Lately I've been thinking a lot about gossip: how quickly you can get wrapped up in it, what it creates in people and how it makes me feel when I participate in it. It's so easy to get caught up in the latest chisme when there are magazines, websites and Page Six's dedicated to celeb lives, who's hooking up, who's separating, cheating, adopting, etc. Why should anything beyond their work matter to us?Then there's the role it takes in our personal lives. Instead of confronting issues head-on and leaving it at that, we talk behind each other's backs fueling rumors and creating new ones as we go. And even if we don't create or spread the gossip ourselves, the simple act of listening is bad enough.
I can admit that I'm one of these people. Girl talks become gossip fests in which we analyze and speculate about everyone else's lives and as much fun as it is to get sucked into it, in the end it just feels...gross, wrong, like I should know and be better than that. And so it goes until the next time someone goes, "Yooo, guess what I just heard?!"
This needs to stop, for me anyway. As hard as it may be, I don't want to continue being a cog in any rumor mill. If someone comes to me with the latest news on so-and-so, I'm turning the other way. Now I'm not referring to well-intentioned updates about someone I haven't talked to in a while. I mean the snide remarks and malicious comments you probably wouldn't want that person to ever hear. If I wanted to know that person's story, I'd just give him/her a call. If he/she doesn't give up the info then maybe it's because he/she doesn't want me to know and that is just fiiiiine by me.
Surely we have enough going on in our own lives that we don't need to go meddling in things we've no business meddling in. But if you're that starved for entertainment, I hear those celebs put out movies every once in a while.
Image: thefreshxpress.com
Amen.... and sing it girl!
ReplyDeleteThat is so true.
ReplyDeleteI am guilty of it at work. But we mean no harm and most of it is gentle teasing or so I tell myself. You are right.
ReplyDeleteYou are so right!
ReplyDeleteIt's such an easy trap to fall into, but nothing good ever comes from gossip. I try not to get involved in it, but sometimes it happens before I even realize it.
ReplyDeleteWhat drives me crazy is when people try to claim that it's not hurting anybody. I've seen too many cases where that is simply not true.
Very true. The world would be a better place without it.
ReplyDeleteSaw you on SITS today and decided to drop in.
Where you are in this line of thinking is terrific. I hit that point awhile ago myself...and it only got reinforced when I had children and knew for certain that people were speculating on MY life. I feel this way about people in my everyday, but also about things like Tiger Woods and his wife...Kobe and his...etc etc. It does no good to bash people I know and see everyday, or those whom I will never meet. Neither would make me feel good, be productive, or set any sort of positive print on the world in general. :)
ReplyDeleteAmen there girly!
ReplyDelete