All we need is another buzz term – that was my initial response to this article:
https://www.wsj.com/articles/tired-of-being-told-cheer-up-the-problem-of-toxic-positivity-11635858001?st=y0ud3q4z09rme0i&mod=pcktm_1221&utm_campaign=pockethits&utm_medium=email&utm_source=pocket
Initial reaction, which was immediate:
I hate to see “toxic positivity” accepted because it reminds me of other buzz things, such as “toxic masculinity” and “gaslighting.” They could at least have come up with something that doesn’t sound immediately like a buzz word. Why my strong reaction? Because as soon as a term is coined and accepted, all the specificity and power goes out of it. The meaning gets all thinned and washed out, or broadened and flattened out, and people don’t really think before they use it. They throw these words at each other, like monkeys throwing poop, and they react like Pavlovian Pups, or people driven by the alligator/crocodile/squirrel or even monkey brain.
But first let’s hear from this guy:
“David Kessler, a grief expert and the author of six books about grief.” We always need those experts, particularly ones who have written six or more books. The article has three such experts – probably the standard guideline for a piece like this. You got the grief expert, then Dr. Dattilo, a clinical psychologist who is being considered for a new Marvell character (I made that up). Dr. Datillo offers the Whack-A-Mole theory of emotional circuitry, which isn’t too bad a concept but perhaps not the best described. Then there’s the psychologist who yaks about gaslighting, but who also says something interesting: “Those emotions are rooted in reality, while toxic positivity is a denial of it.” That’s a good point. I mean what is reality anyway? But still – toxic positivity? That kind of assumes that everybody trying to help you with positive bullshit is out to get you.
Heck, *most* people are ignorant of reality. I hear the monks at the Tibetan Buddhist monasteries get on YouTube occasionally and just laugh their asses off at how divorced from reality the ordinary moron is.
Finally, I thought of people who just flipped out when the pandemic hit: theirs was the opposite of “toxic positivity.” I call it toxic negativity. And I am working on my book!
Tim Bryant – Good day!
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The Everlasting Now 
I suspect that every word starts out as a creative and poetic metaphorical expression, but when it gets used a lot it takes on a mundane meaning and people no longer think about or remember its original sense. Take the word “consider”, for example. It comes from the Latin words “con”, which means together, and “sider” meaning “the stars”, and the later is where we get the word “sidereal”. So somewhere way back in time somebody used the word “consideration” to mean something like “together or in harmony with the stars or the heavens.” Now we just throw the word around without relating to the stars or the heavens at all. In my long life I have heard these words pop up, and the next thing you know you hear it every time you turn on the TV or hang around educated people at a party. I recall in the 70’s people started talking about the “centerpiece” of the President’s program. That word is still hanging around but not as relentlessly knocked back and forth. These days I hear the word “nonbinary” a lot.
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That’s realy interesting. I looked up sidereal on Merriam-Webster’s. Well, I had two objections to the idea of toxic positivity: (1) the psychologist is saying just about anyone who says it’ll all be O.K. with regard to horrible grief is a monster who is gaslighting you, making you doubt your own reality, when the odds are these people are simply ignorant of your feelings adn they mean well. (2) we just don’t need more crap terms that may or may not be of any use, either initially or ever. 🙂 Thanks, Jack!
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