Screaming in a Diaper

On a pensive stroll around Austin we encountered a woman topless and possessed. She shook her arms at the sky as she flew past, like noodles flung with desperate violence at God, deliriously screaming to match her furious pounding pace.

Garbled nonsense suddenly spewed at us from the corner of a construction fence hiding her approach. We nearly collided and had our toes stomped. We leapt backwards in shock, then continued retreating, backs into the fence and arms seat-belted across each others' chest as she whipped past, circling us 270 degrees. She hung a sharp left through the space we previously occupied and gave no indication of seeing us.

We were absolutely still, mystified and quiet, rooted to the spot as if hiding motionless from a T-rex. We watched her shrieking shaking white form—her only wrapping a puffy dirty loincloth diaper—disappear still frothing in the distance.

My companion Alexandra said it was the most nightmarish thing she'd ever seen up close and personal. For context, she previously volunteered in LA's Skid Row among wild homeless encampments.

Alex's reaction to this experience was fascinating. After proceeding to cross the intersection on our walk and heading in the direction of a cafe, she expressed frustration and anger. I was surprised because many people have a knee-jerk sort of pity or sympathy when encountering the mentally ill and unhoused.

Alex had a different take. She had no individual desire to fish out a dollar or two from her pocket and try to remediate the nastiness in front of her. In fact, she would probably be against that kind of action as ineffective emotional processing from the privileged.

Rather, her compassion was channeled into rage at the system. Her upset was much more grand and sweeping. Firstly, at herself and her powerlessness to help such a troubled soul. Secondly, at centuries of incompetence insufficiently providing education to uplift each person's potential and leaving this poor woman behind. Thirdly, at widespread mediocrity holding back leaders and innovators from creating safety, prosperity, and opportunity in our communities.

What kind of society do we live in that tolerates squalor and pollution of the public commons, especially in otherwise beautiful and majestic city centers? Perhaps back to the first point, who exactly is in power (and nominally responsible) for the cleanliness of the streets and safety of the people?

To me at least, Alexandra's compassionate rage on behalf of excellence, combined with the stark (screaming) failure of society to meet the bar (in this case), raises excellent questions. This kind of tension might start us on a quest for better.

Others could see things differently. They'd think, "wow that's a lot of negative energy, maybe you should chill out and spare a dollar if you have one."

Can we both be right? Sure. We're just thinking on vastly different time scales.

I've given $20 bills to homeless folks when it strikes my fancy, acknowledging both how I can spare the cash and that the person in front of me has great need. So I might as well give what I can, fine.

But to me this doesn't feel principled at all. It's a temporary band-aid, more geared towards alleviating my own discomfort in front of a beggar than actually helping any beggars to outgrow their difficult circumstances.

I'd rather operate in alignment with a 50-year vision of society, the kind of systematic uplifting that made Singapore richer than the US starting from Jamaican GDP levels. This posture might end up refusing an individual beggar, denouncing a public outcry as a disturbance of the peace, and possibly accepting some hypocrisy.

Cheap compassion has never appealed to me. It seems immature somehow, like we're avoiding the hard work of acknowledging and finding the difficult tradeoffs which best ratchet us all forward...

It's like an adult screaming in a diaper at the unfairness of the world who mindlessly pops in a pacifier.

~~~
Thanks to Alexandra for inspiring this post and reviewing an initial draft.