I Hate This Hyper-Sensitive Society

Petty (adjective) - of little importance; trivial.

This word describes so many people that I know in this country.  Too often, I see people take nothing and turn it into something negative.  The reason: people love to be victims.  A lot of us tend to enjoy the "Me vs. The World" mentality.

Unfortunately, as a black man, I see a ton of pettiness in my community.  In fact, there are a lot of black people who embrace pettiness as if it's something in which to have pride.  I recently saw a "Black, Educated, and Petty" t-shirt on a young lady downtown.  All I could think to myself is, "why are you embarrassing yourself by wearing that ignorant shirt?"

I hate this hyper-sensitive society that we live in today.  No matter what you say, someone can take it, twist it, and make it look as if you are out to get them when you're not.  And if you say something that someone deems as criticism, and they are not sure if you're referring to them or not, then they'll use this other dumb term to justify their negative feelings: "throwing shade".

You'll have to go to the Urban Dictionary for the actual definition, but essentially, it means to say negative things about a person, but to try and do it in a discrete or indirect manner.  So, the person can only assume that you're talking about them because their name is never mentioned.  Almost like a subtweet, for those familiar with that.  It's why you can sometimes post something at random on social media and later get an inbox message from some offended follower who assumed that you were talking about them.

What's the point of even speaking if people are going to hear what they want to hear instead of what's actually being said?

From the President on down, people get in their feelings way too often and it's frustrating.  No one can have an opinion any more without someone being bothered by it.  What happened to the "sticks and stones" mentality?

Social media was supposed to be a great means of rekindling friendships and networking, but it's turned the U.S. into a country filled with chumps.  Instead of taking advantage of an amazing opportunity to get viewpoints from people from all over, we take sides with those who agree with us and bash those who don't.  Gone are the days when two people can just disagree and move on or maybe even actually learn from one another.

If Jesus came back today, he'd probably turn around and leave.  SMH.