Roy Huggins Says Stuff

I just got an email from MoveOn, like I do.

The gist of the message is a request for members to support a bill currently sitting in front of Congress that would make it a federal crime to price gouge for gasoline. The punishment would be up to 10 years in prison. Hmm…

I know gas is expensive. I know it effects all Americans heavily when gas costs a lot. I know that oil interests are utilizing the current political climate to price gouge. But come on. Make that specific thing a federal crime with significant prison time? That’s going too far and is certainly a slippery slope issue.

I like MoveOn. But sometimes it isn’t the best idea to support something just because it’s a chance to stick it to the Republicans.

Personally, I like to think systemically about this one. Maybe if gas does top $4 then that’s one more price point in the direction of convincing even the most grossly consumerist, SUV-driving Americans that maybe it’d be a good idea to work towards more sustainable energy practices.

I’ve been thinking about the ways people behave around apologies. Sometimes folks don’t really know how to express themselves well when an “I’m sorry” situation arises.

Consider the following scenario:

Sam and Sally are housemates. Sally really loves curry. Suffice to say that there is a convincing reason to treat Sally’s curry as sacred.

Sally leaves her leftover curry in the fridge one night. Sam comes home after an evening of heavy drinking, finds the curry, and scarfs it.

The next morning, Sally opens the fridge and is furious. She doesn’t say anything, though, because her general approach to conflict is to be passive-aggressive. Sam wakes up (several hours) later and comes into the kitchen, opens the fridge, and realizes with a smack to the forehead that he ate Sally’s curry and she’s going to be very unhappy about that.

Sam goes to his silently fuming housemate and apologizes. What is Sally’s response?

“It’s okay,” she says.

This doesn’t sound right to me.

Yes, Sam is doing good by noting that he has wronged his housemate and taking the initiative to apologize. However, that doesn’t make the original act “okay.” It may repair the rift in his relationship with Sally and allow them to move forward without hard feelings, but simply declaring everything to be “okay” is sweeping it under the rug. It certainly doesn’t do anything to help Sam understand how much he has hurt his roommate.

I think I don’t like the phrase “It’s okay” as a response to apologies unless it really is okay. The phrase should be reserved for moments when someone is apologizing unnecessarily — like if they accidentally bump into you.

In the scenario above, it seems that Sally would get more mileage out of saying something like “Thank you for apologizing, it makes me feel better about this whole thing.” That way she smooths over the problem between her and Sam but without creating the impression that Sam’s behavior wasn’t actually hurtful.

It is my observation that insects in general, and flies in particular, find no problems in the fact that they are icky.

This is why they must be stopped.

Many of my fine readers know that I’m in the throes of building an advice column-blog. It isn’t quite ready yet, so no link for you¹. As such, I’ve been paying closer attention to all the advice columns I read…

And you wouldn’t believe² how many people write in all offended by secrets they found while snooping though their SOs’ email. The letters usually go something like:

So, I just happened to walk up to my husband’s computer while he was away and I accidentally glanced at his email and just happened to notice an old email from 5 months ago to his ex-girlfriend where he implied that he misses her! My trust in him is shattered! What do I do?!

It also goes the other way gender-wise. I’m not being sexist. Or hetero-sexist. It happens with same-sex couples, too.

Whenever I see these letters I feel the need to stop reading at the point where the spouse is snooping on his/her partner’s email. Ya, obviously there is a trust problem in your relationship. But maybe the cause is a little more systemic than you previously thought.

This post was inspired by today’s Savage Love column, in which the ever-wonderful Dan Savage dishes it out with a fantastic way of thinking about these situations. His rule:

Here’s a good rule of thumb—one I just made up—for e-mail snoopers, PISSED: If the transgression your snooping uncovers is a more serious transgression than e-mail snooping itself, you apologize for snooping and confront. But if the uncovered transgression is less serious, you keep your fool mouth shut.

I love you Dan Savage. Will you be my friend?

1. but there is one in my blogroll. I’m fickle. [↩]
2. unless you read advice columns as much as I do [↩]