When Should We Be Happy?

It seems that it currently makes a number of people angry when they see others being happy with "all the shit going on in the world right now." So, when is it a good time to be happy?

Every time Taylor Swift releases an album, it seems to create an absolute firestorm of backlash, criticism and chaos, so when it happened this time, I wasn’t too surprised. Swift was quickly accused of being everything from a racist to a trad wife, which is genuinely quite hilarious. But what also seemed to absolutely irritate the masses no end was just how….happy this album seemed to be. A sentiment, she herself seems to be absolutely bubbling over with. The outrage her demeanor sparked made it seem like they felt being happy right now should almost be classified as outright criminal behavior.

I was delighted to see a number of people address the critics by posting videos of themselves dancing blissfully to (arguably) the album’s biggest bop, a sheer explosion of infectious joy called Opalite. But even the people posting these videos frequently made comments to the effect of “how bad we need this right now.”

What’s interesting, however, is that I began to notice similar comments on a wide range of heartwarming posts on social media. Comments like “oh, we just need this so badly right now, with all that is going on in the world” or “I’m so glad I saw this today, because the world is such shit right now.” Now, granted, people can always be just having a bad day, or have things going on in their own world, but the prevalence of their comments leads me to believe they are talking about the larger world around them.

What I find ironic is that the largest Protestant organizations in the U.S. right now (and even some Catholics) have united under the banner of “Evangelicalism”. Which means that they believe the primary mission and task of The Church is to spread the “gospel,” which literally means good news. So, riddle me this, Batman: If the largest Protestant denominations in the U.S. have spent decades now making it their primary mission to spread “good news”, then why is everyone so miserable and angry?

The truth is, there is nothing new under the sun. There is literally NOTHING happening right now or today that has not been happening for the last 100 years, if not 1,000.

So, I spent an enormous amount of my precious and valuable (to me) time to put together a somewhat exhaustive timeline of the last 100-ish years of U.S. history. Turns out, there pretty much hasn’t been a single moment of the last 100 years, when something anywhere from scary to downright terrifying wasn’t taking place. From school shootings and mass shootings to race riots, earthquakes, bombings, wars, very-close-to-wars, scandals, tragic deaths and hostage situations. So, if you’re waiting for nothing “bad” to be happening in the world to be happy, then I would guess you have at least another hundred years to wait. I don’t know about you, but I don’t have that kind of time.

Happiness is a choice. There is never, ever going to be a “good time” to be happy, nor is there ever going to be time when something “bad” isn’t happening somewhere in the world.

• 1914-1918 - WW I

• 1915 15 year old boy accidentally shot by his brother

• 1916 20-year-old teacher shot by parent

• 1916-1955 Polio outbreak

• 1916 19-year-old teacher found tied to a tree, assaulted and shot twice in the face

• 1916 One man killed and three injured during a shooting at a school Christmas tree celebration

• 1917 Sixteen-year old student shot in the leg at school

• 1917-1920 Red Scare

• 1918: Spanish Flu Epidemic (H1N1 flu)

• 1918-1919 Post-War Recession

• 1918-1920 Russian Civil War (Direct U.S. involvement)

• 1920 -1933 Prohibition

• 1918 Professor is shot in a gunfight over an argument about dishes

• 1918 Boy is killed by a classmate examining a rifle

• 1919 Black Sox Scandal

• 1920 Boy shoots teacher in the arm for sending him to the principal’s office

• 1920 Boy attempts to shoot teacher six times for whipping and expelling him

• 1920 Night watchman shoots 10-year old boy at school for the Deaf & Blind

• 1920 Mother shoots teacher for spanking her son

• 1920-21 Depression of 1920-21

• 1921 Tulsa Race Massacre

• 1921-25 Diphtheria epidemic

• 1922 Boy shoots and kills classmate in an outhouse. Claims it was an accident

• 1922 Man breaks into school, kills a girl and fatally wounds a boy

• 1923 Posey War (American Indian wars)

• 1923 Teapot Dome Scandal

• 1929 Black Tuesday (Global Stock Market Crash)

• 1929 St. Valentine’s Day Massacre

• 1929-1939 Great Depression

• 1930 Man kills female teacher standing in the door of a schoolhouse

• 1931 Teacher is accidentally shot by a student who brought a revolver to school

• 1932 Lindbergh Baby Kidnapping

• 1933 Chicago mayor killed during assassination attempt on President-elect Franklin D. Roosevelt

