Realings

Oooh Kimmy… you’s in trooooouble.

You got excited at 5:12 ⬇︎ and exclaimed:

“I have the best advice for women in business. Get your fucking ass up and work. It seems like nobody wants to work these days…”

😬

Of course the Internet did it’s thang and vomited passive-aggression everywhere. Rightfully. It’s an obscene, awe-inspiring ridiculous that a comment like that came from Kim (or any Kardashian).

They may work hard to grow their wealth, but their retire-if-they-want-to mountain of de-risking seed money came from a purple-unicorn, one-in-a-billion bit of grace… by basically existing and doing what comes 😏ally. Almost no one in the reality (including most rich people) stumble onto their income stream(s) that easily.

And hard work for the rich is very different than for most. The rich have the *ultimate* privilege of being able to enter whatever business they want, when and how they choose. Doing what you want while controlling context is a special kind of awesome – one the vast majority will never experience. It makes working hard easier, natural and invigorating… even when shit happens. And if too much shit happens, the rich can safely wash their hands of it and move on – another luxury the vast majority also don’t *really* have.

Despite all that, though, she ain’t wrong: we are dealing with a legit, multi-layered motivation problem.

(Layer 1) Some people are just lazy. They don’t have goals or seek any higher purpose other than fulfilling their base needs. Not awesome, but not the whole story…

(Layer 2) We’ve spent decades smugly shitting all over lower-ranking, lower-paying, blue-collar jobs… which is LOTS of them. Dismissive, wildly disrespectful judgments are often made of those who do them as less-than… failures. Who wants to work (and work hard) at a job they’ll be spurned or insulted for having… especially when they can collect unemployment instead? GO CLASSISM GO! 👊💩

(Layer 3) Media saturates us with the baller ideal of living the good life while winning easily (which makes it the most winning). Sure the hard work has to be done, but that’s for other, less-magical people. Those drones handle the boring details while real winners focus on sexy big-picture stuff and tasting the best of everything (a lá Kardashian social media). If you’re not doing that, you’re not doing it right… which means most people (even fancy educated ones) aren’t doing it right. Not a 👌 mass-motivator, and as the girls emphasize at the end, not how most of success actually works.

(Layer 4) For the Kardashian+-level rich, more work has huge potential benefits – freeing amounts of money, global reach, exotic travel, great PR, elite connections and more. But at most levels, hard(er) work doesn’t offer anything close to that. The best you get’s occasional raises or promotions, which usually come with more work and time demands. If there’s little-to-no chance of making independent-wealth money, harder work’s usually more cost than benefit – free time’s more valuable.

(Layer 5) A lot of people don’t seem to wanna work these days because they’ve already worked way, way too hard.

For many, work’s all-consuming. Whether blue-collars doing 10+-hour shifts, gig workers constantly side-hustling or white-collar “elites” racking up 50+-hour/at-all-hours weeks, billions are basically living to work, do errands and give their soul’s sloppy seconds to friends, family and passions.

Telling someone already working at their limit to work harder isn’t just wrong… it’s dangerous. It stokes hopelessness and desperation in people already trying their best, fueling things from breakdowns and great resignations to revolutions and national collapses.

So, yeah – issues.

Playing live’s a feeling flood.

A self-strengthening rush.

Pulsing, breathing joy.

Bathing in warm vibrations of life.

Ultimate oneness with others.

An affirmation. Transcendent.

I give my energy to the crowd, they feel it, enrich it and amplify it back at me. I feed on it, play better and give more. I give more, they smile wider, dance harder and bring me beer. On and on it goes in beautiful feedback.

It’s raw, real… refreshingly dirty. Everyone in community, vibing, swimming in their visceral. An awesome kind of public intimacy.

Women exquisitely-prepared in their form-fitting best, perfumed by scents of concentrated girl. Gleams in their eyes, smirks on their lips, hips not lying as they move with my music… centered in their feminine.

Finally ripping my shirt off after soaking it through, a palpable hum of energy surges from the crowd. Daringly sexy glances shoot at me from around the room, objectifying me as I fucking love it. I’m my most-alive – centered in my musician and masculine.

No worry, no judgment… just release. The fun and feeling that fuel the best memories.

Poetry in motion.

We shouldn’t love drama. We know better…

… but secretly, we don’t care.

It’s emotional crack. A lightning bolt to our nerves that ignites our blood and rushes it… everywhere.

