”. We could hold it up when we do something stupid – cutting someone off in traffic or jumping uninvited into a line of cars, running red lights, changing lanes on the spur of the moment, pulling around a school bus whose red lights are flashing, playing with your car radio when the light turns green so that half the cars behind you won’t make it through the intersection, pretending you’re James Bond on the highway until you get pulled over, speeding up to take a parking space from someone that’s been waiting patiently for it, driving a safe and steady speed well below the speed limit so there’s about a five mile backup behind you that many mistake for either a parade or a funeral. When you’re driving along, there really isn’t a look of sufficient sorrow that says, “I’m deeply sorry”, so you could just hold up your sign. For older drivers like me, a set of voice-activated signs that pop up in every window of the car.
I suppose that I could follow the lead of our president. Now there’s somebody that never, under any circumstances, even if he set in motion a nuclear holocaust by pushing the wrong button, apologizes for anything. Let’s face it, he says lots of things that are apology-worthy. Of course, as the president, he can and does have a battalion of people around him that can issue apologies on his behalf. They’re not really apologies, though. Their comments usually start with, “What he really meant was . . . .”, and are crafted in such a way as to imply that what he said wasn’t “wrong”, it was just misinterpreted. He really meant “thugs” and “rapists” in the nicest, least offensive possible sense.
By way of wrap-up, I think it’s safe to say that we need more people to feel guilty, and to let others know how badly they feel. If you’ve spread an infectious disease at a really-poorly-thought-out pool party in Lake of the Ozarks, tell everyone you’re sorry – preferably on Facebook where you can get thousands of “likes”. Don’t hold back and internalize your feelings of guilt and inadequacy – say it right out loud. It’s cathartic and makes everyone feel better. In case you’re searching for the right words, here’s a sample template:
‘Against the advice of my attorney, I’d just like to say how deeply sorry I am for . . . . . . . . .”
I'm Thinking...No! 