The Paradox of Character Assassination
If you’ve ever been the victim of character assassination, then you’re probably aware (whether you’ve realized it or not) of what I’d call the grand paradox of character, and of character assassination itself…which is this:
When someone attacks our character, our initial response is often to defend ourselves by counter-attack. To try and invalidate the person attacking us. To point our fingers at the accuser, and to ‘enlighten’ those around us to their deception.
The paradox is…displaying true character is often about what we don’t do.
It is about restraint. It is about ignoring our impulse to lash out and fight back. It is about recognizing the futility of the counter-attack…and refusing to bring even a shred of credibility to those who act without character, by acknowledging their actions.
You know…all those things that all of our elected ‘leaders’ seem to do. Never. Ever. Ever. But I digress…
It is about realizing that often the very best display of our character is not to act swiftly in our own defense, but to not act at all.
Some call it ‘taking the high road’.
You know what I call it?
Ignoring the sick feeling in the pit of my stomach that makes me want to shout from the mountaintops about a person that is constantly cruel, unreasonable, divinely hypocritical and utterly devoid of character, and to expose them to the world in the hope that the transparency of their actions might somehow shame them into decency…only to realize that shining a light on this person doesn’t force a revelation of character, but merely causes them to scatter like a cockroach exposed to that very light.
Or something like that.
Today I must realize that when a person attacks my character, it is more revealing of their own character, than of mine.
Today I must ask for the strength to refrain. Today I must try to remind myself that character is often what we do when no one is watching.
And today I will again realize that small and impressionable minds… are always watching.
But damn it’s hard.
It’s so–damn–hard.
Perhaps I’ll just engage in what I might think is some clever rhetoric. Maybe blog a little.
But then I wonder…am I still taking that high road?