A dangerous, addictive hit that elevates our alive.

Separated from the source, we can see it… clear as day. Everything rational in our brain screams it’s bad for us – that we’re better-off without it. We can’t explain why we keep going. We know there are better alternatives… better ways.

… but re-exposed to drama, that fancy thought’s crushed by sheer sensation of stimulation. By the adrenaline spikes made of mystery, intrigue, uncertainty, struggle and hope that excite and override. FUCK does it feel.

Sure there are better options… but none as exciting. None as captivating.

Even if it’s bad, it’s emotional proof we’re alive. It might be hard, but better alive than just existing.

Of course, we never say it aloud. Not a great look.

Outwardly, we’re

🤔 🙄

… but inwardly,

😏 🙃

It’s been a helluva day.

You’re exhausted, work was 💩, you just realized you’ve immediately gotta do something you really don’t want to, your car’s making a sound you know’s not good… the world’s piling on. But then you come home, walk to the door…

… boom: excited borks, frenzied paw steps tapping inside…

Smile overcomes, inner warmth surges, anticipation spikes, you open the door…

… and there they are: goodest of doggos.

Your return sparks a manic joy so fierce it powers wags that shake their body to dance. They literally collapse-in on themselves in desperate efforts to be near you. They’ve missed you to the point of joygasm.

No judgment. No games. No bullshit. Just pure, real love.

You take a moment, wishing you could enjoy anything that much and basking in the refreshment of their presence. Suddenly, almost magically, your day’s better.

It’s so much good at once: soothing, gratifying, centering, enlivening.

You’re their world. Their sun, moon, stars and sky. Everything.

You’re their hooman.

You feel it most curled up with them at night. In your PJs, the day done, in that golden hour where you don’t have to do anything but be. Their head nuzzled in your lap, time standing still as you pet-n’-cuddle their eyes closed, when suddenly they exhale that dramatically-contented sigh letting you know all’s right in the world.

And in those moments, it is.

One of the worst parts of being a writer right now is having to constantly fight the attention span clock.

You have to be mindful of every second it takes for someone to read your material. The more you give to process, the less likely it’ll get processed. Potential distraction and boredom lurk in every moment.

Most of us writers have a lot to say – it’s a requirement of the gig. Not to mention that some of what we want to write about just isn’t simple enough to cover in 5-second-to-3-minute reads.

The things truly worth understanding take longer than that to explore. Nothing worth having or knowing comes easy.

But it is what it is, so we adapt.

… but this is one of the things that’s poisoning communication and shredding civilization. It’s a huge part of why we’re so on-edge and tribalistic.

If we can’t take the time to pay full, quality attention to something, we’re not going to meaningfully understand it. We’ll only get the bits & pieces soundbites, clipped video and other multi-second exposures reveal… which ain’t much, and ain’t enough.

Add to that we usually only pay attention to what fits with our narrow, feelings-charged worldview and our perspective gets even smaller.

What makes this attention-starved ignorance really dangerous, though, is that it’s coupled with an epidemic of over-confidence.

At the same time attention span and holistic understanding are at all-time lows, self-confidence in opinion and certainty of rightness are at all-time, nigh-narcissistic highs. Because feelings, regardless of the attention we haven’t paid or research we haven’t done, we somehow magically, emphatically believe ours is the right understanding – ultimate truth.

And it’s all capped with a passive-aggressive, faux-“tolerance” – “Look I’m totally open-minded and mature cuz I’m awesome… it’s just that ur wrong and stupid and ur thinking needs to change lol.”

😬

Yeah, no. Try again.

COVID’s a bitch. It’s fucked with our lives in gloriously horrible ways.

One of em’s the two philosophies that divide our already-tense world.

The First Philosophy:

Save lives and keep people healthy above all else. Any restrictions that do this are absolutely the compassionate, enlightened, right thing to do.

Yes, masks, lockdowns, financial strain, business failure, virtual schooling, remote work and vaccine mandates are all are big impositions that sum to a bigger sacrifice. But we owe it to the most vulnerable among us to do everything in our power to make sure they have the best possible chance of staying healthy and surviving. Everything else is repairable or replaceable… lives aren’t. Full-stop.

More than that, think about the pressure COVID’s putting on our hospital system. Nurses and docs are burning out at record rates. The last thing we need is to strain an already-strained system, or worse, run out of beds. So we do whatever we can to stop the spread.

