I spent a lot of my life being sure that my being kind and polite and gentle meant I’d never get anything done.  I wasn’t good at yelling or being pushy (things I’ve gotten better at over the years) but I’ve also found that honestly, you can get a fuck of a lot done with nice.

Not passively, quietly, endlessly agreeably nice, but firm, and polite, and calm and basically warm and empathetic.

I’ve had people who generally think my points of view are beyond the pale, totally unreasonable, actually listen to me and conceded points to me, just because I wasn’t yelling at them, and came at them gently and respectfully.

It’s not emotionally satisfying.  Frankly, it’s fucking exhausting to have to bite one’s tongue when dealing with oppressive bullshit, but over the years I’ve found this is the way I actually change viewpoints.

Not by yelling, not by making people defensive, but by being nice.

And it sucks.

It sucks that this is what we have to do to get the point across.

Having to police your own tone so they keep their ears open long enough to hear you fucking sucks, but I haven’t found anything else that works as well as this does.

I don’t think I’ve ever gotten anyone to listen to me with expressed rage, at least not anytime I wasn’t preaching to the choir, whipping up people who already agreed with me, which has its place, and its value, rallying the troops has value too.

But to win converts?  I find the only way is to bite back rage and be nice.  The fact that I have the emotional reserves to do this is something I’m grateful for.

There are times when catharsis is more important than getting heard.  I don’t think all the empathy and sweetness in the world would let me get through to a neo-nazi or an entrenched MRA, but the casual on the fence sexists?  The casual on the fence classists and whorephobes and racists?  Sometimes I can make them listen.