When Do Crips Feel Schadenfreude?

When bad things happen to bad people.

Alex Dobrenko`(@alex dobrenko) inspired this post with this post:

let's talk about schadenfreude, let's talk about competition in youth, let's talk about being an average joe and all the bad things that may be

Schadenfreude

Schadenfreude has been one of my favorite words since I learned it long ago. It’s not something that often comes up in usual conversation. Alex asked this in his post:

        I want to talk about how fucking weird schadenfreude is and what I’m learning about why it exists, and also if you guys get schadenfreude, and if so, what is it about?

I looked up schadenfreude in a couple of places to see the “official” definition, but I kind of like this one:

Wikipedia defines Schadenfreude as Schadenfreude (/ˈʃɑːdənfrɔɪdə/; German: [ˈʃaːdn̩ˌfʁɔʏ̯də] ⓘ; lit.Tooltip literal translation 'harm-joy') is the experience of pleasure, joy, or self-satisfaction that comes from learning of or witnessing the troubles, failures, or humiliation of another. It is a borrowed word from German, with no direct translation, that originated in the 18th century.

The Wiki entry says that schadenfreude has been noted in children as young as 24 months old. This surprised me until I thought of how even little kids will laugh at seeing someone trip and fall — on a banana peel, for example — which could be characterized as schadenfreude. And so, it begins…

photo from Unsplash

I feel schadenfreude in spades. Daily, triggered by the multiple legal problems befalling our former orange president, I am feeling hope and joy. I have been waiting for shit to come down on him since before he got elected. Talk about schadenfreude-interruptus!

Schadenfreude also rears its head when I hear about bad things happening to people who have screwed me over. If it is something like a cancer diagnosis, that is beyond the pale. But if it is a firing, or they get caught with their hand in the cookie jar – schadenfreude me, baby!

Alex talks about jealousy of others’ success, triggering schadenfreude for him. That only happens to me when someone I know is successful but incompetent or taking credit for others’ work. Or if they are a hack. Or a jerk. Or their mama dresses them funny.

I used to have a boss who always took my ideas as her own. I would say, “What if we did x, y, and z?” Minutes later, she would come into my office and say, “I just had an idea! What if we did x and y and z?” She wouldn’t even rearrange the fucking letters!

One time, after many instances of this scenario, I said, “I literally just said that to you in your office fifteen minutes ago.”

“Huh?”

My underlying trigger is that I despise hypocrisy and dishonesty. Hypocrisy is my Kryptonite. (More about that in a future post.)

All of the instances of people and organizations being hypocritical about including people with disabilities in their DEI (“diversity, equity, and inclusion”) programs (for example)—there aren’t enough banana peels in the world to satisfy my desire for schadenfreude at their expense.

photo from Unsplash

I will write more reflections on Alex’s post; too many thoughts for me to sort through in one Reality Check…