And remember, pandemics are tricky. If we don’t take proper precautions, there’s the ever-looming possibility of COVID spiraling out of control. And that’s a world-stopper.

All that’s… pretty fucking inarguable. There’s no pain like the chronic sickness or death of a loved one. It’s a gaping, gushing, soul-level wound that stirs the worst and uncomfortably numbs. A height of suffering to be avoided whenever and however possible… well-worth some inconvenience. People are resilient – we’ll manage.

The Second Philosophy:

Masks, lockdowns, mandatory vaccinations, virtual schooling and other restrictions are well-intentioned overreactions that do more harm than they prevent. While every life lost is a tragedy, those lives have to be weighed against all of the damage and suffering these restrictions impose on all of humanity… and the latter outweighs the former.

…

Let’s break that down.

Masks force your own hot, stale, sometimes-stank breath back up your nose and against your cheeks… continuously shoving vented waste back in your face. This sucks, though it’s tolerable for a few minutes at a time, a few times a day. But for the many, many millions of people who have to keep masks on for hours at a time while working hard and/or having to be polite in the process, this is way more than a minor irritation. It’s a constant, grating frustration lumped on top of an already-demanding responsibility that makes everyday life materially-worse. Enduring this day-in and day-out over weeks/months/years is going to have an ongoingly cumulative, increasingly negative effect on anyone’s mental health – it’s mindfuck by a million paper cuts.

More than that, masks prevent us from seeing each others’ expressions. This sounds minor, but most of our real communication (including the best, most important parts) is non-verbal – done through body language and subtext. It’s what conveys emotion, intent and vibe – i.e. the feeling fuel of relationships. When you take away a person’s ability to see another’s face and force them six feet apart, you’re taking away a LOT – preventing communication and connection that could’ve otherwise happened. It saps something beautiful from life… something that makes it truly worth living.

Then there are the lockdowns. We’re inherently social creatures, so forcing distance and isolation on us is toxic. On top of that we’re already a connectively-stunted, distanced generation, so legally imposing more separation is basically like fire-hosing rocket fuel on a social dumpster fire.

Lockdowns have also financially devastated millions and destroyed hundreds of thousands of businesses. While it’s easy to say “money-is-replaceable-but-lives-aren’t” from a comfortable distance, the real, ground-level morality of this isn’t so simple.

Most people are living in debt, paycheck-to-paycheck. The next-largest group has maybe 1-2 months of savings. These two groups represent most of humanity.

So most people literally can’t afford lockdowns. They make getting life basics much harder (or impossible), drive them deeper into debt and result in all kinds of crushing anxiety and other thought-darkeners. If you can’t afford what you need to not suffer without having to constantly hustle and fear creditors, your life isn’t really your own – it’s a never-ending series of urgent obligations and looming disaster. Life like this isn’t an inconvenience – it’s misery.

Destroyed businesses are even worse. People who build their own businesses infuse huge parts of themselves… of their souls… into them. They eat, sleep and breathe them. These businesses are much more than a simple means of making money… they’re profoundly personal extensions of self. When they go under, the owners aren’t just losing livelihood, they’re losing purpose… part of their essence. Telling people who’ve gone out of business “that-sucks-but-don’t-worry-you-can-rebuild” is tone-deaf whitewashing of suffering and an epic missing of point – technically true, but realistically false.

Next there’s remote schooling. Expecting parents and children to peacefully coexist in-house, all day, while parents remote work/parent and kids remote school/kid isn’t just unreasonable… it’s savage. Brutal even. Not only is it a worse way of educating and socializing children, but a pressure-cooker of parents who can’t reasonably be expected to effectively work & parent simultaneously. The rules governing family and work/school life are very different from each other (and tend toward opposite)… expecting people to continuously switch between the two without a critical loss of attention quality is folly (and quality really matters here). Force-intermingling work and social life is rarely a good idea, but imposing it on parent-child relationships is poetic 💩.

Next are the vaccine mandates. Even if you agree that legally compelling vaccination is the right move now, it sets an amazingly dangerous power precedent. Humanity is reliably terrible at governing itself. We’re… not good with power. At all. We’ve shown relatively little responsibility, competency, accountability or maturity growth wielding it over our ~5,000 years of written history. Forcing people to get things injected into their bloodstream is a slippery slope. It WILL be abused in the future… and not for the greater good.

