Were I to give this image a title it would be called ‘Denial.’ It smacks of National Lampoon’s Christmas Vacation: a holiday obsessed Chevy Chase pretends he is having the perfect family Christmas even as the house comes down around him. Of course, in Hollywood, denial has a happy ending for everyone but the snotty neighbors. Their suffering makes us laugh.
These days I think almost daily of the phrase Roger tossed out a few decades ago: denial is the most powerful of human capacities. He is a director of plays, a great student of human motivation. People are great at denying what they don’t like. People are great at having one too many drinks and getting behind the wheel, or texting while driving because, after all, bad things happen to other people. People are masters at pretending that they are not involved, above it all, or what they see is not happening. Ask the NRA.
The important detail that Roger understood is that denial is never passive. It abdicates responsibility. It assigns blame other places. Chinese hoax. It minimizes the impact. It paints pretty pictures of ugly situations. It throbs with intention.
Denial: the action of declaring something untrue.
Here’s the question that Roger’s observation invokes in me: at what point do we wake up and realize that we are all the snotty neighbors?
[now, don’t you wish that I’d just written about Hieronymous Bosch like I intended?]
read Kerri’s less pessimistic blog post on the PICNIC TABLE
the picnic ©️ 2019 kerri sherwood
Filed under: Flawed Wednesday, Random, Rants, Uncategorized | Tagged: climate, david robinson, davidrobinsoncreative.com, denial, denial climate change, Kerri Sherwood, kerri sherwood itunes, kerrianddavid.com, kerrisherwood.com, laughter, NRA, pretending, studio melange, suffering |
The Direction of Intention 
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