• 1934-1940 Dust Bowl / Agricultural recession

• 1936 University student kills a professor for giving him a failing grade

• 1937 Student is killed by a prop gun that was supposed to be loaded with blanks during a play rehearsal

• 1937 HIndenburg Disaster

• 1938 Another student shot and killed during a play rehearsal with a prop gun supposedly loaded with blanks

• 1939-1945 Nazi Germany Invades Poland - WW II begins

• 1940 School principal shoots 6 of his colleagues, killing 5 and wounding another

• 1940 Man shoots and kills his 15-year-old daughter for refusing to leave boarding school

• 1940 Selective Service Act establishes first peacetime draft in U.S. History

• 1941 Attack on Pearl Harbor

• 1942 Teacher is shot and killed in the school corridor by two students

• 1942-1946 Internment of Japanese Americans, German Americans and Italian Americans

• 1943 Detroit, Michigan Race Riots

• 1944 D-Day

• 1945 Battle of Iwo Jima

• 1945-1949 Operation Beleaguer (Chinese civil war and Cold War)

• 1945 Recession of 1945

• 1948-49 Berlin Blockade (Cold War)

• 1949-1956 Operation Valuable (Cold War)

• 1949 Soviet Union tests first atomic bomb

• 1949 Recession of 1949

• 1949 Student is shot in the arm by a classmate showing off a pistol

• 1949 University student shoots and kills a fraternity brother

• 1949 16-year-old girl is killed when two groups of female students pulled out guns and started shooting at each other

• 1950-1953 Korean War

• 1950-1954 McCarthyism

• 1950 Failed assassination attempt of President Harry S. Truman

• 1950 13-year-old boy shoots female classmate in the neck

• 1950 12-year-old boy shoots classmate in the abdomen after a fight the previous day

• 1951 16 and 19-year-old students shoot school superintendant for reprimanding them and another student for telling

• 1952 15-year old boarding school student shoots dean after being told to take down pinup pictures

• 1952 Man kills secretary of American Physical society at Columbia University after they rejected a paper of his

• 1953 Recession of 1953

• 1953 Rosenbergs executed

• 1954 14-year-old killed by the accidental discharge of a firearm held by a classmate

• 1954 Student killed in frathernity house when fraternity brother starts shooting after a night of drinking

• 1954 CIA overthrows Guatemalan president

• 1955 College student kills classmate after hazing incident involving urinating on his mattress

• 1955 15-year-old student kills classmate while showing off his father’s gun in a school restroom

• 1955 Murder of Emmett Till

• 1956 14-year-old shoots a classmate after a disagreement

• 1956 15-year-old student fatally shoots one teacher and wounds two others after failing to turn in PE assigment

• 1957 H2N2 Flu Epidemic

• 1957 Soviets launch Sputnik, “space race” begins

• 1958 16-year-old student shoots classmate in the stomach at school

• 1958 15-year-old student shot and killed by classmate in the bathroom

• 1958 High school student shot and injured in Latin class

• 1958 Two high school students have shootout in hallway before teachers restrained them

• 1958 Recession of 1958

• 1958 Lebanon Crisis (Cold War)

• 1960-61 Recession in 1960-61

• 1958 Student shoots classmate in the stomach

• 1960 14-year-old girl fatally shoots male classmate with a target pistol, as she believed he posed a threat to one of her girlfriends

• 1960 15-year-old student shot in the leg during a game of Russian Roulette at a Jr. High School

• 1961 17-year-old is fatally wounded by a bullet from a rifle intended to be used as a sound effect in a school play

• 1961 Former UC Berkely student opens fire in a professor’s office, wounding the professor and killing another student

• 1961 16-year-old student accidentally shoots a 17-year-old bystander during a fight

• 1961 14-year-old shoots and wounds one fellow student and kills another

• 1961 Bay of Pigs Invasion (Cold War/ Cuban Revolution)

• 1961 Berlin Crisis (Cold War)

• 1961-1975 Vietnam War

• 1962 Cuban Missile Crisis

• 1962 Marilyn Monroe dies of barbituate poisoning

• 1963 17-year-old student accidentally fires a gun in a classroom, wounding another student

• 1963 15-year-old student shoots classmate twice after swim class, where classmate dunked him in the pool

• 1963 13-year-old girl accidentlaly wounded by shot from a rifle used as a prop for an elementary school play