Finally there’s the utter lack of data we have on mRNA vaccines, because they’re a brand-new technology. Using newborn tech to interact with our genetic code… isn’t a great idea. Fun fact: it usually takes humans a few passes at new technology to really get it right… and making even one mistake with genes is potentially disastrous.

=========================================================

So, the real question:

Which philosophy creates less suffering?

It’s…

=========================================================
The ultimate pain caused by every single COVID sickness and death, multiplied by every COVID sickness and death on Earth,

*PLUS*

The severe strain on the hospital system and the ongoing danger of overflowing emergency rooms,

*PLUS*

The looming possibility of COVID spiraling out of control if we don’t take adequate measures to stop it.
=========================================================

VS.

=========================================================
The cumulative psychological effects of masks on the millions of people forced to keep them on under stressful conditions for hours at a time, days/weeks/months in a row,

*PLUS*

The sapped communication and millions of missed/ruined opportunities caused by masks and social distancing,

*PLUS*

The mental and emotional health damage done by forcing isolation on millions/billions of people,

*PLUS*

The financial strain/devastation/ruin of millions/billions of people,

*PLUS*

The financial AND personal devastation of the millions of people who lose their businesses,

*PLUS*

The decreased effectiveness and increased social isolation remote schooling imposes on millions of kids, at critical points of their development,

*PLUS*

The stress and psychological strain of forcing millions of parents to work & parent simultaneously (remembering that these are very different, mostly-opposite social sets),

*PLUS*

The dangerous precedent vaccine mandates set,

*PLUS*

The as-yet unknown effects mRNA vaccines will have on the millions/billions who will receive them (remembering that we’re not great with brand-new tech and that genetic manipulation has a razor-thin/basically-zero margin of error).
=========================================================

…

🤔

………………

😬

There’s one kind of intelligence that matters way more than any other.

The only one that’s deeply, consistently rewarded when displayed.

And no matter how much we love telling ourselves otherwise, it sure-as-shit’s not logical, technical, academic or any other high-mindedness.

Really, it’s social intelligence that drives just about everything. It’s the ultimate human currency – something to which money is incidental.

How we’re able to make people think and, way more importantly, feel, is paramount. It’s a prime mover that directly shapes reality. The other intelligences almost always only do this indirectly, and nowhere near as well. They’re supporting cast… distant runners-up.

That’s not to say they aren’t important. They are… vitally. Civilization would literally crumble and collapse without them (think Idiocracy)…

… but we’re at a strange crossroads in our evolution.

We get off on seeing ourselves as these super-advanced awesomes who greatly value intellectual curiosity, deep thought, hard work and other-orientation. And sure, we love the end results of all that noble stuff. We excitedly point to them and go “Wow! Look how badass we are… how amazing the human mind is!” We revel in just how much more sophisticated we are than all other life we know.

… But let’s be real: we love those end results, but we don’t love dealing with the tedious bulk of thought and detail that goes into producing them. Like, at all.

Actually, we tend to avoid it at all costs… whenever we can.

High-minded details bleed feeling from the moment. They aggressively disinterest people, often to the point of pained boredom. They may be necessary for getting shit done and making things better, but that’s life’s dirty work… not the good stuff people want. It’s what’s discussed when it has to be… not when there’s a choice.

… so displaying those intelligences rarely goes over well. Actually the opposite – it usually comes off as dry, boring, try-hard and a lack of ability to talk about anything better. It’s basically social poison.

The good stuff people want is what social intelligence does. It’s how we get them to want to be with and help us, regardless of what we can potentially do for them. It’s how we truly connect with others – how we choose our people.

It’s most true in our personal relationships. At our core we’re emotionally-driven beings who crave feeling and connection… things higher thinking is really bad at inspiring (and if anything diminish).

So without social intelligence a person’s… pretty fucked. If they can’t effectively understand what others want, appear confident, compellingly small-talk, read & use body language correctly, control their voice, touch the right ways, stoke the right feelings, know when to engage and when to pull back, stay emotionally-disciplined, drive narrative and otherwise guide the interaction – they’re gonna be real lonely. The best they’ll get is unreliable acquaintance, passionless friendship, professional contact and/or transactional relationship.

What’s really weird, though, is that it’s also true in the professional world… where it really shouldn’t be.

