Kos Youth Grapples with Reality
Sat, May 26, 2007 at 7:22:41 pm
The last few days have been tough for the Nutroots, and Daily Kos front-page poster Devilstower is trying to make sense of it all, from the reality-based perspective: Daily Kos: Redeeming Realism.
You mean, tantrums don’t work? Waaahh!
This week has been a tough one for a concept that’s been dear to the Daily Kos community over these last five years: realism. We’ve prided ourselves on being realistic, on not trying to candy-coat ugly truths and not lining up to swallow attractive lies. That’s been hard this week. Partly, that’s because reality has been particularly unattractive this past week, full of feet of clay, weak-knees and weaker excuses. A week of red hot frustration that — slowly, slowly — is transmuted into dull disappointment laced through with renewed resolve.
But it’s not the vote, or the even the war that’s waged the week’s greatest assault. The thing that’s made it most difficult to be realistic this week has been the continuing effort to turn that word into just another synonym for “resigned.” Too many times, the word “realistic” comes with a shrug of the shoulders and a roll of the eyes. It comes attached to expectations of the worst. It’s dropped in front of acceptance of defeat. With every setback, “being realistic” takes another battering.
It would be nice if we could bring the troops home now, but that’s not realistic.
Yeah, we wanted serious lobbying reform, but come on, be realistic.
Sure, we need to do something about the energy problem, but to expect us to change our ways simply isn’t realistic.
All I have to say to that is, get your hands off our word.
Red hot frustration slowly transmuted into dull disappointment, then laced with renewed, steely resolve. Reality is such a harsh mistress.