• 1963 President John F. Kennedy assassinated, Lee Harvey Oswald subsequently shot by Jack Ruby

• 1963 Civil Rights Activist Medgar Evers is assassinated

• 1964 19-year-old student dies after a pistol is accidentally discharged during a gunsmithing class at a Jr. College

• 1964 17-year-old takes two female classmates hostage and shoots at a teacher as she runs for help

• 1964 “Ghetto Riots’ begin with Harlem Riots of 1964

• 1964 Tonkin Gulf Incident

• 1964 Panama Canal zone riots

• 1965 15-year-old freshman in injured by an accidental discharge of a firearm on a school bus

• 1965 21-year-old fired a revolver twice, wounding a 17-year-old boy and 15-year-old girl outside of a high school

• 1965 27-year-old truck driver fatally shoots 18-year-old female freshman atter students lined the street to throw snowballs at cars

• 1965 16-year-old male student fatally shoots 17-year-old female student in high school classroom

• 1965 Disgruntled 16-year-old student fires a shot at a biology teacher

• 1965 14-year-old student shoots and wounds English teacher, after student was referred for disciplinary action.

• 1965 A 16-year-old student fired a rifle at student’s exercising on school athletic field

• 1965 Several high school boys wound a 13-year-old girl while playing with a gun on the school’s playground

• 1965 16-year-old student shot in the abdomen at Baltimore High School

• 1965 Anti-war marches begin in Washington D.C.

• 1965 Selma to Montgomery marches

• 1965 Malcolm X. assassinated

• 1965 Watts riots

• 1965 8-year-old student injured by a gunshot while standing on the school playground

• 1966 15-year-old student fires shots in the fieldhouse, wounding two students while attempting to kill the school dean

• 1966 17-year-old student shoots a 15-year-old inside the school cafeteria.

• 1966 50-year-old man fires at students playing on the playground of Jr. High School, wounding a 13-year-old boy

• 1966 Teacher fatally wounded after trying to stop 16-year-old student armed with a shotgun from shooting boys he had argued with earlier that day

• 1966 University of Texas tower shooting (15 people fatally shot and 31 more wounded

• 1966 15-year-old high school student fatally shoots administrator and seriously wounds fellow student

• 1966 Baltimore student discharges a pistol four times in the cafeteria, wounding two other students, one critically

• 1966 Rose-Mar College of Beauty Shooting

• 1966 18-year-old fires a rifle from the balcony of school auditorium. When apprehended, he had 1,000 rounds of ammunition and a gas mask

• 1967 Detroit Race Riots

• 1967 18-year-old opens fire in the hallway of a technical collge, killing one student and wounding another

• 1967 18-year-old dropout kills former 17-year-old girlfriend inside Illinois high school

• 1967 18-year-old student opens fire in high school cafeteria during gang-related incident and wounds two people

• 1968 17-year-old student accidentally fired a gun inside a classroom in Florida high school, wounding a classmate

• 1968 16-year-old female student shoots and kills fellow 16-year-old female student during a fight over a fountain pen

• 1968 8-year-old student shot in a hallway by a 16-year-old student at an Oklahoma high school

• 1968 Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. assassinated

• 1969 Recession of 1969-1970

• 1969 Stonewall riots in NYC

• 1969 U.S. bombs Cambodia and Laos

• 1970 Kent State and Jackson State Shootings

• 1970 Jimi Hendrix and Janis Joplin both die of overdoses

• 1971 Jim Morrison dies of overdose

• 1972 Watergate scandal

• 1973-74 Arab Oil Embargo causes gas prices to skyrocket and Daylight Savings enacted 4 months early

• 1974 Super outbreak of tornadoes hits 13 U.S. states, kills 315 people and injures more than 5,000

• 1974 House impeaches President Nixon over Watergate scandal, Nixon resigns

• 1973-75 Recession of 1973-75

• 1975 President Gerald Ford survives two assassination attempts in a 17-day span

• 1977 New York City blackout lasts 25 hours

• 1978 Mass suicide led by Jim Jones in Guyana leaves 918 people dead

• 1979-1990 Contra War (Cold War/ Central American crisis)

• 1979 Three Mile Island Nuclear Disaster

• 1979 Iran hostage crisis

• 1979 American Airlines flight 171 becomes deadliest crash in aviation history on U.S. soil

• 1980 Operation Eagle Claw (Iran Hostage crisis)

