Sans Fig Leaf
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"Less self, more…"
25 May, 2006
"How can he be so selfish?" The question was grumbled, rather than whispered, by a person visiting our house for a social. An open invitation had been issued to certain fannish circles, and he was one of the attendees we didn't know. He'd arrived in the company of someone else we barely knew. Less than ten minutes after his arrival, he pointed to a movie on our shelf--one we had bought recently and hadn't even torn the plastic from--and asked if he could borrow it.
I politely said "No." I was frankly so stunned I'm surprised I got that much out.
His eyes practically bugged out. "Why not?" he asked.
Still trying to remain polite, I explained that I didn't loan things to people I barely knew. He retreated into a corner of the room and grumbled about me for some time. Never mind that he was consuming food and drink I had provided, spending an evening in my home, participating in an activity I had organized. I wouldn't give him the movie, therefore I was selfish.
That's hardly the first misapplication of the word "selfish" I'd ever heard. There's the classic of case of my semi-cousin who--after maxing out all of her boyfriend's credit cards, using money that should have gone for bills to buy herself clothes or shoes or jewellry so that his car had been re-possessed and they had been evicted twice--refused his marriage proposal because the diamond engagement ring he (somehow) bought for her wasn't expensive enough. "How can he be so selfish?" she had exclaimed.
The "selfish" charge gets used as a catch-all for all sorts of things people don't approve of. For instance, I've had friends who were called selfish by their relatives and other friends because they said they didn't want to have children. I've had friends who were in same-sex relationships called selfish by relatives and strangers because they said they want to have children. I've had relative strangers tell me that being gay is nothing more than rampant selfishness.
In all these cases what's really happening is the person playing the "selfish" card thinks they know what's best for the other person's life, and they hope to emotionally manipulate said other person into conforming. The hope isn't always conscious. They often genuinely feel that the person is being selfish and that their perception is perfectly reasonable.
And since the dictionary defines selfish as "being concerned mainly with one's own wants or needs," it's understandable why our choices can appear selfish to others. There's nothing wrong with living our lives as we wish, so long as we aren't exploiting or harming someone else--that's acting out of responsible self-interest, rather than selfishness.
Having the selfish card played on you can range from annoying to quite hurtful. It's particularly hurtful when the person playing it is someone you care about.
It's easy to dismiss, out of hand, the selfish card. Or to get irate and self-righteous then bite their head off. But I try to remember that the people I care about are the people I care about for good reason, so it can't hurt me to listen to them, at least if they're remaining relatively civil, and attempt to explain why we're doing what we're doing.
Our obligation to do this is in direct proportion to how close we are to the person in question, and how much of a stake we have in remaining on good relations with them. In no case am I saying we should ever compromise our principles, or change who we are simply to please someone else. But making a sincere effort to understand them, and to help them understand you, can't hurt. After you've made a sincere effort, if you can't at least reach the agree-to-disagree stage, then you can resort to the "yes, I know" and go on living your life your own way.
Some people can't stop there. Once they have explained their reasons, they want the other person to agree with them, or at the very least shut up about it and never bring it up again. When we feel like that, it's time to look in the mirror and scold ourselves. Because insisting that someone else compromise their principles (however wrong we think they are) is precisely as hurtful and wrong to them as it was when they tried to do it to us.
Which isn't to say that if they're screaming and making trouble we have to put up with it. But we do have to pick our battles. Let's say I have an Aunt Tilly who is disappointed that I don't want to live in the small town where most of my family live. Every holiday she'll find a way to slip some comment about how she wishes I lived closer. And every holiday I roll my eyes and say, "It would be nice, wouldn't it?"
On the other hand, if Aunt Tilly threw a hissy fit every time I showed up with my partner, saying we were doomed to hell and so forth, well, then I would do precisely what I did do some years ago when some relatives were taking that route: I completely stopped visiting any of them that behaved that way or condoned the behaviour. I didn't cut them off or refuse to speak to them, I simply stopped visiting. And if they asked, I calmly said that I would only come visit if I was assured that my partner would be treated exactly like the spouse of any other member of the family. I never demanded that they not invite Aunt Tilly if they invited me. I simply declined to attend. Eventually, they came around. I don't think they ever would have if I had gone ballistic; neither would it have worked out as well if I had been a doormat.
That's for the people you care about. The strangers, casual acquaintances, and so forth, that's another thing. Even then it's okay to weigh the options. If this is a total stranger you're never going to see again, maybe shrugging it off is the way to go. Because life's too short to waste time arguing with people who aren't part of our lives.
--Oscar Wilde
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