Not always, and not as often as in the social world, but a scary number of people are able to climb the competitive ladder relying primarily (if not entirely) on their social intelligence. How good they *actually* are at their jobs or how hard they *actually* work (not pretend to work) is incidental, if not irrelevant to their success.

It’s even true in the most technical/academic environments, where it really, really shouldn’t be. In his social epic “How to Win Friends and Influence People,” Dale Carnegie cites several studies concluding that even in such technical lines as engineering, only about 15% of one’s success is due to technical knowledge, while about 85% is due to skill in human engineering, to personality and the ability to lead people – i.e. social intelligence. My decade working in Silicon Valley has loudly echoed these findings.

On one hand, this is good.

Human civilization is the ultimate team sport, so knowing how to effectively understand, interact with and lead people is crucial. Awareness of human nature, relationships and politics is vital to knowing the difference between what’s possible, what’s probable, and what’s folly.

…but on the other, awkwardly-bigger hand, this is really, really bad.

Social intelligence is incidental to the other intelligences… which means it’s independent of them. It’s also incidental to morality. 😬 But the real kicker’s that the rules of social intelligence aren’t just different, but mostly opposite from the rules of the others.

Academic/technical/logical intelligences are driven by discipline, thinking, planning and results. Social intelligence is driven by fun, feelings, improvisation, perception and the moment.

… So the idea that the modern world is somehow a meritocracy where the best, brightest and most devoted consistently rise to the top to better-shape humanity is, at best, misguided. It happens sometimes, in better-case scenarios… but we wouldn’t be stuck in the same-shit-different-day loop we are if this was the rule (rather than the exception).

Things will improve when what and how we reward improves. And it makes sense to reward the intelligences we claim to value most.

Unfortunately right now what makes sense doesn’t win much.

What feels good wins.

We are endowed with a fucking magnificent separation of our rational from our emotional.

It’s why the space between what’s said and what’s done tends toward vast.

Why what we think and what we feel are so damn dissonant so often.

Why knowing something and understanding it are very different truths.

Why theory’s so pretty and reality’s so gritty.

Why so much of what’s on social media’s a steaming pile of regressive cumchuckle.

Why we’re forced to reconcile what people say against what they actually do to get to who they really are… and if what they’ve said is any sort of valid.

The brain/blood divide is our essence. What we need to understand before we can understand ourselves, others, and the way the world really works.

The Brain is what we think we are… at least, what we like to think we are. In reality it’s the crafted, optimized version of us we try to show everyone because it looks and sounds good. It’s what makes sense – the thoughtful, logical, mature stuff that should be said and done. It lives in potential and optimism, shaping the narratives we create (whether true or not). The Brain is our presentation – our personal marketing.

But The Blood is what we really are – where we really live. What happens in the moment when the brain’s overwhelmed by surges of instinct, ego, curiosity, arousal, passion, greed, tribalism, defiance, frustration, fear and all other sorts of primal. It’s our rough edges – the life-affirming illogic that feeds on feeling and fuels our impulses. What the heart uses to so easily bypass so much of that beautifully-crafted thought to get what it really wants. The Blood is our real-real, our deeper substance – our soul.

We are the ongoing collision of brain and blood – of thought and feeling, logic and emotion, sensible and fun.

It’s a fucking war zone… and in the war of what makes sense vs. what makes sensation, sensation usually wins.

Some examples –

Reason and Logic

Brain – Reason and logic are obviously the best way to go about things. If you just take time to research, think rationally and are fully honest with yourself you’ll figure out the best way to do things and distill truth. Blood – Ugh reason and logic are so boring. Yah they’re smart but there’s no excitement… no feeling. Feeling is meaning. Too much of life’s spent in a state of forced logic… so let’s only do that when we absolutely have to. Otherwise booooo…

Communication

Brain – If people communicated more and better a lot of the problems we have now wouldn’t exist. Full, clear communication is the key to building better relationships and a better world. Blood – Don’t volunteer too much – it shows over-eagerness and immaturity. It exposes and obligates you. Whomever volunteers less has more power – mind the gap. You can hide behind vague communication and change the narrative as you go to suit your shifting needs. Besides the important communication’s done with body language… not words.

Confidence

Brain – Confidence is superficial social presentation that can be (and often is) faked. Without backup it’s meaningless. If you really think about it the people who usually are the best at things are the ones always questioning if they’re good enough – since that’s the relentless kind of perfectionism that naturally creates the best at anything. Confidence is easy – delievering’s hard. Blood – Wow they seem so sure and strong. My feelings and gut instinct tell me they’re the real deal because they’re projecting certainty, so naturally I’m impressed by and believe them. Sure there are others that have better, proven track records, but they don’t come across as well, so yeah, no.