• 1980 to Present AIDS crisis

• 1980 U.S. Boycotts summer olympics in Moscow

• 1980 Mt. St. Helens erupts

• 1980 John Lennon murdered

• 1981-82 Recession

• 1981-1991 Second Measles outbreak

• 1981 Attempted assassination of President Ronald Reagan

• 1981 Hotel Walkway collapses in Kansas City becoming deadliest structural collapse until 9/11

• 1982-84 Multinational Intervention in Lebanon

• 1983 U.S. Invasion of Grenada (Cold War)

• 1983 241 U.S. Marines killed by suicide bomber in Lebanon

• 1983 Karen Carpenter dies of complications from Anorexia Nervosa

• 1984 Most of Eastern Bloc boycotts summer Olympics in Los Angeles

• 1985 Willie Nelson and John Mellencamp form Farm Aid to raise money for struggling family farmers

• 1986 Bombing of Libya (Cold War)

• 1986 News of Iron-Contra affair breaks

• 1987 Black Monday (Global Stock Market crash, Dow-Jones falls 22.6% in single session)

• 1987 Scandals break involving high-profile televangelists Jim Bakker, Oral Roberts and Jimmy Swaggart

• 1988 – Severe droughts and massive heat wave gripsthe Midwest and Rocky Mountain states

• 1988 Yellowstone Fires become the largest wildfire in recorded history

• 1989-1990 U.S. Invasion of Panama (Cold war/ war on drugs)

• 1989 – The Exxon Valdez dumps 10.8 million gallons of oil into Alaska’s pristine Prince William Sound wildlife habitat

• 1989 Actress Rebecca Shaeffer murdered by obsessed fan

• 1989 – Hurricane Hugo strikes the Caribbean and U.S. Southeast Coast, causing $7 billion in damage.

• 1989 the Loma Prieta earthquake kills 63 people in the greater San Francisco Bay area

• 1990-91 Recession

• 1992-95 U.S. Intervention in the Somali Civil War

• 1992-95 NATO intervention in Bosnia and Herzegovina

• 1992 Los Angeles riots

• 1992 Hurrican Andrew kills 65 people and causes $26 billion in damage to Florida and the Gulf Coast

• 1993 Truck bomb explodes under the World Trade Center, killing six people and injuring more than 1,000

• 1993 Cryptosporidium outbreak in Milwaukee

• 1993 Branch Davidian standoff in Waco, TX

• 1993 The “storm of the century” strikes the Eastern Seaboard, killing 300 people and causing $6 billion in damage.

• 1993 Massive flooding along the Mississippi and Missouri Rivers kills 50 people and cause $15–$20 billion in damage.

• 1994 The Northridge earthquake kills 72 and injures 9,000 in the Los Angeles area, causing $20 billion in damage

• 1994-95 U.S. Intervention in Haiti

• 1995 Oklahoma City bombing kills 168 and wounds 800

• 1995-1996 — A budget crisis forces the federal government to shut down for several weeks

• 1995-96 Taiwan Strait Crisis

• 1996 TWA Flight 800 explodes off Long Island killing all 230 aboard.

• 1996 Khobar Towers bombing leaves 19 U.S. servicemen dead in Saudi Arabia.

• 1996 Centennial Olympic Park bombing at Summer Olympics in Atlanta kills 1 and injures 111

• 1997 Mass suicide by cult followers known as Heaven’s Gate leaves 39 dead

• 1997 Dow Jones follows world plummets 554.26, or 7.18%, to 7,161.15.

• 1998-1999 President Clinton accused of having a sexual relationship with 22-year-old intern Monica Lewinsky, leading to the impeachment of Clinton

• 1999 Columbine Shooting

• 1999 Tornado outbreak in Oklahoma kills 50 people and causes $1 Billion in damage

• 1999 First officer deliberately crashes EgyptAir Flight 990 south of Nantucket, Massachusetts, killing 217.

