Michelle Obama’s dignified restraint: “When they go low, we go high” are words to live by

[applegrove]

Michelle Obama’s dignified restraint: “When they go low, we go high” are words to live by

by Mary Elizabeth Williams at Salon

http://www.salon.com/2016/07/26/michelle_obamas_dignified_restraint_when_they_go_low_we_go_high_are_words_to_live_by/

"SNIP.............


And most pointedly, in a message that ought to be familiar to anyone who’s ever been or had a loving parent, she spoke of how she and Barack tell their daughters, “When someone is cruel or acts like a bully, you don’t stoop to their level. No, our motto is, when they go low, we go high.”

The high road often feels like the world’s roughest and least well-trafficked one. It also, it must be said, often feels like one that women and minorities are expected to travel far more than others. Watching Mrs. Obama Monday night, I was reminded of Jesse Williams’ BET Humanitarian Award speech last month, when he pointed out that “The burden of the brutalized is not to comfort the bystander. That’s not our job.” But what Michelle Obama was speaking to was the difficult, important, invisible work of not escalating the fear and divisiveness, of not becoming the things we despise. And you don’t have to be running for President of the United States of America to take that message to heart.

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It’s sometimes even satisfying, that feeling of besting somebody, of getting in the last word. But. It will almost never, ever change anybody’s mind. It will almost never, ever make the world a better place. It’s a short-term adrenaline hit of drama. Unlike actual useful dialogue, it’s hollow and ultimately degrading.

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But what if, trolls, you had to accept that the grace and class of Michelle Obama is real? What if behaving like an adult was really just being honest, and these public temper tantrums we’ve been watching play out in front of us were recognized as the poor impulse control they are? What if all of us remembered Michelle Obama’s words the next time we’re provoked? What if high was as true as low? That’s the person I want to be. And that’s the America I want to live in.

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[Bluzmann57]

1. Words to live by.

My mom and dad told us that a lot when we were growing up. Easier said than done.

[applegrove]

2. My grandmother was a pro at that. She was unflappably kind. And a flapper too

come to think of it.