There’s a lot to be said for moving slowly… you just don’t hear it much.

We live in history’s fastest time – too fast. But on top of that (maybe because of it) it’s also the age of YOLO. Most of what’s shoved in our faces compels us to go faster and do more for fear of missing out.

But YOLO + FOMO = a whole lotta UH-OH.

Exhibit 1: The way shit generally is.

Always hard charging and getting shit done’s great on paper and looks cool from the outside, but actually living it’s pretty much the opposite. It’s demanding, stressful and draining. It puts the focus on getting to the next thing rather than being in the moment… which is isolating. It’s fine in short bursts, and can be good for getting shit done, but as a lifestyle it’s a psyche shredder. People going too fast and doing too much makes for general crankiness and life lived in physical, social and spiritual burnout.

On the other hand, going slowly’s awesome… in lots of ways.

It projects strength and control of one’s frame. Rather than having to be hyper-alert and constantly pivoting, you’re able to just relax and be in the moment. You’re focusing on the fun, purpose-oriented stuff – doing what you want to do, as you want to do it. You’re centered and cool, which puts others at ease and makes them want to be around and engage you.

And for good reason.

Engaging with over-busy, fast-moving people tends to be the opposite. They’re chronically distracted so you’re forced to compete with all of their other obligations for their time, energy and attention. Plus their focus tends to default to their business… which is cool for them but boring for you (and everyone else). They’re almost always stressed, either outwardly or inwardly. It’s a lower quality of interaction – you’re not getting their best, you’re getting their selfish, their leftover… their meh.

This is fine and can work if the fast-mover is just a means to an end (business partner, co-worker, gatekeeper, etc.) and all you’re doing is handling logistics and strategy. But it’s garbage for social connection and real enjoyment.

Think about it: most of our best memories are made when the world slows down and we’re living by feeling – unpressured, uninhibited, unburdened. Lying on a beach sipping Mai Tais, EDM concerts where you were felt reality breathe and temporarily achieved oneness, dates so good the rest of the world melts away, backyard BBQs playing cornhole and swimming, bottomless mimosas on Sunday Fundays, the kind of all-in sex where you feel each pulse of the other’s being.

…All the moments where you go “Aaaaaaah… fuck yes. This is it.”

Moving slowly also lets you think about and process things more. Instant exposure and reaction to everything isn’t a great life approach… as we’ve been aggressively learning over the last ~20 years. It’s the right move for certain things, sure… but really not for a whole bunch of others. Good reaction needs calibration, and calibration needs consideration.

Moving slowly rules – let’s value it more and do more of it. We’ll all feel better.

Emotional privilege is the greatest power on Earth.

It means being able to freely indulge your feelings in the moment – getting to fully react and emote to what’s shown, when it’s shown, without having to worry (or at least worry less) about how your reaction affects others.

In many relationships, especially the romantic and professional, someone has emotional privilege – a pre-existing right to be more reactive and less controlled than others. In romance it’s the more-pursued, and in business it’s the boss or investor.

This privilege is ultimate. It’s the difference between true freedom and self-restriction. It means not having to exert emotional discipline… which is arguably the hardest thing in human being. Having to control or suppress feelings you’re feeling in the moment, especially the really strong ones (like arousal, anger or loss), is brutal. It forces you to internalize uncertainty, frustration, stress and pain, rather than healthily venting them as they’re felt. It’s like swallowing acid.

And internalized feelings don’t just disappear once suppressed – they graft themselves onto psyches and become part of people. They directly and deeply shape emotional well-being and character (and, I think, even physical health). The more someone’s on the wrong end of emotional privilege, the more emotional acid they swallow and the more psychic poison they’re forced to carry.

With emotional privilege also (usually) comes privilege of reactivity. Instead of having to lead the interaction, the privileged get to simply react to what’s presented them. It means getting to make less effort while also being a kind of social judge, evaluating how they treat the presenter as they take in what’s said and what’s demonstrated. Having to lead an interaction is much harder and more demanding than simply reacting in one.

Emotional privilege and privilege of reactivity are the observable, ground-level revealers of real power – and the real definers of social inequality in action.