• 1999 NATO Intervention in Kosovo

• 2000 6 school shootings

• 2001 September 11 attacks

• 2001-21 War in Afghanistan

• 2001 Recession

• 2001 6 school shootings

• 2001 Anthrax attacks kill 5 and infect 17 more through U.S. mail

• 2002-Present U.S. Intervention in Yemen

• 2002 6 School shootings

• 2003 5 School shootings

• 2003 Space Shuttle Columbia disintegrates upon re-entry to the Earth’s atmosphere, killing all seven astronauts

• 2003-2011 Iraq War

• 2004 3 school shootings

• 2005 11 School shootings

• 2005 Hurricane Katrina

• 2006 13 School shootings

• 2007

• 2007-Present U.S. Intervention in Somali Civil War

• 2007 VIrginia Tech shooting

• 2007-2009 Great Recession (Mortgage crisis)

• 2009 H1N1 (Swine Flu) outbreak

• 2010 Deepwater Horizon oil rig explodes in the Gulf of Mexico spilling millions of gallons of oil into the sea

• 2011 – Representative Gabrielle Giffords is severely wounded in an assassination attempt when a gunman went on a shooting spree, killing a Federal Judge and five others, as well as wounding 13 others

• 2011 ATF “Gunwalking” scandal that allowed thousands of guns to “walk” across the border to Mexican criminals

• 2011 A series of tornadoes rips across the South, killing 234 people in the deadliest natural disaster since Hurricane Katrina

• 2011 Flooding devestates the Mississippi River valley causing $2-4 Billion in damage

• 2011 A tornado devestates Joplin, MO, killing 158 people and injuring more than 1,000

• 2011 International Intervention in Libya

• 2011-2017 Operation Observant Compass (War on Terror)

• 2012 Gunman kills 12 and injures 70 at a movie theater in Aurora, CO

• 2012 A gunman kills 26, including 20 children, at Sandy Hook Elementary School

• 2013 Terrorist attack at the Boston Marathon

• 2013 The most destructive wildfire in Colorado history burns nearly 16,000 acres and kills two people

• 2013-2024 U.S. Military intervention in Niger

• 2014-2021 U.S.-led intervention in Iraq

• 2014-present U.S. Intervention in Syrian Civil War

• 2015 – Dylann Roof kills 9 people during a Bible study at the Emanuel African Methodist Episcopal Church

• 2015-2021 U.S. Intervention in Saudi-led operations in Yemen

• 2015-19 U.S. Intervention in Libya

• 2015 Two gunmen kill t4 and seriously injure 2 others at the Inland Regional Center in San Bernardino, California

• 2016 Gunman kills 49 people and injures 53 members of the LGBT community at the Pulse nightclub

• 2017 Fort Lauderdale Airport Shooting

• 2017 Hurricane Harvey floods large areas of Texas and Louisiana, causing tens of billions of dollars of damage

• 2017 Hurricane Irma makes landfall in Florida and causes tens of billions of dollars of damage

• 2017 Hurricane Maria made landfall on Puerto Rico, killing hundreds and knocking out the island’s power

• 2017 A gunman opens fire at a Las Vegas Strip concert, killing 60 people and injuring 867.

• 2017 A gunman kills 26 people and wounds 22 others at a church in Sutherland Springs, Texas,

• 2018 – A gunman kills 17 people and injures 17 at Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School in Parkland, Florida

• 2018 A gunman opens fire on the Tree of Life congregation in the Pittsburgh synagogue shooting killing 11 and wounding 6.

• 2019 The longest government shutdown in American history ends after 35 days

• 2019 R. Kelly charged with ten counts of aggravated criminal sexual abuse for incidents dating back as far as 1998

• 2019 A gunman kills one and injures three in a California synagogue.

• 2019 A city employee for Virginia Beach enters a municipal building with a gun and kills 12 people.

• 2019 23 people are killed and another 23 are injured in a mass shooting at a Walmart in El Paso, Texas.

• 2019 – A gunman opens fire on a bar in Dayton, Ohio. He kills nine people and injures another 27

• 2020 Nigerian Hostage Rescue

• 2020-23 COVID-19 Epidemic

• 2020 6 people are killed in a mass shooting in Milwaukee, Wisconsin before the perpetrator killed himself.

• 2020 Dow Jones falls by −2,997.10, the single largest point drop in history and the second largest percentage drop ever

• 2020 Nearly 22 million Americans file for unemployment within a single month, the worst unemployment crisis since the Great Depression.

• 2020 Covid-19 Recession

• 2020 George Floyd dies by asphyxiation at the hands of officer Derek Chauvin, sperking global outrage

• 2021 A condominium in Miami collapses, killing ninety-eight people and injuring eleven others

• 2021 Trump-supporting rioters storm the U.S. Capital

• 2021 A major winter storm kills 58 people and causes over 9,724,000 power outages across 13 states

• 2021 A spa shooting in Atlanta leaves 8 dead; 6 of whom were of Asian descent

• 2021 Ten people are killed in a mass shooting at a grocery store in Boulder, Colorado.

