Indignation Fatigue

Rocket fuel burns fast and hot, but it doesn’t burn long. The same is true of prideful, moral indignation. It burns fast because we live in a world not only of sin, but of sinners. Ignition is not a problem. It burns hot, in a manner of speaking, for the same reason. That is, I find it easy to become indignant, because of my own sin. My indignation over your sin allows me to cover my sin. As long as I am sputtering in wonder over how you could do that, I have no time, energy or ability to consider what I have done. “How could you!?!” trumps, “What did I…” The brightness of the burning rocket fuel blinds my own eyes, and the eyes of others, against my own sin.

Indignation, however, cannot burn long. While our sin is rather abundant, it is eventually likewise rather ordinary, pedestrian even. After a brief time of twisting the words and actions of the object of our indignation, after assuming motives and judging them, after convicting your victim of all that is evil in your imagination, sooner or later you’re left with, “And another thing. He feeds his dog generic dog food!! Generic I tell you. That stuff that’s deficient in protein, and abundant in ground horse bones. That no good scum not only hates dogs and horses, he’s cheaper than a very, very cheap person!!!”

That’s where our indignation can get both embarrassing and lonely. Indignation always looks for partners. I tell you about how awful he is, so that you can join me in my outrage party. Eventually, however, one of us decides it’s time to go home and get some sleep. Now what do we do? Someone has to give up and the other one is left holding the bag. Consider, for example, the web junk of orphaned attack blogs. The indignant take their indignation public, inviting all the world in to look at the purported sins of another. The blog author rants, raves and rails. Others come to visit, and join in the assault. Cross posting and linking feed the beast and the rant-meister rejoices in the good news from Google diagnostics. Then it all dies. Either people stop coming, or the author stops posting. Eventually everyone moves on because the victim, strangely, never confesses to being the anti-Christ. And the accusers grow weary in their do-gooding. Or, as is more often the case, someone creates a different attack blog with bigger names in its crosshairs, and draws all the indignant away.

Unlike the media ancestors of this stuff, the tabloids and sundry forms of yellow journalism, this web stuff stays up there. Like derelict satellites in space, these blogs stay up in orbit, and from rare time to rare time, thanks to google, attract a new visitor. Said visitor, ignorant that the rest of the world has moved on, gets his or her knickers in a twist, joins in the long dead indignation, and then sits alone listening to the echoes mixing with the crickets chirping.

We yet have so much to learn about the message of this media that is the internet. Worse still, we still don’t understand ourselves. If we can’t stay indignant, perhaps we shouldn’t be getting indignant. If someone is inviting us to share his indignation, perhaps we should ask for a lifetime commitment first. Better still, maybe we should save our indignation for that special someone- ourselves.