I think we have preconditioned ourselves to gossip. We love gossip magazines, scoop on the stars, talk shows, current event articles, fake news... you name it, people consume it. So it really wouldn't be that much of a stretch for folks to not think twice about telling friends/neighbors/family about whatever juicy bits of news they'd heard about a fellow friend/neighbor/family. It's like no filter is applied on what goes in the ears and out the mouth.
I don't care much for gossip. I am semi-private and if I do make a bit of news public, I figure I'd better not say it unless I fully do not mind it being spread to all ends of the earth. So, when someone puts words in my mouth that are not my own for the sake of ramping up the salacious nature of the juicy tidbit—swearing that I said them—I think it is understandable that I'd get a little angry about it.
Understatement of the century.
I decided I'd better not write about gossip until I'd cooled off enough to limit the bombardment of swearing on my blog. Now that I am several days departed from it, I've had time to think about my next course of action. Calm down. I'm not going to hunt this person down. I know I have a history of chasing egging kids and swearing at them, but I decided it wasn't warranted... this time.
The next time someone gossips ask yourself a question:
What am I going to do about it?
Not kidding. What are you going to do about it? So your neighbor just drank herself into a stupor, got a DUI, and is now in rehab. Everyone is talking about it and she's LITERALLY the go to topic of everyone you know. What are you going to do about it? Are you going to take her flowers? Are you going to visit her in rehab? Be a support to her kids? Take meals to her family? If not, guess what...
It's none of your damn business.
Think about it, what if we took gossip and did good with it? Instead of being the one to pass it along with your own twist to make it more sensational and actually helped the person in question? I had a gal tell me that so-in-so's kid just dropped off the deep end. She gave me this very knowing look as if she'd known this kid since cub scouts and was just waiting for him to massively screw up. What are you going to do about it? Give the mom a hug? Be a non-judgemental shoulder to cry on? Make sure you smile at the kid and be kind every chance you get? If not...
It's none of your damn business.
Recently I got mixed up in another person's divorce. I became a sounding board as she tried to make sense of it all and regain the footing that had been yanked out from under her. She was trying, hard, to rebuild what had been broken. Divorce is a harsh place to be, for all involved. The entire ordeal was none of my business. Until I had text come in from another gal with the words "Everyone is judging her, she has to know that..."
Um... first of all, not everyone is judging her and second of all... IT'S NONE OF YOUR DAMN BUSINESS!!! Before I got really steamed over the text, I had to ask myself: What am I going to do about it?
Gossip is painful, unkind, damaging, and is flat out bad manners.
What are you going to do about it?
Be the good. Act.
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