• 2021 Four people are killed and two others, including the suspect, are injured in a shooting at an office building in Orange, California.

• 2021 Six people are killed by gunshots at a house in Rock Hill, South Carolina.

• 2021 Nine people are killed, including the shooter, and seven injured, in a mass shooting at a FedEx facility in Indianapolis.

• 2021 Seven people are shot dead at a birthday party in Colorado Springs, Colorado.

• 2021 A mass shooting occurs at a Santa Clara Valley Transportation Authority rail yard in San Jose, California, leaving ten people dead, including the gunman, who committed suicide.

• 2021 Four students are killed and seven others injured in a mass shooting at Oxford High School in Oxford Township, Michigan.

• 2022-Present U.S. Involvement in Russian invasion of Ukraine

• 2022 A school shooting in Uvalde, Texas kills 19 students and two teachers

• 2023-2025 Operation Prosperity Guardian (Red Sea Crisis, Middle Easter Crisis, Yemen Civil War)

• 2023 Wildfires in Hawaii kill over 100 and caused $5.5 billion in damages

• 2024 The Francis Scott Key Bridge in Baltimore, Maryland collapses, killing 6 construction workers

• 2024 Hurricane Beryl makes landfall in Texas, causing at least $6 billion in damage to the state and 48 deaths

• 2024 Attempted assassination of former (at the time) President Trump, while campaigning

• 2024 Hurricane Helene devestates the Southeastern U.S. killing 230

• 2024 Hurricane Milton strikes Florida, killing at least 24

• 2024 United HealthCare CEO Brian Thompson shot and killed outside The New York Hilton Midtown

While compiling this information, I did notice something. I started off recording almost every school shooting, starting in the 1920’s (yes, they’ve been happening for that long, and really, much longer than that) but there were so many I stopped somewhere in the late 60’s. (You can find the full list here.)

Up until 2005, there were only a handful each year, but in 2005 they nearly quadrupled, and have been on the rise ever since. (Full numbers here). In the last decade or so, however, (barring 2020 and 2021, when many schools were closed) they have quite literally exploded, reaching 53 in 2022, 60 in 2023 and 56 in 2024. That’s not how many people died or were injured, that’s how many shootings there were. Interestingly, Facebook came online in 2004, which heralded the rise of social media.

Now I know it’s easy to blame social media (and before that, video games) for the rise in violence, but it’s important to remember that we all use social media. Yes, I know that there are algorithms that throw things unbidden into your feed, but they are also algorithms, which means, believe it or not, you control them. Whatever you watch, view or comment on, the algorithm gives you more. If you leave an angry comment, it shows you more of what made you angry in the first place. My feeds are pretty much full of animals and a few smart, funny women. To be honest, I haven’t personally seen most of the Taylor Swift hate because I don’t engage with it, so my algorithm doesn’t show it to me.

But even on the funny animal content, there is more than enough gloom and doom and the “world is going to hell in a hand basket” comments. Now, I am old enough and wise enough to know how to manipulate my algorithm to avoid the vast majority of doom, gloom, anger and hate, but most young people are not. I know that everyone wants to believe that gun control is the magic saviour that will solve all our problems and put an end to all violence (particularly school shootings) but what if all of our anger and moaning and crying on social media is just turning up the temperature.

Young people do and have always responded more aggressively to the problems they hear older adults talking about than older people do. It’s said that the older you get the more conservative you get, and that’s true, but it doesn’t mean you become more Republican. It just means after going off half-cocked a few too many times and getting yourself in hot water it takes a long time to get out of, most people learn to cool their jets a bit better and gather more facts before going off. In some cases, they even realize not everything is worth fighting over or even fighting for.

But that takes time and wisdom, which few young people have. Might I perhaps suggest that we need to learn to be wiser with our words on social media and how we speak about what is happening in the world today. We used to say things like “little pitchers have big ears” and would watch our words in front of young people. But I think social media makes it harder to remember because we don’t always see who is watching and listening. We forget to be as careful or guarded with our words and emotions as we might be if we were actually in the physical presence of a young person.

I think the temperature in America is very hot right now and it’s going to take all of us to turn it down. Maybe taking the time to just dance to a good bop or finding joy in the everyday is not the worst thing we can do right now, but literally the best for everyone.