'You don't owe anyone anything'.
Caring is costly, but what is the cost of not caring?
Recently, while on the overground, there was a person walking through the carriage, begging for money. This happens a lot in London.
Observing people’s reactions never ceases to amaze me. Everyone looks away (except for me but not because I am a good person). Demonstratively so. I never understand. Someone is looking at them, speaking to them - and they intentionally stare the other way, pretending not to see or hear.
Disrespectfully, it looks embarrassing.
How about acknowledging the human being that is talking to us?
‘You don’t owe anyone anything’ is everywhere. When you speak to someone about relationships / family trouble / situationships / dating / strangers / social media behaviour - someone, sooner or later is going to say: ‘But you don’t owe anyone anything babe.’ You hear it on podcasts, you read it in Instagram captions, in books, in infographics and of course well - meaning conversations.
Platitudes are never a stand alone truth. Please remember that for every platitude you hear, the opposite is also true, depending on context.
’Never give up!’
’Go with the flow!’
’You don’t owe anyone anything!’
’Blood is thicker than water!’
’Everything happens for a reason!’
These are never ever universal truths. Ever. They are only true in specific circumstances and not true in others.
But this one stands out.
’You don’t owe anyone anything’ drives me mad. That we have normalised saying it, says a lot about where we are at.
’You don’t owe anyone anything’ - with my whole heart, I deeply disagree. Like, ‘I don’t owe it to you to look at you and say something while you beg me for money, I am just doing it out of the goodness of my heart.’
This is itchy.
No.
We do owe each other something.
We do owe each other respect.
We do owe each other humanity.
We do owe each other basic care.
We do owe each other the bare minimum.
What if we started using this phrase with more caution (or not at all) and would apply it more specifically, like, ‘You don’t owe person X this specific thing’ instead of making it a blanket statement that we toss at everything to avoid the effort of caring?
We do owe each other basic decency. Basic reasoning. Basic communication. Basic care. We owe each other humanity.
I don’t look at the person begging on the train or on the street because I am a good human being. I am not special or better than anyone. I don’t do it because I have the energy or bandwidth. I, also, am tired, want to travel in peace and zone out or focus on whatever is going on in my headphones. I look at them and give them money or say 'I am sorry I don’t have any cash’ purely because they deserve that. Because they are a human like me. They deserve to be acknowledged and answered to. They deserve to be heard and seen. Period. And there isn’t much that stands between me and this persons situation. This can happen to anyone of us.
I do it because yes, I owe them that.
In my eyes, ‘owing each other’ is basic care. It means respect. Looking out for someone, even if they are a stranger. It means to consider, for a moment, how someone else is feeling.
Even more so with people we know personally, no matter how briefly they are in our lives.
If we had a personal connection, it means we had an exchange of energy, that means we do owe each other even the smallest amount of emotional care.
‘You don’t owe anyone anything’ is often used as a free pass to avoid any accountability. To not have to consider the impact our action has on someone else. To not have to go through the effort of walking in the other persons shoes.
’You don’t owe anyone anything’ breaks my heart. What would the world be like if we didn’t look away? If we didn’t ghost each other? If we sent a simple, honest text, gave the care of an honest answer? What would the world be like if we acknowledged our universal connection? If we did one small thing to care for the heart of someone else? What if we cared, even when we don’t understand? What would life together look like if we acknowledged that our own wellbeing is linked to everyone else’s?
Last week I watched the Sylvester Stallone documentary on Netflix. It ended like most documentaries do: Realising that all of it didn’t really matter as much as you thought it would.
How ironic, that we have to reach all our goals, have our dreams fulfilled before we understand what really matters in life: our relationships.
How ironic, that when we get everything we ever wanted, we circle back to the thing that fame, money and success cannot give us: love.
’You don’t owe anyone anything’ is cheap.
Caring costs us something.
And eventually, we all discover that caring was the only thing that really mattered. Hopefully it won't be to late when we do.
Screenshot from ‘Sly’ on Netflix.
As always, on point. I wonder, Nadia, if you have ever come across the philosopher Thomas Scanlon? I can only admit to knowing his work via a TV show I love called The Good Place, which I loved because it leant into so much philosophy, and he literally has a book called What We Owe To Each Other! I haven’t read it but it’s back in my periphery having read this blog tonight. Because we do, of course we do.
Like you, I believe the bare basics we owe to each other is common courtesy, humanity. Acknowledgment even, how very very basic a thing to offer. Yet not always given.
I do also wonder if the people who avoid those needing help with outstretched arms are aware how much shame they are holding about it. It’s shame that makes us look away, look at the ground. Shame makes us avoid. It’s a collective shame that we even have homeless people at all! Right? So when people are on their way to work feeling pissed off that their coffee is cold or they argued with the partner, and they are confronted with something so incredibly shameful on behalf of all of us, a real person in need, they literally can’t cope with all the shame and just look away. The irony/tragedy is this then doubles down on shame. Because nobody with humanity feels good about ignoring another human. And obviously I’m not remotely saying this is an excuse, more of a possible contributing roadblock to what feels to many of us like basic humanity. Until the world is able to look at its shame in the eye, everything that triggers it will feel even more shameful and even more of a thing to avoid looking at. Perhaps.
The other irony is that feeling ashamed or guilty that you have more or should do more can be helped by literally doing more. “I feel bad about this’ can be rectified with action. To show kindness and compassion and give to those in need would elevate people from these feelings of guilt and shame. But to avoid and sink into shame, is so much more toxic to the person doing it. Because toxic shame is not ‘I feel bad’, shame is ‘I AM BAD’. And that, I believe, is what people cannot face in these fleeting moments.
Which is (somewhat ironically again...) such a shame. 💔
Yes! Yes! Yes! We owe one another basic decency for goodness sake. I’m so grateful you wrote about this because it’s becoming a growing trend. The world is already cold enough as it is so we really could use some warmth. We should do better really.