Doing what is right is lonely.
When I was a little girl I was tenacious, I still am. I’ve always believed in standing up for what is right.
It doesn’t matter to me if I see some injustice being done to man, woman, child, or mouse.
I have absolutely gone to bat for mouse rights my entire life, ask my mom and her crazy broom.
I was about 7 years old, playing outside and there was a little girl across the street riding one of those bikes with 3 wheels like from the moving The Shinning. What I think was her dad was calling her to come in. When she didn’t come in fast enough he came down the steps of the porch grabbed her by the hair and started dragging her. There were other people outside and they just looked the other way.
I jumped off my porch and ran over to the curb and started screaming at this guy to let her go. The guy started yelling back telling me to mind my own business. I ran to my mom and told her what he did. At no point did I even consider the guy might hurt me.
I learned a lot of unpleasant life lessons from that experience. I didn’t learn to look the other way.
I was about 11 when I saw an older guy slap his girlfriend. I jumped on his back and put him in a headlock. I was a kid and headlocks were what I knew, as an adult, I’ve grown out of that unless it’s one of my siblings.
All through grade school, middle school, and high school I stood up to bullies who bullied in front of me or bullied me. I was never a popular or well-liked person because of this. I even stood up to teachers on occasion.
All through my working career when I saw something I said something.
I’ve been physically hurt, lost jobs, and lost friends along the way.
I still didn’t learn to look the other way.
Lately, it seems like people are telling me I should maybe do something like look the other way. Be a little less righteous. Take the easier road.
No.
It’s not about being right just to be right. It’s about doing the right thing. There is still such a thing as the right thing.
It seems like people are afraid to stand up and say something is wrong.
I was about 13 when a school bully started making fun of the way another girl was dressed within earshot of her. The bully had a crowd of other girls around her laughing. I publicly told her what she was doing was wrong.
It’s easy to look the other way and laugh even if you know it’s wrong. Who is it easy for?
Doing the right thing isn’t always the same as doing what is right for you.
I’ve been going through some shit lately. I keep thinking about the women before me that stood up and said something. One woman in particular. I can’t help thinking if what she went through was similar to what I’m going through now. Everyone looking the other way. It must have been lonely for her. It must have been extremely difficult for her to try to fight while nobody would hear her.
She won a tiny bit of change in the end, by standing up and saying this is wrong publicly. That tiny bit of change made it so just maybe there was a fork in the road I could take. I might not have to fight as hard as she did.
Lucky thing there are people like her who refused to look the other way. One day maybe there won’t be a fight at all.
I can think of a lot of people who refused to look the other way and made things just a little better for other people.
I may live my entire life and never make even a fraction of her impact. I’m going to keep standing up for what is right and I don’t care how hard it is or how lonely it is.
— The fug.