Just got finished…well, not really: I read the article and typed this (two)Thursday morning(s ago)…reading an article about President Obama’s fundraising efforts. He raised $70 million in the third quarter: more than anyone else (obviously), but not on par with previous efforts. At the same time, someone from his camp said that the funding - and the fact that it came from a million donors - is proof that the president’s supporters have his back.
As Lee Corso would say, not so fast.
As anyone who knows me or read the 2O12 note knows, I struggled a bit in deciding whether to make my modest contribution to the president’s re-election effort. Maybe I wasn’t one of the people referenced, as I was never a supporter to begin with…but I’m sure there are people who are less enthusiastic about him now than they were three years ago. Many progressives fit this description. We still like the president for one reason: we abhor the Republicans and everything they stand for (well, at least the practice).
At the same time, I’m sure there are plenty of conservatives who are supporting Mitt Romney or Rick Perry or Michele Bachmann or (side eye) Herman Cain because they don’t like the president. Now, we can get into the myriad of reasons that they don’t like the president, but it makes no sense to do so since that’s not central to the point. Sometimes you just root for one side because you dislike the other side.
The sports world is littered with examples. Anyone see how many people were happy that the Yankees lost - not that the Tigers won, but that the Yankees lost? Teams with “storied traditions” (yawn) always have that negative following as well as the positive following. Notre Dame football, Duke basketball, the Cowboys, the Lakers…there are many sports fans who have that one team they can’t stand, and seeing that team lose makes their day (relatively speaking).
It’s not just about politics and sports, though. Let’s try something a little closer to home - and to the title of this here post: we’ve seen that one status or picture or link that just makes us say ‘ugh’. Save the Master P jokes. Shoot, that was how the idea of a dislike button got started in the first place. I don’t want to see guys with their shirts off in their profile pictures or see people with their middle fingers up holding a bottle of their favorite beverage. Maybe if people saw 38 dislikes and 3 likes they’d get the message. Maybe.
Dislike is fine, and it serves as the driving force behind our support of many of the things that we like. It has also driven technology: look at technological advances in entertainment. Remote control...don’t like getting up and walking to the TV to turn the channel. CDs/MP3s…who wants to rewind and fast forward cassettes - or even worse, flip over records and/or risk them scratching? Same thing with DVDs and videocassettes. Cellular (and other wireless) phones…who wants to deal with that never-quite-long-enough cord? Dislike - with the help of laziness - has helped us seize many technological advantages not available to previous generations.
I’m not saying that people should dislike things just for argument’s sake, and I’m definitely not saying that people should dislike each other. However, dislike is akin to most things: it can be quite useful when used in moderation.
I think your core point is not go along to get along, I agree and like that :-)
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