Right? Ó Tuama says that's the question the speaker is asking from within the "us" -- what would feel like enough?
Me, I hear it as two questions (or kinds of question) overlaid or sort of shimmering together: what action would truly have a meaningful effect? Do I even have that power? and/or what action would assuage my empathy and shame? (Because it's not just shame -- if it is shame, or guilt, it comes first from empathy.)
I have lived more or less happily during every war of the last five decades -- unhappy in the fact of them, but able to lead my life; and even now that a something violent and almost martial is directed against trans people just one province away, for the most part, I live happily, though very afraid for trans folks younger than me.
And what would be, in the face of that fear, enough? I ask myself this all the time, and have, like the speaker, no answer.
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branchandroot
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Date: 2024-03-01 01:15 am (UTC)Right? Ó Tuama says that's the question the speaker is asking from within the "us" -- what would feel like enough?
Me, I hear it as two questions (or kinds of question) overlaid or sort of shimmering together: what action would truly have a meaningful effect? Do I even have that power? and/or what action would assuage my empathy and shame? (Because it's not just shame -- if it is shame, or guilt, it comes first from empathy.)
I have lived more or less happily during every war of the last five decades -- unhappy in the fact of them, but able to lead my life; and even now that a something violent and almost martial is directed against trans people just one province away, for the most part, I live happily, though very afraid for trans folks younger than me.
And what would be, in the face of that fear, enough? I ask myself this all the time, and have, like the speaker, no answer.