The Perpetually Outraged will be Perpetually Outraged – T. L. Knighton

The perpetually outraged are funny to me. Oh, they infuriate me as much as the next person, but they’re funny. They’re always out there, hunting for things to get upset about. The thing is, from time to time, people give it to them.

For example, take the outrage over all the racists claiming they would boycott the new Star Wars movie. Now, none of the hateful cabal that made up the Sad Puppies said they would boycott anything. Most of us were giddy as school girls with backstage passes for Justin Beiber. But someone on Twitter was talking boycott, and that’s all it took.

Now, those who are perpetually outraged could have looked at the numbers and pointed out how pathetically few there were. They could have just shaken their heads, called those folks idiots, and thanked God (or whoever) that there would be that many fewer people taking up space in line on opening day.

But they didn’t.

You see, it was nothing more than a couple of trolls, trying to stir up stuff. Sure, plenty of outlets went on defense, claiming that the fact it was a troll attempt doesn’t negate the fact that there are real racists out there. Well, yeah, there are. Far too many of them (and one is far too many of them), but that’s not the point.

It’s like the University of Virginia rape case. Oh, it turned out to be complete bovine excrement, but the perpetually outraged, now in damage control mode, claimed that while the story itself wasn’t true it outlined a very real problem and was therefore important.

Again, bovine excrement.

If the issue was as widespread as many claim, then why was a false story needed. Why weren’t the perpetually outraged screaming about how fake rape claims make it harder for people to believe the real cases? Where was the outrage at that?

The funny thing is that, at the core, we want the things the perpetually outraged claim they want. We want our daughters to go to college and not have to worry about being raped. We want people paid equally for equal work. We want minorities to be treated properly. We agree on these things.

The difference is, we disagree about the details.

For example, we don’t just look at how much men make when compared to women. We recognize that the alleged gap isn’t because of some nebulous patriarchy that seeks to keep women oppressed. This supposed gap is because women have chosen to take on positions that simply don’t pay as much. Yet somehow, this too is the patriarchy’s fault.

Don’t ask me how, just roll with it.

Let’s talk about rape on college campuses. It’s a real problem, right? Well, that’s the allegation, anyways. However, heaven forbid you talk about avoidance tactics for young women. Nope, can’t have that. If you do, it’s victim blaming.

Of course, I fail to see how it’s victim blaming when you advise a woman to avoid drinking too much at parties, or to not walk across the dark, deserted campus alone, but it’s not to tell someone to not pull money out of an ATM in a bad part of town or to not let anyone see how much cash you’re carrying. [To be fair, we should advise young men not to drink too much at parties, either, because pictures and the internet is forever. Is that victim-blaming too? — editorial note, SAH.]

All of those are avoidance tactics, ways to prevent becoming a victim. Women are generally warned about the rape avoidance tactics primarily because they’re far more likely to be victims of rape than men. However, we tell all genders about avoiding criminal threats. Yet only the warnings on rape are apparently wrong. Why is that?

The perpetually outraged can’t see their victories. They can’t see them because they are too busy looking for more enemies. They’re seeking out villains in everything they look at. It’s why they can’t seem to enjoy a work without filtering it through the lens of their outrage. “There aren’t enough minority characters,” or, “the minority lead character is a token,” or, “this movie full of aliens has insufficient diversity”.

Seriously, it leaves us scratching our heads. We can’t comprehend it, because we just can’t win.

For example, I’m a white dude. It’s how I was born, it’s who I am, and I’m not going to change it for any reason. Yet, thanks to the perpetually outraged, if I have an insufficient number of minorities in my book, it’s proof of racism. If my protagonist is a minority, but doesn’t conform to their idea of what that minority should act like (I thought stereotypes were bad), then I’m guilty of tokenism. If I base my book in a world based on Western Europe, I’m clearly a racist as well…but if I base a book on Meso-America, then I’m guilty of “cultural appropriation”.

And here we get to the biggest failing of the perpetually outraged.

With their constant outrage, they’ve proven to me and many like me that we just can’t win. Nothing I write will be good enough for them. As a result, I no longer care. Larry Correia has a diverse cast of characters in his work, mostly serving as heroes, yet he’s supposedly a hateful, racist, misogynistic homophobe. So, with that in mind, I tune them out.

The irony here is that I was more than willing to listen. We need more heroes of black and Hispanic descent? Make your case, but I’m inclined to agree that it wouldn’t hurt. We need more heroes who are gay or lesbian? Again, make your case. I’ll listen.

But the perpetually outraged don’t want to make their case. They want to be outraged. It’s there reason for existing. It’s their air, their water, their manna.

So, I no longer care. Neither do a lot of other people.

As a result, we ignore them…when we’re not laughing at them. We do that a fair amount too, mostly because the frothing anger gets funny. Especially when the perpetually outraged don’t know what they’re talking about.

Unfortunately, some people actually listen to the perpetually outraged. Maybe they don’t want to be the target of their outrage. Maybe they’re just gullible. Maybe they’re just idiots. I don’t know. What I do know is that there are far too many people who seem to care about not offending the perpetual outrage. Too bad for them that there’s nothing that will stop the perpetually outraged should these people accidentally offend.

It’s times like that when I’m most glad I stopped caring what they perpetually outraged think of me. You see, dealing with them is all mind over matter. I don’t mind, because none of them actually matter.