Fact: I had nothing at all to do with Shakespeare or his wonderful plays.
You see, William Shakespeare was born before I was. Heck, he even died before I was born. A few hours of hard work will result in iron-clad proofs of my non-involvement*. To my mind, pride ought to result from your accomplishments, not accomplishments completely unrelated to you. Or, for that matter, basic, bodily functions like which sex you prefer. Holding a parade for yourselves because you like this instead of that is like holding a parade because you sneezed without decapitating yourself. But I digress.
I figure I can have pride in myself and my descendants, to the extent that I can show some cause and effect relationship with their achievements. If I take pride in something I didn't do, I'm just a leech. William Shakespeare was a genius, but I don't see why I ought to be proud of him or anyone else of his race who isn't somehow connected to me.
I think Fats Waller was a genius, too and I don't have pride in him, either.
* - These proofs will involve logic, which as we all know, is cis-normative, patriarchal and oppressive. Sadly, I don't think there's much to be done about this.
3 comments:
Though I had nothing to do with its happening, I think I have a little pride in being a human rather than say a chimpanzee.
Depends a bit on what you mean by pride, if you say 'proud of' it doesn't sound quite so arrogant, it's a more humble way of saying it. When you give an emotion or something abstract a name, there is a tendency to make it concrete and thence misuse it, hence the Jewish G-d to guard against idolatry. Celebrating 'Gay Pride' is idolatry really, it's not a good path to go down.
Does that make sense? I see too much 'through a glass darkly'!
ligneus, great comment. I would ask: are you mistaking gratitude for pride?
I have a real problem with pride months for this and that. I don't think I'd have near the allergic reaction if they were gratitude months.
Good point, but cannot you apply both in some circumstances? Having trouble figuring it out, I Googled it, got a whole bunch of gay pride crap before it got to Wikipedia, https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pride
Turns out to be a pretty complicate thing, this pride:
Pride is an inwardly directed emotion that carries two antithetical meanings. With a negative connotation pride refers to a foolishly[1] and irrationally corrupt sense of one's personal value, status or accomplishments, used synonymously with hubris. With a positive connotation, pride refers to a humble and content sense of attachment toward one's own or another's choices and actions, or toward a whole group of people, and is a product of praise, independent self-reflection, and a fulfilled feeling of belonging.
There is more at the site with lots of links scattered about the article, worth visiting.
As for gratitude..........
If the only prayer you say in the whole of your life, is thankyou, that will suffice.
Meister Eckhard.
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