Recently I have noticed a change in the way people treat each other. For a while we were making progress; there is less racism, less hate towards the LGBT community, etc. Yet it seems like there has been an overcorrection.
Rather than people being racist or hateful, there is controversy and lawsuits towards people who did nothing wrong- yet are accused of those things. America has gotten extremely sensitive. We have started searching for a way to make someone look like a bad person when really they did nothing wrong. These following three recent events have shown peoples growing sensitivity and immediate accusations.
1. Forever 21 boys line
This July, Forever 21 had to pull an entire clothing line due to one shirt that caused controversy. In their boys line, they released a shirt that said, “Chicks are all over me” with photos of baby chicks around the writing. Shoppers said that the shirt implied that all boys like girls and all girls like boys, and that it is too young to “force” sexuality on kids. The truth is, you only come to that conclusion if you overthink the situation. The shirt was about eight bucks, if someone didn’t like it, they simply don’t have to buy it. When a line isn’t popular, it will be ended by the company itself with no controversy at all. If someone saw this shirt and didn’t like it, why couldn’t they just walk away? They feel the need to think of every possible way it could be offensive and get the whole internet mad when the company meant no harm. Other shirts of this line about models could be seen as offensive, but overall, it was a much bigger deal than it had to be.
2. Gabby Douglas during the national anthem
When Gabby Douglas won her third gold medal for the US, Americans were not impressed. She was the only one out of the five gymnasts that did not have her hand on her heart during the national anthem. This blew up way out of proportion. There are a few reasons why peoples reactions are absolutely absurd. She had just won a gold medal for our country, this is one of the best moments of her life and she needs to face all of this criticism. Your hand is meant to be on your heart during The Pledge of Allegiance; NOT the National Anthem. It is a choice, and maybe some think it would have been more “polite” but the truth is, someone sitting on their couch with a beer and potato chips in hand is not in a position to be criticizing a 3-time Olympic gold medalist.
3. Victoria Beckham’s instagram birthday shout out to her 5 year old daughter
In July, Victoria Beckham posted a very sweet photo of her kissing her daughter on Instagram. Her caption was; “Happy birthday baby girl. We all love you so much- X kisses from mummy X” She received comments saying that the photo was gross, how dare she kiss her child on the lips, etc. A mother should absolutely have the right to kiss her daughter. She is barely out of her toddler years, and even if her daughter were older, it is insane for the entire internet to be disgusted by a mother kissing and wishing her daughter a happy birthday.
People are searching for things to overreact over, trying to find ways to bring people down and simply being hypocrites; considering how incredibly mean people can be while trying to prove that someone else is rude. People think that if they claim to be offended it is okay to offend someone else. That is not sensitivity, that is a loophole to being a jerk.
